Episode 194

full
Published on:

7th Jul 2025

EAP 194: Strategic, Seen, and Scaling – Michael Morgan’s Guide to Intentional Career Growth

In this episode of the Early Accountability Podcast, host Kimi Walker sits down with Michael Morgan, financial educator and passionate advocate for economic empowerment. Michael shares his journey into the world of financial literacy, highlighting how his early experiences shaped his drive to teach others about smart money management. He and Kimi dive into practical tools for achieving financial wellness, including the importance of budgeting, understanding credit, and building long-term wealth through intentional habits.

Throughout the conversation, Michael emphasizes the power of mindset in transforming financial futures, especially within underserved communities. He offers motivational insight into how individuals can start small, stay consistent, and gradually take control of their financial story. Listeners will walk away with not only strategies but a renewed belief in their ability to create lasting change—financially and personally.

Topics Covered in This Episode:

  • The importance of financial literacy and early money lessons
  • How mindset shapes your financial habits and future
  • Strategies for building credit and budgeting effectively
  • Tips for staying consistent with financial goals
  • Empowering underserved communities through education
  • Turning financial setbacks into long-term growth opportunities

About Michael Morgan

In the vibrant city of Austin, Texas, lives Michael Morgan, a dynamic leader whose journey from corporate boardrooms to bestselling author is rooted in purpose and perseverance. With a BS from Penn State University and an MBA from Carnegie Mellon, Michael carved out a successful career in some of the world’s most influential companies, including Amazon, Chevron, J.P. Morgan Chase, and Walmart. But behind the titles and promotions lies a deeper calling: to empower others to reach their full potential through the power of intentional connection.

Throughout his professional journey, Michael faced the challenges of navigating multiple industries and career transitions while maintaining a strong sense of identity and mission. Rather than keeping his hard-earned lessons to himself, he transformed them into a message of growth and possibility. His acclaimed book, The Power of Networking, is more than a guide; it is a movement that has earned global recognition and inspired countless professionals to lead with authenticity and purpose.

Today, Michael is making waves as a motivational speaker and educator, using his story to remind others that with the right mindset, strategy, and support, anything is achievable. His work is grounded in the belief that meaningful relationships open doors and that success should be shared.

Connect with Michael Morgan

Connect with Kimi:

Transcript
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Kimi Walker here and welcome back to the next episode of the

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Early Accountability Podcast.

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Very excited to introduce our guest for today.

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We have Michael Morgan.

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He is a concierge who's going to just tell us all of his experience and

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expertise when it comes to networking and making strides in your career.

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He is the author of The Power of Networking, and he's going to come and

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share with us his over 15 years of.

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Experience in the corporate world and he's gonna talk to us about

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some of the amazing things that he's done and some of the strides and

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pivots that he's made in his career.

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And how we can do the same.

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How we can leverage partnerships or colleagues connections and just what

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that would look like in this kind of current state and Michael, thank

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you so much for being on the show.

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Why don't you first just introduce yourself to the audience, tell

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us a little bit about who you are and how you got to where you were

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doing what you're doing today.

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Being an author, being a speaker.

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Absolutely.

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First off, thank you for having me as a guest on your show, Kimi.

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It's a pleasure to be here.

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With that being said, just a little bit about myself.

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So I have an interesting career journey.

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I am originally from New York.

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I went to Penn State as an undergrad after Penn State, I

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worked for JP Morgan in Delaware.

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I worked in investment banking, private banking, and

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corporate technology and risk.

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I ended up leaving JP Morgan to go pursue my MBA at Carnegie Mellon University.

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After I graduated from Carnegie Mellon, I pivoted to oil and gas.

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I moved to Houston, Texas where I worked for Chevron in

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procurement and supply chain roles.

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I ended up leaving oil and gas and pivoting to tech.

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So I moved from Houston, Texas to Seattle, Washington.

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I worked for Amazon for four years in a combination of vendor management and

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program management roles across AWS Amazon business and the retail side.

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I left Amazon and moved to the Bay in California to work for Walmart in program

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management on their e-commerce space.

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And today I have pivoted again, I work in cybersecurity.

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I work for a startup called Netskope.

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My role is fully remote and I am based out of Austin, Texas.

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So been a few different places, different roles, different

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industries and throughout my journey.

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People have been reaching out to me with questions on why did

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I pursue my graduate degree?

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How was I able to pivot from different industries, how I was able to pivot

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different functions how I was able to move up in my career, get promoted, how I

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was able to transition from an individual contributor to a people manager.

