As a Gen Y feminist, I have tried surround myself with endeavors and friendships that are largely made up of supportive women. But last week, I attended an event at the 92Y that made me rethink the value of being a girl in a guy’s world and the power of breaking into those structures, while still working to build female support systems. Pioneer female rapper and producer Eve redefined for me the benefit of being the only girl, of learning through trial and error, and sticking with your authentic self as a guide through your career.

With breakthrough fame after collaborating with the Ruff Ryders and DMX, Eve went on to a successful solo career, including a Grammy-award-winning collaboration with Gwen Stefani for the single “Let Me Blow Ya Mind.” Since then she has had two other solo albums, a movie career, and a clothing line, Fetish.

Growing up in Philadelphia, Eve said she found that the city lends a feistiness to the music made there, probably because it sits in the shadow of New York City. Philly has “it’s own kind of style and sound,” she said. Eve said she took tons of trips to New York, trying to make it as an artist.

Though she was a singer first, Eve said she liked hip hop because it got her more attention because there were so few female rappers. Breaking those barriers she learned to be fiercely independent, she said, telling stories of trying to meet every music producer in New York. She said she always told them, “I’ll rap right now.”

Sometimes people took advantage of her outgoing nature, often inviting her into their homes under false pretenses. “It was disappointing because I knew I was talented and I knew I wanted to do it the right way,” she said. Young women shouldn’t let that happen to them in their path to success, she said.

Women should never take “no” for an answer. As she approached a male-dominated industry, Eve said she didn’t really care that she would be the only . “Whatever, move over,” was how she interacted with her male counterparts, she said, using the prove yourself kind of mentality that came with being a woman as motivation. Her original role models in music were always women who held their own with the men, like Queen Latifah and MC Light.

Being with the Ruff Ryders, Eve said she was probably the most protected woman on the planet. In her second album, she wrote a song by herself for the first time at the urging of Dre. Eve said she’s so happy he made her stay there. Eve spoke of her fellow artists with praise and familiarity. Dre can scream and kick and punch things sometimes, she said. Swizz Beatz has an infectious energy, she smiled.

When she was young, Eve said the studio was all about drugs and booze and people, but now she can’t have all those distractions. “It’s an energy thing,” she said, “you can get knocked off your game.” She said finding out what worked took a lot of trial and error.

Working with Gwen Stefani seemed natural for Eve because she had always been a fan. The two singers are a lot alike in that they sing with lots of boys and balance a style that is both feminine and tomboy-like. Winning a Grammy for that collaboration was an “incredible moment,” she said.

As for what’s next for Eve, her newest album, Lip Lock, just came out this spring. It was independently produced and released because she wanted more creative freedom in her process.  Her dream collaborator is Lauryn Hill who also has shown a lot of creative freedom in her works. Music is one of those industries where you have to stay relevant as you age, and women are judged much harsher than their male counterparts, Eve said. There needs to be female unity, artist to artist, to combat this disparity, she said.

Eve said she comes from a long line of strong women who instilled a serious drive for success in her. At the end of the day, she said she feels a responsibility to other young women, and she hopes to empower them. Though she wouldn’t call herself a feminist, Eve said she does think that hip hop is oversexed and that women should be taught to take the power back. Don’t oversex yourself out of your comfort zone. “Stay original,” she said.

Photo courtesy of Flickr

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The Internet is one of mankind’s greatest achievements. But since it’s grown to an unmanageable size, using it to hunt for jobs is incredibly daunting for any job seeker. A quick Google search for “jobs in pr” will give you 700,000 results in well under a second! Where do you even start?

Fortunately, there are a few little tricks and tools out there that can help you find the results you’re actually looking for on Google:

Search Operators

A search operator is essentially a set word, phrase or symbol that helps users increase the effectiveness of their search. Below are useful operators for job hunters:

• Site: This operator specifies a keyword or phrase that must appear at least once on the page. You can also use it to search for particular words or phrases on a chosen website. For instance, “royal family site:www.bbc.co.uk.”
• Minus sign: Use a minus sign to remove particular phrases or websites from your search. If you keep getting generic job sites in your results, use the minus sign search operator as follows: “pr jobs –www.randomjobsite.com.” This will eliminate any results from, or containing, that particular URL.
• Inurl: This operator specifies that a particular keyword or phrase has to be found in the URL before it will appear in search results. So if you want to work for a digital company, you could try “digital agency inurl:careers.”
• Asterisk: The asterisk is known as the Google wildcard and comes in handy if you’re not entirely sure what type of job you want. For example, to look for a wide range of entry level jobs in many sectors, search for “entry level * jobs.” Google will fill in the gap for you.

