(Yeah, that’s you.)

1. FIND WHAT YOU LIKE – NO, WHAT YOU LOVE – AND GET GOOD AT IT

Some girls were born knowing they were going to run things and that’s awesome, but it’s really hard to run something you don’t enjoy. So find your passion. It’s ok if it takes you 3, 5, or 100 tries to find your passion. If you’re going to be working 40 hours (let’s be honest, girl bosses work way more than 40 hours per week) on something every single week then you better love it. Are you going to put in all the extra blood, sweat and tears into something you just kind of like? Hell no! You don’t have time for that. So find your passion, work hard, get great at it, and be a girl boss.

2. DREAM BIG AND DON’T RULE ANYTHING OUT

You’re only limited by your dreams. Well, your dreams and your work ethic. As soon as you put a limit on what you can do you are limiting your potential success. But don’t spend all of your time dreaming, you have to actually work the dream. Lying in bed thinking of what you would do to reach your dream isn’t going to make anything happen. It’s a fact. And it’s ok for your dream to change, so don’t say no to a great opportunity just because it’s not exactly what you imagined for yourself. You’ve heard it time and time again – the road to success is not a straight line. So don’t be afraid to stray away from the path you set out for yourself. That side step may just take you to something greater than you could’ve ever dreamed up.

3. LISTEN AND LEARN FROM THOSE WHO CAME BEFORE YOU

Thanks to the Internet and *gasp* real books, there’s so much information at your fingertips so utilize it. Your 20-minute commute to work or class? Use it to listen to some life-changing podcasts. Use your 15 minutes of Instagram scrolling before bed to read the next chapter in your girl boss book. So many girl bosses that came before you have taken the time to share their successes and failures for the next generation of girl bosses so listen and take notes. There’s no sense in making the same mistake twice. Let’s not reinvent the wheel here.

4. SURROUND YOURSELF WITH FELLOW GIRL BOSSES

Find your tribe. Find a big tribe of girl bosses that are going to support you through the ups and downs because there will be lots of ups and downs. And you’ll support them too. You actually want to find two tribes of girl bosses: your professional tribe and your everyday tribe. The professional tribe is made of girl bosses in your industry. They’re there for the advice, connections and even a little healthy competition. The everyday tribe is made of ride-or-die girl bosses who are there with a pint of ice cream when your boyfriend breaks up with you and you can’t even fathom working your hustle. They’ll console you and then get you right back to work. You may find that your best tribe members are in both.

5. BE CONFIDENT, BUT HUMBLE

For women, there’s a fine line between being a boss and being bossy. It’s important to be confident in yourself and in your work, but let’s face it – you don’t know everything and you never will. So don’t act like you do. No matter how successful you become there will still be things for you to learn, so you might as well embrace it now. And being the mean girl may have gotten you what you wanted when you were “running things” on the playground, but in adult world it won’t get you far. People don’t want to work with people that are mean, rude, or inconsiderate. Duh. So pull up your big girl pants and be the kind of person you would want to work tirelessly for and with.

6. JUST START AND EMBRACE FAILURE

Stop waiting for the perfect moment, all the resources, and the carefully mapped plan. It’s not going to happen. It’s never going to be perfect so just start. This is where tip 3 comes in handy. There are plenty of girl bosses that are successful in exactly what you want to be doing so find out where they started and like Nike says, just do it. And then fail, because you will. Sometimes you fail at the one thing you thought you wanted most, but then it leaves opportunity to be hugely successful at something else. So take every failure as a stepping-stone to where you should be going. Remember, every good success story has bumps along the way. And if you don’t believe us about the whole failure thing, hear it from Queen B herself:

“The reality is: sometimes you lose. And you’re never too good to lose. You’re never too big to lose. You’re never too smart to lose. It happens.” - Beyoncé

FOLLOW SOME OF THE GIRL BOSSES OF THE COPPER CLOSET ON INSTAGRAM:

• Danielle Dallas, CEO & Boss Lady: @farewelldanielle
• Halli Bruton, District Administrative Director (Dad): @hallidunn