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So after 15, 20 years of people in my network reaching out to me

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for tips, advice, people in my Network's network reaching out to me.

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Strangers just reaching out to me on LinkedIn that were impressed, my

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profile I figured I had a wealth of knowledge that people were looking for.

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I decided to write a book, and that's when I wrote the power of networking.

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And now that I'm a published author, I've started my journey

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as a motivational speaker as well.

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I speak at conferences, at universities, organizations, companies.

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So balancing the two between working full-time at Netskope

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and being a motivational speaker.

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But that's my career.

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That's how it's all culminated today.

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Okay, great.

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I have a question like off top.

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Here, like in early accountability, we talk about people who were in the early

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stages of a new endeavor, whether it's.

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Personal or professional?

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What would you recommend for someone who, you've done a lot of like

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you've done moves, whether it was in your career, but even location

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wise too, which can be like huge.

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If someone's thinking like, Hey, I'm tired of this burnt out, or I

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want a new position, or I want to be in a completely different sector.

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What do you recommend for those early stages of okay, I think, I

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need to move or I need to pivot, I need to do something different.

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What are some things when you say of, okay, you're looking and going in a

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different direction, like a different career path, a different occupation,

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what are some things that you recommend.

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First and foremost, I'd say make a plan.

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I've talked to a lot of people who were ready for a change, and when I asked them

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What exactly do you want to wanna do, what company you wanna work for, what function?

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They just said, oh, I'll work for any company.

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I'll do anything.

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And at that point you're throwing out too wide of a net.

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Be more specific.

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Know exactly what you wanna do.

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It's okay if you don't know, but take the time to figure it out.

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As an example, when I was in oil and gas, I made the decision

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that I wanted to work in tech.

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I know there was a ton of tech opportunities on the West

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coast, I said, I'm going to work in tech on the west coast.

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I had a top five list.

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I was looking at Amazon, Google, apple, PayPal, Salesforce,

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those are my top five companies.

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I knew the location I wanted to go.

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I noted the function I wanted to do, and that's where I focused my efforts.

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But if I was going to say, Hey, I'll work in, I'll work in finance,

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I'll work in supply chain, I'll work in marketing, I'll live anywhere.

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At that point your net is so wide that you're not going to get anything.

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I'd say first and foremost, have a plan.

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Secondly, if you are pivoting and you don't have the knowledge, the

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skillset, take the appropriate classes, take the trainings, take

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the certifications, read the books.

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What I tell people all the time, you have a set of transferable skills.

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Wherever I go, whatever company, whatever industry.

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I have leadership skills, I have analytical skills, I

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have communication skills.

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Those are going to go with me wherever I go.

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But there are ways that I can get up to speed when I join a new

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industry or join a new company.

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When I joined Chevron, I'd never worked in oil and gas before.

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I read two books.

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I read one book called The Prize and one book called The Quest.

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These taught me the history of the oil and gas industry, so

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that helped me get up to speed.

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Now that I'm joining a brand new industry.

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And then when I lived in Houston, I joined the Texas Young Professionals.

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I joined the American Association of Blacks and Energy, and I joined

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the Young Professionals Energy.

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Now I'm joining organizations where I can meet other individuals in

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the same industry as me that I can learn from and I can grow from.

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And when I joined Chevron, I identified mentors, people who had been at Chevron

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for 10, 20 years, people who had been in oil and gas for 10, 20 years.

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And now I'm learning from them.

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I'm growing from them.

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The combination of taking specific trainings to get up to speed,

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certifications getting mentors, attending conferences like these are all ways that

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you can get up to speed so that you can add value when you're making a transition.

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I'd say first and foremost, you need a plan of where you wanna

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go and why you wanna do it.

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But once you have that plan, you need to take the appropriate steps to get

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up to speed so you have the skillset and the acumen so you can join that

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company, join that industry, join that function, and be able to add

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value and hit the ground running.

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Okay.

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And you bring up a good point too.

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Like bringing value.

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Adding value.

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Let's talk about like maybe, the other end of the spectrum, per se.

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Let's somebody who's oh, this is great.

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I'm in the field.

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At least I wanna be, or the occupation or what have you.

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But I wanna see more growth.

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I want to see me like not taking jobs that are just like a lateral move.

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I want to move up, like I want to go up in more leadership roles.

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What are some kind of tips for doing that?

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Or if they feel like they've been here for a while and not been

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seen I'm working really hard, I'm doing all these things, or.

