When Stephanie Kaplan was a college senior, she didn’t have much time to savor those last months before hitting the work world; she was already in it. Stephanie and two fellow Harvard students, Windsor Hanger and Annie Wang, had founded hercampus.com and were negotiating media partnerships and meeting with their lawyer in between going to classes and sorority meetings.

The trio became friends while working on a campus fashion magazine, and thought that creating a similar publication online could meet an unmet need for publishing-savvy college gals nationwide. They entered their proposal for Her Campus in a Harvard business plan competition, and won. As a prize, they took the free office space in Cambridge, but not the funding, so they could retain as much control of the company as possible. “For now, we are holding off on raising money,” says Stephanie. “We are definitely bootstrapping, but our revenues should be able to cover our expenses. We’re excited to pay ourselves salaries for the first time after all the work we have put in!” Currently, Her Campus gets more than 600,000 hits per month and has more than 500 contributing writers at 65 colleges around the country. What’s life like for this 21-year-old CEO?

Tips for living well on a young entrepreneur’s salary: “Kill two birds with one stone by attending networking events that offer free food! And I love coupons. I sign up for email lists of all the restaurants I go to, all the stores I shop at, and Groupon, BuyWithMe, LivingSocial, Tippr, etc.”

Social media addiction: “Cotweet.com! It makes tweeting SO much easier.”

Secret to running a business with your friends: “We became close friends through working together, not the other way around, which I think makes a big difference.  We make sure keep communication between us completely open at all times and to be frank with one another about how we are feeling, so that interpersonal issues don’t escalate and can be resolved right away.”

Anti-procrastination strategy: “Make yourself so busy that there is just literally no time to procrastinate.”

Workout routine: “Last spring I trained for and ran a half-marathon, which was a really satisfying goal to work towards. Recently I’ve just been hitting the elliptical machine and weights at the gym for a half hour to an hour a few times a week. I keep five and 10 lb. hand weights at home so I can do my arm exercises even if I don’t make it to the gym.”

Power snack: “Orville Redenbacher’s 100-calorie microwave popcorn bag. I keep these at the office.”

Lesson learned from a favorite mentor: “Cathy Cranston (Executive VP at Mansueto Ventures, which owns Fast Company and Inc. magazines) taught me to believe in my ideas and not be afraid to shake things up and go against the flow. She always stresses that the media industry is screaming for innovation and change and that young people have ideas worth sharing.”

To learn more about Stephanie, visit www.hercampus.com.

I had the pleasure to recently attend and speak at the Corporate Council Women of Color Conference.  It was an amazing, empowering event geared toward women attorneys at top firms and in-house at Fortune 1000 companies. Over the course of two days, leading legal and human resources executives presented on topics from transitioning in your career to negotiating a raise to understanding body language cues when networking. (I had a fun job: presenting a fashion show of stylish work looks in conjunction with Saks Fifth Avenue). Here are ten great nuggets of wisdom heard–and overheard–at the conference that I think all GGGs can appreciate:

1. On negotiating salary: You make the case for getting a raise everyday– or not– through your actions and attitude at the workplace.
2. Usually, the mentor chooses the mentee– not the other way around.
3. Sitting on a corporate or non-profit board is an unparalleled opportunity to network with leaders in your field.
4. Raise your profile in your industry by speaking on panels or conferences twice a year. The more high profile, the better. Bonus points if your picture is prominently featured in the program.
5. Continually ask yourself these two guiding questions about your job as you move through your career: 1) Am I happy? 2) Is this good for me? If the answer is no, then you need to make some changes.
6. Just shaking hands with someone establishes the equivalent level of rapport as if you’d spent three hours of face-to-face time with that person. — Patti Wood, body language expert
7. When shaking hands, the most important thing is palm-to-palm contact. Extend your hand at a slight diagonal angle, as if you are landing a plane– instead of perpendicular to the floor. (from Patti Wood)
8. Not really a career tip but very useful: The best oil for cooking at high heat is grapeseed oil (who knew?), but it can infuse your cooking with the grapeseed flavor. Next best option is canola. The best pans? All-Clad — from Chef Jeff, cooking personality and author of Cooked
9. Within a corporation, titles can be deceiving. Learn and get to know the real decisionmakers.
10. On work-life balance: If you want to get married and have kids, but don’t see women at the top of your organization that have the life you envision, then you don’t want to be at that company!