Here’s a full list of search operators.

Google Local

If you’re trying to limit your search to a specific area, go to local.google.com and type the location where you want to search into the bar on the left.

Once you’ve done that, type in the kind of business you’re looking for (e.g. “restaurant” or “school”). Google will then populate the map with the names, addresses and websites of all local results. Pretty handy, eh?

Strategic Search

If you know what company you’d like to work for but aren’t sure whether they have jobs available, how do you give them your resume without sending it to a generic email address?

Just use a simple Google search with the company name and position of the person you’d ideally hand your resume to. For example, you could search for “coca cola uk recruitment manager.” More often than not, the first results will include either their company profile (saves you having to trawl through their website) or a LinkedIn profile. Both can be used to get in touch about possible vacancies.

This technique is simple (and pretty obvious), yet it is woefully underused by hopeful job hunters. It really helps to avoid the middleman.

Google Alerts

Another of Google’s handy tools for those who want to be one step ahead of their fellow applicants is Google Alerts.

Enter a specific term you’re interested in, such as “pr careers in london,” and set a couple of self-explanatory preferences. Whenever that phrase appears on the Internet and matches your set preferences, you’ll be sent an email — and there’s no limit to the number of alerts that can be set up. It’s that simple (and useful)!

What Google tricks do you use for your job search?

Josh Hansen writes for Workfish, a UK recruitment agency that helps people find their dream jobs in PR, communication, social media and events. Follow Workfish on Twitter to keep up with the latest jobs.

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Your 20s are a decade of transition after transition. With graduation and wedding season in full force, this time of year is a bit more transition-heavy than other times. These milestones touch all of our lives. Whether it’s making the move from dorm to apartment, completing an MBA, an engagement, a summer internship, a new city, a first real job, or a new baby, transitions are exciting moments in which we know life will never be the same. This period is exciting but can be stressful and challenging to navigate. Here are five tips for keeping your cool through transitions.

1. Be present: During the heightened emotion and excitement of transitional periods it’s so easy to for it all to become a blur. This is one of my own greatest challenges during a period of transitions — being still and taking it all in. It’s so easy to jump ahead to the wedding day, the moment when you’re holding a baby in your arms, or even to worrying about what life will be like after diploma is in hand. Be intentional about engaging in the present.

2. Take stock: Transitional periods are a great time to evaluate your life. Are you pursuing your goals or are you just kind of going along with the life that seems to happen for you? Are you on the path to the career, relationship, and purpose that you desire and are meant to pursue? Now is a good time to look around and make necessary bold choices to get to the place you want to be.

3. Talk with supportive friends: Transitions are times of increased stress. Nothing is more therapeutic than letting it out and talking with trusted friends and family. So stop what you’re doing. Answer your phone. Take a walk around the block and call your mom. Let your inner circle be there for you.

4. Prioritize: Plan your time based on what is most important. Be intentional. Make time for the people who matter most. What are the most important ways for you to spend your time during this period? What will matter to you looking back? What will matter five years from now? A grade? A certain loved one? How you spent your money (or saved it)?

5. Don’t make decisions out of fear: When forging through times of change it is easy to freeze up and not make decisions at all or worse make decisions based on fear. Look fear in the face and articulate the “worst case scenario.” When you say it, you can extinguish its power. Move forward with courage.

What are your secrets to moving through transitional periods without letting stress get the best of you? Share with us in the comments!

Ask Levo Mentor Rachel Millner, PR Director for WIRED Magazine, how she balances her choices and her career!

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I moved to New York City in March 2009. As the recession swept across the country, I stepped into what essentially was another world compared to the small suburb I grew up in.

