Gen Y – Eyes Wide Open or Shut?

Embodiment of Gen X - Kurt Cobain

Gen Y Phenomena - Lady Gaga

A few months ago, I was staffed on a project with a spanking new MBA graduate. To kill some time at the airport, he started asking me about my long-term career aspirations (This is what type A people do for fun). I decided to be honest and save the whole “I would love nothing more than to maximize shareholder value” spiel and told him about my aspirations to pursue my passion in social and environmental sustainability. While most people I’ve told in the firm would nod, inquire some more to be curious (or courteous), and then change the subject, he scrunched his face, nodded, and then blurted out, “Are you serious?”.

My first reaction was to wonder if he skinned puppies in his spare time. However, after careful consideration, I concluded that he was simply speaking the mind that most people conveyed with their nods. Most Gen Xers and Baby Boomers I’ve met in the private sector do not see a social and environmental sustainability as a desireable career trajectory. You should get a “real job”, make money, and feed your family. Committing to social causes should come out of your spare time, your spare change, or your retirement.

Many Gen Yers, on the other hand, do not separate the work you do from the impact you make. They are the same. In fact, I would go as far to say that many Gen Yers believe that your work is meaningless unless it makes an impact. According to a USA Today survey back in 2006, 61% of 13 to 25 year-olds feel personally responsible for making a difference in the world.

As someone who works closely with people in older generations, I find myself often wondering what drives this discrepancy in work-life philosophy. Is it because Gen Yers have grown up with technology and thus information at our fingertips so we can easily learn about what’s happening in Uzbekistan? Is it because the parents of Gen Yers have raised them through positive reinforcement (remember all the “Yes you can!” or “You’re the [insert superlative form of a desirable trait]?), causing Gen Yers to be optimistic and confident in their abilities? Or, is it because Gen Yers are still young so they haven’t realized the economic realities of life? Is it because Gen Yers are still inexperienced so they haven’t recognized the complexities of ending poverty / curbing climate change / curing cancer?

Personally, I think the answer is “Yes” to all the above. We simultaneously informed and uninformed. We can learn about how to start a non-profit organization online, but we have yet to fully understand how to run an effective and scaleable organization. But it is this combination of one eye open and one eye shut that makes us stellar candidates to jump head first and to steer our overpopulated, resource imbalanced, and intensely polluted world in a better direction. But we also need the help of Gen Xers and Baby Boomers. We need their pragmatism, experience, and resources to help us become the most effective and socially conscious generation.

Colorado Springs: No meat and no trash

PETA offers to put pro-vegan trash cans in Colorado Spring parks

The city of Colorado Springs removed all of its trash cans because it ran out of money to pick up the garbage. Enter their environmental savior – PETA???  PETA, typically a highly controversial animal activist group, offered to cough up the cash and put the trash cans back under one condition – the cans had to be covered with models clad in lettuce (a less risque version featured above), promoting vegetarianism. Apparently, it’s part of PETA’s recent “Lettuce Ladies” campaign, which they have pedestrian and well-known models (Pam Anderson, Elizabeth Berkley) posing in lettuce “bikinis.” (In case you’re curious: http://www.lettuceladies.com) This website provides information and tips on becoming a vegetarian while informing you the turn-on’s (e.g.,pleather shoes) and turn-off’s (e.g., milk) of these lettuce ladies.

Let’s hope these lettuce lady trash cans won’t be brimming with Big Mac and KFC wrappers.

Songs that set back (and advance) the human race

The artist known as Ludacris

So I was listening to the car radio this past weekend, and I found myself simultaneously jamming and cringing to Ludacris’ newest piece of work, “How Low.” “She could go lower than I ever really thought she could,” he raps, “Face down, a$$ up!”

All of a sudden, I find myself flooded with memories of his other songs, including “you’s a Ho”, “move b*tch get out the way” and “ho’s in different area codes.” I guess he encounters a lot of ho’s or just likes to degrade women. But even if he is surrounded by ho’s, they are people too. Therefore, it makes me think about all the songs that we bump and grind mindlessly to while they do nothing but send messages that impede social progress (interpreted as achieving common goals of development with full respect for individual freedom and dignity).

Here are some songs that I think just completely thwarts any social advancement we’ve made in at least the past 50 years.

Songs that set back the human race

• Mind of a Lunatic, Geto Boys: There are so many things wrong with these lyrics that I can’t even begin. I’ll let you see for yourself: “Her body’s beautiful, so I’m thinking rape / Shouldn’t have had her curtains open, so that’s her fate / Leavin out her house, grabbed the b*tch by the mouth / Drug her back in, slammed her down the couch / Whipped out my knife, said, “If you scream, I’m cutting” / Opened her legs and commenced the f*ckin”

• Let me smell your dick, Riskay: The song title explains it all. What self-respecting woman would ask a question like that?

