Stop trying to look cool

At a company in Trieste I used to work for, all of the top managers had really fancy status cars. The other cars in the fleet were the cheapest cars you could find. They didn't even have radios, so that employees would just wear their ipods when they drove to worksites far away. The sense of hierarchy was so strong that these super intelligent people were made to feel like unimportant losers.

This feeling, that some people are important, others aren't, was communicated in other ways too, especially through equipment and cell phones. I was a marketing person, therefore  my hours weren't billable, which made me less valuable to the company. This was communicated to me through my work tools, which were hand-me downs from my colleagues. ("Ahhh. That phone was mine for a while, before that, it was Francesco's and before that, who knows. Gosh, it looks so BIG now, compared to this one..."). I remember the day I plugged in my laptop dinosaur and it caught on fire! The people with the highest status, communicated through fancy phones, cool computers, and cars, were the sales people (I know. Gag).

I still lust for a fancy phone, by the way, but I use a 20 euro Nokia (which I bought with my own money when I opened my business), partly because, when I decided I wanted to create wealth, rather than just get by,  I started to track my spending. I mean every penny. I still do. It forced me to really look at where my money was going (beer and entertainment). Did you ever read the Millionaire Next Door? That's what made me decide I would rather be a rich girl with a crappy car (mine, all mine) than a fancy person with no bank in the bank.

While still at that job, I decided to try to live (with my husband) on just one salary and sock the other away into savings. That meant no eating out, walks with friends instead of dinner, and shoe polish and black magic marker instead of new shoes. 

It turned out to be easier than I thought, we became great cooks, and more outdoorsy, and pretty much no one noticed...until I told a colleague that we were living on one salary. He got angry and accused me of making more money than him. Which made his fancy phone seem like just a way to keep him quiet while I was making the big bucks...