Every day, as I applied for jobs and attempted to network and get interviews I ran across “that girl.” You know, well put together on that 9 a.m. downtown 5 train, green juice in hand, reading the economist on her iPad before heading in for a long day of work at a job she found fulfilling before meeting friends for a class at Soul Cycle or drinks on the roof of the Soho Grand. You know you’ve seen her. And I’ll be honest, I was envious.

In college, my best friend and I would watch The Real World (when it was good) and eat Chips Ahoy and frosting. Fitness and wellness were utterly foreign to me, but when I moved to New York and felt the pangs of envy for a life I didn’t have — it dawned on me. Her life was that way because she chose it. So now, four years later, as a proud 6 a.m.-four-days-a-week-Chelsea-Piers-gym-bunny, I have a few pieces of advice for all of us building the lives we’ve dreamt of for years:

Transform Envy to Action

It’s true, jealousy is not a good thing. That said, the root of envy is often a desire for something you don’t have. By paying attention to these moments you can harness a unique opportunity to see a growth opportunity for yourself. If there’s someone you know whose career you’re jealous of, ask yourself what is it that they have that you’d like. Is it the salary, the title, what they get to do each day? Then, begin mapping out how you could make those things happen in your own life.

Modify, Modify, Modify

Yoga instructors often advise students to modify positions and focus on making the pose meaningful to you. “It’s your practice” is a phrase that is used in many classes. The same is true in life, if you’re goal is to be “perfect” you’ve missed the mark because our perfection is in our humanity. If your goal is a daily early morning work out and then you take a job that requires you to be at your desk at 8 a.m., modify the goal and focus on doing what you can, when you can, and how you can instead.

Celebrate

One of the things about adulthood that caught me off guard was the decrease in special events. Without a graduation looming, I realized that celebrations outside of birthdays and holidays required a bit more initiative and felt in some ways even more important. As you create the life you dream of, be sure to take the time to enjoy it. It can be easy to be so focused on looking ahead that you forget to look around and realize how far you’ve come.

What are your methods for self-actualization in your relationships, fitness, career, and lifestyle? Tell us in the comments!

Ask Levo Mentor Arielle Patrick, Director of Publicity for The American Reader, how she makes adjustments to put her life on the path she dreams about!

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Let’s get one thing straight. Brit Morin may be called the digital Martha Stewart but she is a genius in her own right. After nabbing big jobs at tech giants Apple and Google, Morin decided to venture out on her own and capitalize on the world’s love of all things do-it-yourself.

And her timing could not have been better. Though most days the main purpose of the internet seems to be giving us new videos of cats doing adorable things, it has also become the great DIY instructional tool. With YouTube videos, slideshows, and experts breaking down processes for everything from woodwork to making shoes (for a week I convinced myself I could make a pair of Valentino-like stud flats because I saw someone else do it), DIY has become accessible and attainable.

Brit & Co., Morin’s start-up, is the digital foundation for DIY nation. Founded in 2011, Brit & Co. is a visual site like Pinterest, but it shows you how to make or where to find everything you see. This is everything from that trendy necklace you are seeing everyone wearing to that delicious carrot cake you thought you could never make. The site has an estimated 5 million followers and attracted the likes of notable investors like Marissa Mayer.

Morin, who was always a crafter growing up, said she saw this trend growing and growing. And she felt it especially resonated with millennials because we were the first generation that often had two working parents who weren’t there to greet us with snacks and help us with our various projects the minute we got out of school. “I spent a lot of my time just figuring things out. There was no Google or YouTube back then. There was a lot of trial and error,” she said.

And it is that domestic cluelessness, for lack of a better word (I will fully admit I get stressed out when making a Lean Cuisine) of Gen Y has that has made her site take off. “A lot of us didn’t get the instructions on how to cook and all these domestic things and now we are buying houses and having babies and just trying to figure it out!” Morin told me. On her web site she even talks about how she taught herself how to French braid hair after many tries. (For comparisons sake, I gave up French braids after one try and this was yesterday, mind you.)   That combined with the internet being a vast portal for discovering makers and their ideas as well as more tools like apps and 3D printers has resulted in perfect timing for Brit & Co.