• Kim, Eminem: I love listening to Eminem when I’m running, especially “Till I Collapse” and “Lose Yourself,” because they motivate me. But this song about his twisted relationship with his ex-wife. From this song, you learn that Kim has cheated on him (and apparently he cheated on her too), but in Eminem’s world the punishment for cheating is death, so he says, “Now shut the f*ck up and get what’s comin’ to you / You were supposed to love me / Now bleed b*tch, bleed / Bleed b*tch, bleed.” Can I say hypocrite?

• Pimpin Ain’t Easy, Big Daddy Kane: Usually it’s just the ladies that get picked on in songs, but Big Daddy Kane apparently also discriminates based on sexuality: “ The big daddy law is anti-f*ggot / That means no homosexuality.” Good thing he doesn’t have his own country and legal system.

• A Milli, Lil Wayne: These lyrics should be a warning to all potential conquests of Lil Wayne: “Don’t you hate a shy b*tch? / Yeah I ate a shy b*tch / She ain’t shy no more, she changed her name to my b*tch” I suppose oral sex can lead to slavery.

Despite the plethora of songs that degrade people, especially women, there are songs that actually promote social progress.

Songs that your kids and grandkids should be listening to

• RESPECT, Aretha Franklin: Ludacris and other violent / sexist / racist / homophobic artists should listen to what Ms. Franklin has to say: “R-E-S-P-E-C-T / Find out what it means to me.”

• War, Bob Marley: As a product himself of a multicultural union (his dad was white and his mom was black), he not only advocates but also represents peace between different races: “Until, the philosophy / Which old one race superior and another / inferior / is finally / and permanently / discredited / and abandoned / everywhere is war.” Can’t we all just get along?

• I Can, Nas: Despite being an eighth-grade drop out, Nas has achieved financial success earning more than $5 million (although his ex-wife Kelis, who is claiming child support, says he’s worth more than $10 million). In this song and video, he preaches to young children about the value of hard work, so anyone from any background can “Be what I want to be / If I work hard at it / I’ll be where I want to be.”

• Sunday Bloody Sunday, U2: Humanitarian and renaissance man, Bono, wrote this song to describe the 1972 Bloody Sunday incident in Northern Ireland where British troops shot and killed civil rights marchers. U2, especially early in their careers, had a staunch anti-war stance with lyrics that question the merits of war and violence: “And the battle’s just begun / There’s many lost but tell me who has won.”

• Baby Got Back, Sir Mix-A-Lot: There are two sides to this coin, but I appreciate that Sir Mix-A-Lot isn’t down with Cosmo magazine calling bootilicious ladies fat.

Preparing for a Corporate “Green” Takeover

Recently, I have been staffed on an internal project to jumpstart our company’s embarrassingly minimal efforts in sustainability. The tasks at hand include figuring out our current carbon footprint and as well as to develop mitigation plans and office-based initiatives to lower our emissions.

I admit. For a green geek like me, this project sounds pretty sexy. Plus, since it would incredibly ironic to engage in my normal weekly travel (Monday flights out and Thursday flights back), I get to work from home while I’m on this project. Nothing like wearing the PJ’s and eating cereal out of the box while presenting on a conference call. Ahhhhh…the life!

But implementing large scale change, especially ones that start with shaping cultural attitudes, is nothing short of difficult. To illustrate, here’s an exchange I recently had with a partner in our firm about the project.

Partner: Sooo…what are you working on these days?

Me: I’m staffed on the internal carbon project.

Partner: Why are you wasting your time on that? You should be staffed on a real project. All that green talk is just hot air.

Me: [Refraining from hocking a loogie into his eye while carefully selecting my next set of words] Well….it’s been a tremendous learning experience so far on a fascinating topic.

Partner: Let’s get you staffed on something that makes money.

Although I wish that partner was an exception, but as my conservative firm would have it, his attitude is the general rule.

That’s why we’re taking baby steps. Ok…maybe fetus steps. To make the overall efforts less of an ear sore for others, we’re first eliminating the terminology “green” and changing it to “sustainability.” It’s now the sustainability team, sustainability newsletter, sustainability website, and so on. A few months back, some daring New Yorkers from the NYC office tried calling themselves the “Green Gurus,” based on the reaction it caused you would’ve thought they were calling themselves “Hilter lovers.” To ensure we don’t alienate firm leaders, we had no choice but to neuter some of our supporters of their offensive language, such as “green” and “recycle.”

So the strategy we’re taking is three pronged. (As you can see, since I’m a management consultant, I’m programmed to have a 3 point proposal.) First, rally support from rogue liberals from offices around the world to amass and enlist an enormous number of people as a part of the sustainability team. (Power in numbers.) Second, we’re going to position these sustainability efforts in terms that the firm leadership can understand. (Environmental sustainabilty is a big concern of many of our clients. Therefore, if we become more sustainable and build expertise in this area, that would translate to more moolah for their already overflowing pockets.) Third, we’re benchmarking what our competitors are doing in sustainability in hopes of shaming our fearless leaders to act quickly.

Firm leadership be prepared. The green sustainability team is on the rise.