For all their good intentions, New Year’s resolutions can lack staying power. There’s never a perfect time–and it never gets easier– to make changes in your life or career, so Go-Getter Girls tend to just bite the bullet and get to it. In the spirit of this tackle-the-hard-stuff attitude, here’s a thought-provoking passage from a book I read over the holidays, Free Food for Millionaires by Min Jin Lee. The book follows the post-college life of protaganist Casey, a Princeton-educated New Yorker (from Queens) and daughter to Korean parents who own a drycleaner.  She’s not sure what she wants to do with her life and is kind of stuck — hampered by debt from overspending habits; too prideful to ask others for help when it comes to her career; and too individualistic to embrace the traditional path her parents want: go to either medical or law school (with business school a barely acceptable, very distant third) and marry a Korean boy. At one point, frustrated with Casey’s lax attitude toward (to put it bluntly), getting her sh*t together in general, her workplace/big picture mentor, Sabine, who owns the boutique where Casey’s been a part-time sales associate for years, delivers a wake-up call speech that is full of GGG wisdom.

“Listen Casey . . . ” Sabine talked faster and louder because the girl’s attention was slipping.  ”Every minute matters. Every damn second. All those times you turn on the television or go to the movies or shop for things you don’t need. . . every time you sleep with the wrong man and wait for him to call you back, you’re wasting your life. Your life. Your life matters Casey. Every second. And by the time you’re my age– you’ll see that for every day and every last moment spent, you were making a choice. And you’ll see that the time you had, that you were given, was wasted. It’s gone. And you cannot have any of it back.” Sabine tiled her head her eyes full of worry.  ”Oh my darling, do you see that?”

. . . Sabine reached across the table to cover Casey’s hand. “I’m not saying you can’t f*ck it up. I’m just saying you should be making the mistakes as you head toward your goals. Okay?” . .  .”If you made the hard choices and tried to live by them, you’d be at greater peace with yourself.” [pp. 168-169]

The passage acts as a sort of turning point in the story (don’t you want to find out what Casey does next?!) and– if you’ll let me indulge my inner English major!–  represents the crux of the dichotomy facing each of the book’s characters, and most of us at one time or another: fulfillment vs. happiness.

The New Year is a great time to consider,  Are your actions helping you move towards your life goals, or just making you feel good in the moment?  Are you making the hard choices?

Here’s to making every moment count in 2010. Happy New Year!

Earlier this week I spoke at a bookclub for Ed2010 (a great org for magazine editor-types) alongside author Jennifer Scanlon, a professor of gender and women’s studies who wrote Bad Girls Go Everywhere, a biography of famed Cosmo editor Helen Gurley Brown (or HGB, as she is called). Scanlon argues, somewhat controversially, that HGB should be credited as an antecedent of Third Wave feminism– i.e., the more individualistic strain of feminism that emerged in the 1990s.

One hot-button topic discussed was if/how HGB used sexuality to get ahead in work and in life.  She admittedly slept with a few bosses (though said a woman can’t sleep her way to the top) and told women that “A lady’s love should pay for all trips, most restaurant tabs and all liquor.” Some of the young women in the group took issue with her ‘calculated’ methods, and questioned HGB’s feminist legacy.  One girl asked something to the effect of, “How could you call [Cosmo] a feminist publication today if every cover says 105 ways to please your man?”

As an advocate for women being sexually liberated, taking care of themselves physically and emotionally, advancing professionally, and most-important, earning their own money, HGB was obviously an original type of Go-Getter Girl. However, as I write in the GGGG, I do think there’s a big difference between using your sexuality to get ahead and embracing your femininity in the workplace. GGGs don’t do the former, period!

On another note, one of the young women at the event was a Columbia grad who has been on the job hunt for a minute. She asked me a few questions about job searching for her blog, Ivy Leagued and Unemployed. You can check out the post here! http://bit.ly/47RJJC.

Coming up next, a primer on negotiation, Hong Kong market-style!

This week’s “Corner Office” column in the New York Times features a great interview with Gilt Groupe CEO Susan Lyne, a Go-Getter Girl who happens to run a company that sells great clothes for your GGG wardrobe (if you’re not a member of Gilt Groupe, sign up now!). Anyway, in the article, Susan make a great point about one thing b-schools don’t teach you: how to mobilize those around you and persuade them to help you get stuff done.  In the article Susan explains:

“The people who truly succeed in business are the ones who actually have figured out how to mobilize people who are not their direct reports. Everyone can get their direct reports towork for them, but getting people who do not have to give you their time to engage and to support you and to want you to succeed is something that is sorely missing from B-school courses.”

This is a critical GGG concept, what we talk about in the chapter called “Find allies and advocates” in the book. In order to succeed, you need many people your corner who will help you achieve your goals. This could be your boss, your secretary, your coworkers– in your own and different departments; essentially, people who respect you and admire your work and have a role in helping you get your projects and goals accomplished.  If you don’t have any allies in your workplace, start building those relationships STAT!