But it isn’t just timing. At only 27, Morin is clearly a very driven and determined woman. She “fell in love with technology” and went straight to Silicon Valley after graduating from University of Texas at Austin and did very well landing jobs at Apple and Google. She had written off crafting as a hobby. “It wasn’t until after Google that I had that white wall moment and thought I could combine them,” she said.

Even if you have a great idea, leaving a big, safe job is always tough, but Morin said she really wasn’t scared. “I had always been excited to be an entrepreneur. I felt like the time was right and in my 20s I had a much higher tolerance for risk. I was really excited about it. I would have been scared if I were in my late 30s,” Morin told me.

It may have been a risky move but it is paying off big time. Morin has raised around $1.25 million from mentors like Mayer, is a tech correspondent for Katie Couric’s daytime talk show, frequent lifestyle contributor on The Today Show, and has several branding projects. You don’t just get a name like “Silicon Valley’s Martha Stewart” for sitting around twiddling your thumbs, after all.

But she is happy to admit that running a start-up is all about tiny little failures and learning from them. “The challenge is learning from them very quickly and iterating on them. I think it is a good thing to fail especially early on in a start-up because it means you are trying a lot of different things. As long as you are iterating on your failures you are able to learn and get to success. You’ve got to try all kinds of things,” she said. Surrounding yourself with people smarter than you also helps, she added.

Going home to a successful, passionate, and risk-taking partner also helps. Morin is lucky because she married one of those! Her husband Dave Morin is the founder of mobile social network, Path. “The great thing is that he can totally resonate with me whether I’m having a stressful day or a really exciting day. The challenge is the balance part. On the weekend we make a no-company talking rule. I think it really just helps to have someone understand what it’s like to put yourself at so much risk but also be so passionate about they are doing. It’s great,” she told me.

Well, it sounds like life is pretty good for Morin. We are glad she went back to her crafting roots and figured out how to share them with the world especially clueless folks like me. I am thrilled to listen to anyone who managed to construct an awesome bag out of Capri Sun packets. I would wear that now.

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Maybe I’m speaking too generally here, but I feel pretty safe in saying that one of the most overarching and deep-seated desires among Gen Y-ers is a craving for freedom. We have access to more choices today than any generation before us about how to make money, who to build relationships with, and what to do with our time. And with so many opportunities, we know that there’s a career out there that will let us create a life that is 100 percent authentic — if only we could figure out what it is.

With this growing awareness of the endless options set before us, we start to play the comparison game, which often leads to discontentment with our chosen path (ignorance is bliss, right?). I’ve coached so many women who are very clear about how they want to feel in their job (energized, deeply fulfilled, connected to others, free, etc.), but they just can’t decide on one specific career that will make them feel that way and combine their many passions.

Here’s a tough question: What if it’s not up to a career or an employer to make you feel that way? What if it’s entirely up to you?

For some people, this simple reframing is enough to help them reclaim responsibility over their own happiness at their job. For others, though, it’s a lightbulb moment when they realize they’ll simply never feel completely authentic and fulfilled working for someone else’s mission.

These are the brave few who decide to create their own opportunities. The world is changing, and yet many companies are stuck in outdated, inflexible models; so more and more young people are making the unconventional choice to create a business that better fits their lifestyle.

Have you caught the entrepreneurship bug that’s running rampant in the Gen Y population? It’s absolutely not for everyone, but if you’ve been fervently nodding your head with me through this article so far, I’m willing to bet there’s a part of you that’s craving the freedom and the fulfillment that comes from working for your own mission.

As a coach, I’ve talked to so many amazing women who have admitted to me that they have a dream of starting their own business. I’ve heard inspiring ideas that range from video hosting to jewelry making to home office decorating to accounting for creative businesses. These comments usually slip out in a hurried tone and are prefaced by something like, “I know this sounds crazy, but…”

Stop. Stop thinking that living life on your terms is crazy or unrealistic or risky. You tell me what’s riskier in terms of your lifelong happiness: spending your entire working life at a job that will never feel deeply fulfilling, or investing some time and money to create a business that feeds your passion and gives you that sense of freedom and purpose you’re craving?