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I know in business I'm bringing all this extra money in for the company.

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I've heard people like brought in, like I've seen stories of people write

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in like a million, $2 million and they got like a $500 gift card or a

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$50 gift card or something like that.

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And you're like, wait, what?

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And I'm not in that field.

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I'm not in corporate, that kind of corporate.

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I'm like, I can't believe it.

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You.

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I'm like, I'd be like, I'm gone.

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I can, if I can do this, I know there's more to it.

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What do you say?

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How can people, someone who's this is where I'm at, or this is the company.

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Either it's the company or the field that I wanna go in, but I do wanna see me

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going up, I do wanna get more leadership.

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What are ways that they can proactively increase their visibility within

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their organization or industry?

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Without I guess taking on too much and like being strategic about it.

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Oh, I'll just take on a whole bunch of things.

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Let, lemme take on a whole bunch of roles that I'm not getting, documentation for.

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How do you recommend the steps for that kind of strategic scaling?

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I'd say a few things.

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First and foremost, you need a network.

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I treat networking as part of my job.

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Yes I meet with my manager on a regular basis, on a weekly cadence.

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I'm also meeting with my skip level, my manager's manager,

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I'm meeting with them regularly.

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I'm meeting with.

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Multiple people within senior leadership within the organization.

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So ultimately, when it comes down to the decision of promoting an individual, it's

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not a decision that one person makes.

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It's a coalition of leadership that are sitting in a room and your

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manager is your biggest advocate.

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But there are situations where your manager may not even be in the room.

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I've been a part of organizations where there's.

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An organization of 400 people, and there's 10 or 10 or 20 people sitting

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in a room ranking them on a scale of one to five or 10 or 20 people sitting in a

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room making a decision of who's getting promoted and who's not getting promoted.

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If your manager's not in the room and the people who are in the room

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don't know who you are, don't know the value you're bringing, don't know your

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aspirations to move up, it's going to be detrimental to you regardless

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of the work that you're doing and the performance that you're providing.

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You have to identify who the key players are and make sure you're building

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those relationships with them, and make sure that they're aware of the value

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that you're bringing to the table.

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Make sure you're documenting, like you said people that have

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generated extra million dollars, $2 million to the business.

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Have that documented, show the value that you're bringing and make

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sure that they're aware of your aspirations to get to that next level.

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I'd say first and foremost, networking is critical.

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I'd say the second piece, most companies have what's called a leveling guide.

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If your company doesn't have a leveling guide, talk to hr, talk to your boss

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and make sure that it is put together, but a leveling guide essentially.

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Every company has employees at different levels.

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So you can have level one, level two, level three, level four,

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and based off your level we'll dictate what your title is.

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We'll dictate what your pay is, and there should be a leveling guy that says at

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level one, the expectation is an employee.

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That's level one should be doing X, Y, and Z.

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At level two, the expectation is to be doing A, B, C. Level

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three should be doing DE.

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F. If I'm a level one and I have the data and documentation to show that I'm

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already performing at level two, that's justification for me to go to leadership

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and saying, I'm going above and beyond my job based off the leveling guides.

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I'm doing the work of someone that is above me.

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I should be promoted to this level, and here's my justification for why.

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Leaders are not promoting people based off of, potential they're

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promoting you based off the fact you're already performing at that level.

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So really having the data

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. exactly.

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If you can show that you're performing above your level based off the company's

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leveling guides, that is justification that you should move to the next level.

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Okay.

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I know you talk about like the power of networking.

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You and just a lot of things that you posted, you talk a lot about like

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internal and external networking.

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And like I was telling you too, like I know I've been at conferences and

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I've gotten cards and I'm like, dang, I did not follow up these people.

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And some of these people were like.

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Really had a great connection.

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Do you have any tips for like external partnerships or jv, things like that?

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Like how do you stay on top of that and same thing, keep that visibility

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or that consistency or have some kind of like operations, how you do that.

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What do you recommend with that?

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'cause you've done a lot of things.

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You've traveled a lot, so I know you've had to get out and be like meet.

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New people in your community, what do you recommend with those type of things?

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So I'd say a few things.

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One, leverage technology, leverage social media.

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I love, I'm a big fan of LinkedIn, what I recommend to people.

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A lot of people will in your example, you said, going to conferences, a

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lot of people go to conferences.

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They'll hand out business cards, they'll pull out their phone, scan

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LinkedIn, and then just move on and never follow up with the person.

