Embracing a “Very Millennial” Career Path
Some may describe millennials as “job hoppers” but one thing we can thank them for is something that benefits us all—a drive to make work more flexible and meaningful.
Author and motivational speaker Brit Barron—age 36—has done both, and very successfully.
“My career is very traditionally ‘millennial,’” the Girl Scout alum explains. “I’ve had many roads and journeys. I do multiple things that don’t necessarily go together but come together to create the exact professional life that I want.”
She is very aware that hers is the first generation to see careers as fluid. Her grandfather once suggested she stay in a job indefinitely because it had health insurance. Brit laughed because she understood the difference between the way millennials and boomers look at work, and she had learned at an early age that there are different routes to the same destination.
“In college, I would say to my professors, ‘Is there any time we could grab lunch or get coffee? I want to hear your stories,’” Brit recalls. “One time I presented in front of the board at my university. I went to every board member and asked them if we could get lunch. Two of them said yes.”
What she learned from these conversations was that every person “had a different road map” and it gave her confidence in her choices as she followed her heart.
“I’m going to make it work to do all the things that matter to me,” she says, adding that turning interests into revenue is also a “very millennial” way to work.
Brit is someone who brings enthusiasm to everything she does. For example, on the morning of her first day as a Girl Scout Daisy, she woke her parents up at 5 a.m., fully dressed in the uniform, beaming, and excited to start the day.
“In evangelical households, if you have an outgoing personality, you’re told you should be a pastor,” Brit laughs.
Brit went to Azusa Pacific University, a small evangelical Christian university outside of Pasadena, California, where she studied psychology. At age 26, she became a pastor at an evangelical megachurch in Los Angeles. There, she met her now-wife, Sammy, a fellow employee. By the time she was 30 they had fallen in love, come out together … and found themselves out of a job together.
“Falling in love for the first time with this incredible woman was so delightful but it truly meant absolutely everything changing,” she explains.
Today, Brit sees the evolution of her sexuality and self-awareness as being paramount to her professional evolution.
“Being a queer person has been a gift to my life,” she says. “It was my biggest teacher.”
After leaving the church, she parlayed her skills into an academic position.
“Anti-racism work was always part of my work as a pastor so the first job I took after that was the director of an African American resource center at a nearby state school.”
It was there that she realized that this was the work she wanted to do. However, she wanted to do it in her own way. Brit has been self-employed ever since.
“My wife and I started a company that houses all of the work that we do. Anti-racism work and queer identity training with companies, writing, public speaking, and keynotes,” she explains.
An opportunity to do a Ted Talk about race in 2016 led Brit to several new clients. But in the summer 2020, she found more companies had the budget for anti-racism experts and the business grew quickly by word-of-mouth.
In 2020, she also wrote a book, Worth It, which was published by Broadleaf Books.
“I said to a friend, ‘I feel like I am just throwing spaghetti against the wall to see what sticks.’ She said, ‘I don’t think that’s a bad thing,’” Brit recalls.
“I think she’s right. In the past ten years there have been ten versions of my career and I would consider them all successful. That’s my style of entrepreneurship; I’m always going to be hungry for something different and fresh.”