If you’re reading this and saying, “That’s me!”— how willing are you to even entertain the idea of entrepreneurship? I’m giving you permission to admit that you want something unconventional and scary and exciting — in fact, I’m encouraging you to dream even bigger than you’ll let yourself.

So now what? How do you turn your vision into reality? Do some research, and consider working with a coach to get really clear on your vision.

Have you ever thought about being an entrepreneur? Why? Tell us in the comments!

Ask Lauren Maillian Bias, Founding Partner and Managing Director of Gen Y Capital Partners, what made her want to become an entrepreneur!

Image courtesy of Lucky

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The extremely accomplished and beautiful Queen Rania Al Abdullah of Jordan got herself some major world points this week when she wrote an open letter to to girls everywhere as part of CNN’s “Girl Rising” project. I won’t put the whole letter here because it is quite long but I will give you a small but inspiring excerpt:

We know that in every country around the world, healthy, educated girls can play a crucial role in stabilizing societies, resolving conflicts, bolstering democracies, strengthening economies, and nurturing healthy and educated children.

But they can’t do it alone.

Role models can inspire. Campaigns can motivate. But if we want all girls everywhere to rise up, then we must find them, befriend them and support them.

That means going outside our comfort zones. Maybe they’re recovering from civil war in Sierra Leone, like Mariama — now educated and a popular radio DJ. Maybe they’re trapped in servitude in Nepal, like Suma — now an activist working to free others. Maybe they’re living in slums in India, like Ruksana — now strong and in school.

Though the “Girl Rising” project is less than a year old, fighting for young women’s rights is nothing new to Abdullah.

As Honorary Global Chair of the United Nations Girls’ Education Initiative, HM Queen Rania lends her support to a global partnership of organizations from both the United Nations family and civil society that is committed to achieving gender equality in education. In 2009 this role led her to a visit at the Young Women’s Leadership School in East Harlem. She told the students there, “I want you, girls with voices, to speak up and shout out for girls whose cries fall silent.  I want you to fight for them, as others are fighting for you. I want you to pull up another girl, and help her stand tall and strong. I want you to be great, and inspire greatness in others. If anyone can do it, you can.”

In Jordan, HM Queen Rania’s home, women are fighting for their rights. Among Jordanians with advanced degrees, two-thirds of those without jobs are women even though 55 percent of graduates over the past decade have been female, according to the The New York Times. Women do not play a role in key leadership positions.

When a National Dialogue Committee was appointed last year to weigh reforms proposed by the king, only four of its 52 members were women.

This is why HM Queen Rania is fighting so hard for women.  In March she wrote a piece for The Huffington Post about the “spirit of sisterhood.” She wrote:

Today, as a result of sustained investment, women in the Middle East and North Africa region are healthier and far better educated than ever before. They outnumber men at university. Sadly, though, that success does not yet translate to the job market, so nations are not reaping the rewards of that investment. A new report by the World Bank concludes that women are hampered by legal and social factors. In other words, it’s a question of changing mindsets.

That’s why it’s important that the girls and young women of our region have strong female role models: women who successfully juggle the demands of a career and the demands of motherhood.

This is why she is supporting the Girl Rising initiative. In case you aren’t familiar, it is a global campaign to raise funds to help girl’s education. As part of the campaign a documentary was produced, under the same name, that tells the stories of girls from around the world and how the power of education can impact their lives significantly and the planet. Watch the trailer below (especially if you need a good cry!)

Though her life may look more like Cinderella’s than most (seriously the woman is stunning), Abdullah knows what’s up when it comes to the power of women and young girls. In her letter to girls all over the world she wrote:

Marketing and stereotyping combine to have us believe that you’re also made of pink dresses, pigtails, dolls, ringlets, ribbons, bows, and tiaras. That you like cupcakes. That all you will want to be are wives and mothers. That you’re more “inclined” to the arts and “better suited” to caring professions like teaching and nursing. And, maybe, that’s true for some. But my daughter Salma teaches me every day that there’s so much more to you — and for you.

This Queen knows the deal.