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I'm making an effort to make sure that I'm regularly following up with

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individuals on a regular cadence, and everyone is, I treat differently.

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So there's some people I speak to weekly, some people monthly, some quarterly.

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But I'm trying to find opportunities where I can regularly connect with people.

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So if I see someone in my network has started a new job or just received a

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new certification or just got married, there's some reason to celebrate.

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I can easily.

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Click, like on their post or I can put a comment on their post.

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I look at it as an opportunity to connect with them either face to face or over

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the phone or over Google Meet or Zoom.

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So I'll send them a message saying, Hey, congratulations.

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I see you just started a new job.

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I know we haven't talked in the last six months.

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I'd love to catch up.

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Let me know if you have 30 minutes of free time where we can connect.

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I leverage LinkedIn, but I'm eventually getting people off of LinkedIn and picking

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up the phone or setting up Zoom calls.

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So I like to leverage it, but I'm finding ways to connect with people one-on-one.

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And like I said, technology's great.

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Everyone is not located in Austin, so I can't meet with everyone face to face.

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So I'm using my phone and I'm leveraging technology and zoom in different channels.

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But whenever I can, I'm trying to meet with people face to face.

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So my network that I have in Austin I'm making the effort to regularly go out

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and meet with individuals for people that don't live in the same city as me.

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I love to travel.

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I travel for work.

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I travel for fun.

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My company headquarters is in the Bay.

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I usually travel out there for work once a quarter when I travel, I

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know people that live in the bay.

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I may travel for work.

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I may travel a day early or two days early, and then I'll reach

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out to other people that I know that live in the Bay Area and say,

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Hey, I'd love to connect with you.

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I'm here for work.

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Do you have free time to grab coffee?

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Do you have time for lunch?

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Do you have time for dinner?

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If I travel to Chicago for fun, I may reach out to people in

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my network in Chicago and say, Hey, I'm here for the weekend.

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I'm here for this, I have some free time.

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Are you free for breakfast?

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Are you free for lunch?

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So I'm always trying to find opportunities to meet with people face to face,

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even if they live in different cities.

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Because I love to travel generally, I'm probably showing up in someone

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city that I know, and that's my opportunity to connect with them.

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Funny enough, there are people who don't live in the same city as me and tell me.

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They see me more than people that they know that live in that

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city, but I'm making the effort.

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I could easily just travel different places and just focus on work when I'm

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there, or just focus on, me having fun and enjoying my vacation, but I'm building in

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my networking while I'm traveling as well.

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Okay, so I guess a couple things.

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So I talk a lot too on the show about just like wellness 'cause

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it's kinda like really bullying.

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Whatever domain of wellness, right?

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And career is a big one, right?

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Our career what we're doing with that, what that looks like for us.

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How do.

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Especially someone who's you may have been ingrained to be like a

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hard worker and you're trying to always trying to rise or climb.

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There's some people who are on that, I wanna go upward, trajectory.

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I wanna move, I wanna climb in some kind of way, shape, or form.

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What are ways that people can keep like a balance, like work

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life balance and I'm just not.

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A hundred percent consumed with my job where, my family, my significant

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other, and my kids, other obligations that I have in my life don't suffer

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and I still am able to be visible or network or, climb this ladder.

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What are some things that people can do to, basically keep a balance

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where it's just not, okay, I do this was a upward, but now everything

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else is crashed and burned.

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Yeah, absolutely.

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It's a fantastic question.

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I'm in the same situation.

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A few things.

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One, I just got married four months ago.

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I'm all about having a happy marriage, so I wanna make time for my wife.

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We're talking about starting a family.

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So I'm big on work life balance.

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There are things that I enjoy doing outside of work that I

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wanna make sure I continue to do.

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So I'm, and I've seen a lot of people in my career burnout and

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I definitely do not want that.

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So for one.

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Organization is key for me.

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I keep a calendar like one of the things that I like to do every day.

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I like to work out.

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I've blocked out my calendar every morning.

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I hit the gym between six and seven.

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I come home, shower, get dressed.

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I hit work by eight.

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That way I'm making sure it's something that I want to do.

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It's blocked out in my calendar.

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By six o'clock.

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My wife usually gets home from her job at six o'clock.

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Between six and nine.

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I usually block that out.

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That's time for us to spend with each other, and that way she's not coming

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home and she's sitting in one room and I'm working in another room and we

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don't see each other and don't spend any time with each other the whole day.

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Usually my wife, she's a early sleeper.

