Postcards

How the power players do it - by Fortune senior editor at large Patricia Sellers

Powerful women fund Gen-Y startup

March 20, 2012: 8:18 AM ET

Caroline Ghosn, Pattie Sellers, and Amanda Pouchot. Photo: Sierra Jiminez

If you're creating a career platform for aspiring Gen-Y women, it's smart to line up star businesswomen as angel investors. Facebook's Sheryl Sandberg, Gilt Groupe's Susan Lyne, and serial entrepreneur Gina Bianchini invested slivers of the $1.25 million that Levo League has raised to get off the ground, but so what that their stakes are tiny? The two young entrepreneurs behind the new site know how to ask for help and how to get attention as well.

Attention toward Levo League is high right now because co-founders Caroline Ghosn and Amanda Pouchot are officially launching their site today. Fortune is the new company's exclusive media partner.

Fortune has no money in the venture but saw an opportunity because Levo League aims to be a sort of LinkedIn (LNKD) for rising-star women. Ghosn, who is 25 years old and the daughter of Nissan (NSANF) and Renault (RNSDF) CEO Carlos Ghosn, met Pouchot, 26, when they both worked as consultants at McKinsey & Co. The two twentysomethings were surprised -- and frustrated -- that the web offered no go-to hub for smart, career-driven types like them.

"We want women who want to be on the Most Powerful Women's list," says Pouchot, referring to the Fortune Most Powerful Women rankings, about Levo League's mission. This is actually the second try at a startup for her and Ghosn. Their first venture, PYP (Pretty Young Professionals), had similar goals as Levo, but infighting led to a split from two other partners. Levo (the Latin root of "elevate") is going more smoothly. With five full-time employees, Ghosn and Pouchot have convinced 100 companies, including AOL (AOL), Pfizer (PFE), and Teach for America, to post job openings on their site. The companies pay a fee, but job-seekers and other visitors use Levo for free.

How did these two twentysomethings get those star businesswomen to invest? Classic networking. A McKinsey colleague introduced Ghosn and Pouchot to Sandberg, who had worked at McKinsey pre-Google (GOOG) and Facebook. A friend of a friend's mom knew Bianchini, who co-founded Ning and is now CEO of Mightybell, another social site. Bianchini introduced the Levo founders to Lyne.

In the next few weeks, you can go on the Levo League site and access select Fortune content about Most Powerful Women, including last October's cover story about Lyne. While Levo is likely to draw mainly a female audience, men are most welcome. Among Levo's 10 investors are a couple of guys who see opportunity. And yes, Carlos Ghosn is betting his money, too.

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About This Author
Pattie Sellers
Patricia Sellers
Senior Editor at Large, Fortune
Executive Director of MPW/Live Content, Time Inc.

Fortune senior editor at large Pattie Sellers has written some of Fortune's most talked-about cover stories, including "Marissa Mayer: Ready to Rumble at Yahoo," "Oprah's Next Act," "Can Meg Whitman Save California?" "The $100 Billion Woman" (Melinda Gates), and "Remodeling Martha" (Martha Stewart). She has helped oversee Fortune's "Most Powerful Women in Business" package every year since its launch in 1998. Pattie is Executive Director of the Fortune Most Powerful Women Summit, the preeminent gathering of women leaders in business and beyond. She oversees MPW programs that enable women leaders to extend their influence and empower the next generation—such as Fortune MPW Entrepreneurs and the Fortune-U.S. State Department Global Women Leaders Mentoring Partnership. Beyond her Fortune duties, she is also developing Live Content across Time Inc. Pattie grew up in Allentown, PA, graduated from the University of Virginia, and started at Fortune in 1984. Her blog, Postcards, is about how power players lead, manage others, and navigate their careers.

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