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As my 30th birthday approaches ever so quickly, I’ve been wondering how I can measure success without looking at how many things I’ve been able to cross off the checklist that I made in my early twenties.

I realized the more important question I should be asking myself is how I’m living up to the legacy that I want to leave behind. This sounds like such a strange and scary thought to have at 29. My grandfather and I were extremely close, and since he passed away seven months ago I’ve been thinking about the legacy he left behind. He was a well-respected and successful businessman, but despite all of his achievements and risk-taking endeavors, it was his character that encompassed his legacy. While saying a few words at his funeral, I realized he had truly lived up to a memorable legacy.

Looking back at his life, my grandfather made decisions that reflected his character even when it meant he had to make a sacrifice. Others may see his sacrifices as mistakes, but everyone’s definition of success is different. For me, I thought it meant being an overachiever and perfectionist. Whether it’s in work, relationships, or something as simple as making lasagna, I’ve spent the last decade chasing after things so I could adhere to the checklist I had made. I thought if I could cross everything off that checklist, I’d be successful. There have been moments where I was extremely stressed out, exhausted, and so caught up chasing the checklist that I forgot to stop and smell the roses. Quite frankly, I wasn’t even fun to be around (just ask my friends and family).

It was not until my grandfather got sick and I spent a lot of time with him for the last two months of his life that I came to see my definition of success had been wrong all along. In an eye-opening moment, I realized it wasn’t about how fast I could complete a deliverable or how quickly I could respond to emails. And it wasn’t about how to perfectly present myself at all times.

After some soul searching, I didn’t really have the answer on how to define my legacy, but I knew that at the very core it’s about my character as a person and how I can make some sort of difference in the world. It’s all about living my life fearlessly and with passion. It also means that somewhere along my journey, I can inspire someone to achieve their legacy according to their terms. If I can do that, then that’s ultimate success.

How do you define your legacy? Tell us in the comments!

Ask Warren Buffett, Chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, a question about his own incredible legacy!

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In her poignant TED Talk, Angela Lee Duckworth argues that the key to success is grit — a characteristic she defines as “passion and perseverance for very long-term goals.”

When I first tuned in, I was skeptical. Is a six-minute TED Talk really going to reveal the secret to success? It sounds like an infomercial.

But after watching Duckworth’s speech several times, I was singing a different tune.

Duckworth’s background is compelling. She left a fast-paced job in consulting to teach math to seventh graders in a Manhattan public school. Following this, her curiosity about the determinants of success led her to study the psychology behind motivation.

She focused her attention on “super-challenging settings.” We’re talking West Point Military Academy and National Spelling Bees. The question she sought to answer: “Who is successful here, and why?”

Study after study, the most telling factor of success was this quality she described as grit.

I stand behind Duckworth’s grit theory not just because of her research but because her definition of grit is not black and white. It’s a multidimensional, fuzzy “gray” concept.

Her studies show that talent and success are usually either unrelated or even inversely related. She argues that it’s all about the perseverance and follow-through, and she’s right.

There are lots of brilliant people but it’s the ones who stay true to themselves and follow through that make it. The key to success is setting a goal and pacing yourself. It’s staying true to that goal even when life gets messy and even when it’s inconvenient.

Duckworth’s talk inspired me to think about concrete applications of grit. Below are five ways to have more “grit” in your everyday life.

5 Ways for Gen Y Women to Be More Gritty in Their Careers and in Life

1. Set long- and short-term goals

Grit is all about working hard to make your long-term goals a reality, but in the push and pull of daily life, it’s hard to keep long-term goals at the forefront of your mind. Set smaller “bite-sized” goals to help move you along towards your longer-term goals, and look at them frequently.

2. Pace yourself

Reaching long-term goals takes time. The best way to pace yourself is to create good habits. This could mean going to bed earlier, making time to disconnect from technology, or even just setting time aside in your schedule to work out. Forcing yourself to practice these habits, even when it’s inconvenient, will build up your self-discipline and sense of autonomy.