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I'm the night owl, so I know that she goes to sleep by nine.

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If I still have work to do, I may jump back on a computer and do work from

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nine to 11, nine to 12, but that's not interrupting my time with my wife.

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That's when she's sleeping, and I can do more work.

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And then I also recommend have the conversations with your boss.

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If I've been in situations, and this is before I would, I got married,

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but I've been in situations where I would work around the clock.

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I would start my workday at eight, nine in the morning, and I would be

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on every night till 10, 11 o'clock.

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And it starts to get to the point where it's an expectation.

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You do it so much that your boss expects you to do it, and they're

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sending you messages at 8, 9, 10 o'clock, and they expect you to

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respond at 8, 9, 10 o'clock, and.

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At the point where I am in my life and in my career I wanna make

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sure I'm not doing that anymore and I'm not burning myself out.

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And I have that balance.

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So I've had the conversations with my boss Hey, if you send me an email

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or send me a request after this time, I'm going to respond the next day.

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So I've set those expectations.

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If there's something specific that's critical that needs

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to get done that night.

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Please let me know early in advance, but I'm not going to be checking my

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computer at all times of the evening.

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It's an uncomfortable feeling when you live in your phone or your laptop is by

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your hip and you're checking every five seconds for any email, any slack messages.

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You see something you have to jump on and be on, like it's just not healthy.

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Or productive.

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I've No, I've noticed that too in my own business.

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I'm like, you answered a lot of messages, but it was like, was

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it strategy, was it strategic?

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Was it like the long term was like, no, you probably should have even just.

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I'm off messages right now.

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I need to actually do, so I see how it too can like that, being

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busy versus being like productive,

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Yeah,

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exactly.

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And then another piece I would say try to find ways to be efficient.

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So one of the things that I've worked at a lot of different companies.

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One of the things that I love that one of my leaders has told the entire

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organization, work smarter, not harder.

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There are times where people, like you said, it's not productive.

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People may work 12, 14 hours a day.

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Try to find ways to, optimize the initiatives that you're working on.

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Is there a way, to do it more efficiently?

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Can you develop some type of script automation, leverage ai?

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Is there a ways to reduce things so you're not, you're getting the same

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productivity, but you're not working 12, 14 hours a day to do it, and you can

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get it done in eight hours, nine hours, I'm always in whatever role that I have.

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I'm challenging people.

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I'm trying to understand what is critical, what needs to get

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done, how can we do things better?

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How can we do things more efficiently?

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I'm always thinking, I think of things as a puzzle and what's the best way

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to make the pieces of the puzzle fit.

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So I'm big on process improvement, efficiency, and I'm figuring

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out ways to optimize it.

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So I'm getting the most use outta my eight, nine hour day, so

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I'm not working 14 hours a day.

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Got it.

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So I wanna ask you too we were talking about productivity and things like that.

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What do you recommend, or, I don't know if this is a way to leverage networking

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or what have you, or just career-wise, what do you recommend for people?

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We know the political climate we're in right now, and especially with people

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who are like, might be in government type positions, and things have shifted and

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changes as far as what expectations are.

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Now versus what used to be right or what they may have gotten comfortable with.

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What do you suggest for people who have uncertainty right now with their

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position, their role, what may or may not happen what are there ways

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that they can do, like as far as.

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I guess like looking without other people knowing you're looking or

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networking or making those connections with, without being too I guess maybe

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overt to the point if you need like a recommendation or what have you.

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What are some advice that you give in that kind of sector of not knowing what's next?

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Yeah, I'd say a few things.

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One, I always recommend people focus on doing the job to

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the best of their abilities.

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That's first and foremost.

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I've been in situations with reorgs and layoffs at different companies, and

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there's some people that I've seen that were so worried about losing their job

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that they weren't performing at their job.

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And then it made it easier for the company to let them go.

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So there, there's going to be things that are outside of your control.

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If you do your job and you do it well, generally it will help as

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far as you finding an opportunity to stay within the company.

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If you're just focused on the fact that you may be impacted, it may impact your

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productivity and it may give them more of a reason to potentially eliminate you.

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Even given the climate.

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I understand it could be stressful, but Yeah.

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But I strongly recommend, always put your best foot forward get the work done.

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Secondly, to your point, I'm really big on networking.

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You just never know what doors may open up based off a connection that you meet.

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So a lot of the opportunities that I've had just 'cause my

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network opened up doors for me.

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I didn't even see a future for myself in cybersecurity.

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My, my current manager, I worked with him at Amazon and.

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One day while I was working at Walmart, he reached out to

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me ' cause we keep in touch.

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And he was just checking up on me and he said, Hey I made the jump

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to this cybersecurity company.

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I have a role that's open.

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I think you'd be a perfect fit.

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Would you be interested in joining?

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And like I said, joining Netskope wasn't on my radar going into

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the cybersecurity industry.

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Wasn't on my radar.

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But the fact that I have a robust network and they know the value

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that I bring to the table, it can open up opportunities for me, you,

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when you're not even looking for it.

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So I'll say, make sure that you're networking.

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And I'll say the third piece.

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You have to invest in yourself when it comes to professional development,

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always trying to learn and grow, like I said, whether it's taking training

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courses, taking certifications, finding ways to become better at your

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craft or learn new skills altogether

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the more it's about return on investment.

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The more that you invest in yourself, the more of an asset you are, where either the

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company you're working at is going to make sure that we're not going to lose you.

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We're gonna do whatever it takes to keep you, or you'll be

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a strong asset somewhere else.

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But you have to invest in yourself and find ways to continue to grow and develop.

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And it's more than, yes, you'll learn by doing on the job, but there are

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other ways you can learn, like I said, mentorship, training, courses

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the you have to find ways to just continue to grow and develop and

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that's gonna really make you stand out.

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Okay, awesome.

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So Michael, where can the audience go to find out more about you?

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Where can they go to get your book?

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Just keep up with you and the things that you have happening and are developing?

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Yeah, absolutely.

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I have my own website.

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It's Michael V. Morgan, V as in Victor, michaelvmorgan.com.

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So feel free to go on my website.

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I have a contact me form.

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Feel free to connect me on LinkedIn as well.

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My name, if you search by my name, it's Michael Morgan, PMP,

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because I have a PMP certification project management professional.

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If you search by the URL, it's Michael V. Morgan on LinkedIn.

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So feel free to connect with me.

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My book is available on all platforms.

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If you want the paperback, it's available on Amazon.

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If you want the audio book, it's on Spotify, it's on Audible.

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If you want the ebook, it's on Barnes and Nobles

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. Whatever medium it's, available.

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But I hope I'm able to connect with your audience.

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Like I said, I like to help people.

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So anything I can do to assist them and if they're interested in buying the

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book, I'd love to have their feedback.

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But yeah, that's how you can get a hold of me and that's how

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you can get a copy of the book.

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All right, awesome.

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I always ask every guest, what are some words that you live by?

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What's a mantra that you use to guide yourself day to day?

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I'd say the biggest thing, everybody's journey is different.

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I've had a lot of conversations with people recently where they're

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comparing themselves to others.

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They're looking at, oh, my classmate is doing this and I'm here and I should

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be further along in my career, or my colleague is here and I'm at this place

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as long as you're putting in the work.

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You'll get to where you wanna go.

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You'll achieve your goals.

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Like I said, you have to put in the work, but don't compare

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yourself to other people.

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Sometimes your career journey is not always like perfect linear.

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Sometimes you have to take a step back to do, take two steps forward.

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Sometimes you have to make a lateral step to move forward

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but understand it's a process.

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Make sure you're putting in the work as long as you're investing

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in yourself and putting in the work and making those incremental

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changes and improvements over time.

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You can achieve anything that you're striving for, but make sure you

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understand that it's a journey.

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Enjoy the journey.

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Enjoy the process.

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Thank you so much.

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So Michael, audience definitely, we'll definitely make sure to have

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you, everything will be linked in the show notes, so we'll have linked

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to your LinkedIn all the places we can get your book, like you said,

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if we wanted ebook, hard copy audio.

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I'm audible, I'll tell you I'll be audible.

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Any anyway that you wanna get it.

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I definitely, the power of networking, you gave us a lot of great tips

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no matter where people are at in their career, whether they're

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beginning wanting to make a shift or.

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Just wanted to make some upward moods where they're at.

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I wanna thank you so much for being a guest on the show.

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Thank you for coming to the Early Accountability

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podcast and to the audience.

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Until next time.

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About the Podcast

Early Accountability
The Early Accountability Podcast transforms Dreamers into Doers and Visionaries into Victors through goal activation strategies that abandon excuses, jumpstart motivation, and ignite results. Early Accountability Coaching is a specialty focused on helping those who are in the fragile beginning stages of a new endeavor, professional project, lifestyle change, or mindset shift.

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Kimi Walker