3. Don’t be afraid to fail and take risks

These days, everyone is talking about the importance of failure and taking risks. It begs the question: What does this actually look like in real life? Taking risks in your career could mean taking on a project without lots of direction, proposing an innovative disruptive solution, or even just speaking up in a meeting even though everyone vehemently disagrees with your point of view. According to Duckworth, the brain grows in response to challenges, and this growth increases the likelihood of perseverance and success.

4. Apply the lessons you’ve learned

We’re so focused on moving forward that we forget to look back to the lessons we’ve learned. When faced with a problem, take time to look back at the most challenging circumstances in your life and ask yourself, how did I get through that? What skills did I use? Who was there for me in those moments? Who are the people I want to surround myself with? You know more than you think you know, just make sure you give yourself the time and space to reflect or else you’ll end up making the same mistakes over and over again.

5. Make hard, uncomfortable decisions

Grit is sticking to your long-term goals despite all the noise around you. The fact that not everyone in your life will support you in reaching your goals is a harsh reality. If you want to be successful and see your goals come to life, it’s going to mean facing some uncomfortable situations and listening to your gut. Instead of avoiding sticky situations and confrontations, take them head-on. In the words of the great Seth Godin, embrace discomfort because these uncomfortable, challenging situations are the ones that force us to grow the most.

How do you get gritty? Tell us in the comments!

Ask Ido Leffler, Co-founder & Chief Carrot Lover at Yes To, Inc. (Yes To Carrots), for his secrets to success!

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Thought “the boss” would be older, grayer, and heavier than you? Think again.

It turns out that Gen Yers are increasingly being managed by… each other, according to Manager 3.0: A Millennial’s Guide to Rewriting the Rules of Management. This guide explains how the whole world of work is changing as more of us find ourselves managing our peers. But how is this affecting millennials?

The news is likely to divide employees into two camps. One camp will be uncomfortable at the thought of being managed by someone who’s essentially the same age as them — or even (wait for it) younger. There’s something unnerving about this. Even though older bosses might be the butt of the joke at the water cooler, it’s somehow much easier to accept direction and criticism (constructive or otherwise) from someone who’s considered more “established.”

On the flip side, because you are “peers,” it might be easier to challenge bosses who are your age. Remember the Friends episode where Chandler finds himself ostracized by his former colleagues as soon as he takes over the reins? This is what the old-school thinkers will fear, whether they’re the one in charge or the one taking orders.

Others, however, will celebrate that this surge in younger managers heralds the beginning of a whole new way of working. Brad Karsh and Courtney Templin, authors of Manager 3.0, argue that younger bosses will shake up the traditional working environment in a number of positive ways.

If you think you’re ready for a management position, consider these three key benefits:

Millennial managers encourage collaboration in the workplace

Rather than trying to assert your authority over others, as a young boss, you’re more likely to create a sociable and collaborative relationship in the office and foster a supportive team attitude.

By making the office a fun, engaging, and creative place, you’re bound to get better results from everyone. Plus you don’t have to miss out on the after-work drinks for fear of cramping anyone’s style.

Younger managers are likely to support flexible work environments

Just like the rest of Gen Y and your peers, you’ve grown up texting, Tweeting, updating, and posting. You’re always plugged in, and you know you’re sometimes more productive at your kitchen table than at the office.

So chances are you’ll be far more open to the idea of staff working from elsewhere and at different times of day. You understand just how important it is for people to work flexibly, which in turn makes employees happier and ultimately more productive.

Gen Y managers embrace new technologies and ways of working

As a millennial manager, you’re just as up to speed with technology as those who work for you. So it’s more likely you’ll be keen to embrace everything from Skype to group texting when it comes to communication in the office. Of course managers and employees need to see each other from time to time, but at least you know there’s no risk of technophobia when you tentatively suggest a video call rather than a lengthy day traveling to and from meetings elsewhere.

In short, younger managers make for a more flexible and creative working life, so embrace the change! Better still, go for positions you might otherwise have thought too senior, because if you can do the job, you deserve the job. Managing others is always going to present a range of challenges, whatever age or stage you’re at, but one thing’s for sure: the face of management is changing. It’s getting younger.

The author of this post is Amy Noble, a freelance writer, copy editor, proofreader, and general grammar-obsessive living in London, England.

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