Why Millenials Are Different

I bought a new book over the weekend last weekend, called The World is Flat,and it's a revamped (3.0) version of Thomas Friedman's (of The Lexus and the Olive Tree fame) original book released in 2005. I just started it, but the first part of the book provides a review of the forces that he calls "world flatteners" or things that he thinks brought the world together. 

One of the main things that he cites as a "world flattener" is the power of communities, and beyond that the power of uploading and "community developed software" or, as it is more commonly known, crowd-sourcing. He uses examples of companies like Apache, which was created by some guys who just wanted the freedom to progress and evolve without the bureaucracy by syncing up with other like-minded smart guys all around the world. The question that Friedman gets to is, "If crowd sourcing is the future, then innovation will begin moving away from being profit-driven to being recognition-driven." He got this interesting response from Microsoft founder, Bill Gates, who said:

You need capitalism [to drive innovation]. To have [a movement] that says innovation dos not deserve an economic reward is contrary to where the world is going. When I talk to the Chinese, they dream of starting a company. They are not thinking, 'I will be a barber during the day and do free software at night'...When you have a security crisis in your [software] system, you don't want to say, 'Where is the guy at the barbershop?'

 Although I think that he has exaggerated a bit here, I see his point. If there's no economic incentive, there's no drive for progress. If there's no drive for progress, then crowd-sourcing can't possibly be the model of the future. However, I want to caution against this mentality because there is one fact that is not being taken into account here. Millenials are Different.

I've referred to it before, but Millenials are just different- studies all over the place have shown that they fundamentally think about work differently. A study conducted by GenBlending states that there are three main trends in working with Gen Y:

1. A Desire for Significance. Boomer have worked for 30 years to achieve success and now are turning their energies to achieving significance. Gen Yers, however, won’t wait for twenty or thirty years to feel like they’ve made an impact. They want to achieve significance now. Employers must rethink job design and provide innovative opportunities to have a significant stake in the outcomes.
   
2. A Zealousness for Improvement. Status quo will tempt them to go. Status quo is contrary to all they have ever been taught. They were urged to question everything; to constantly think about possible improvements and enhancements, ways to make things better, faster, more innovative. Employers must teach their managers how to effectively engage their thinking and more effectively listen to their ideas.
   
3. Trust is a Must. This is a generation that intensely dislikes to be micromanaged. Not because of their dislike for oversight, but more from the standpoint that micromanagement conveys a lack of trust; and that is a red flag for this generation. Trust is a must. Employers must work on ways to create stronger trust at all management-employee levels and between teams and departments. Expect this generation to have a much greater sense of self-management than previous generations. 

Based on what we know here, it seems pretty clear that Gen Y is mostly motivated by recognition and significance more than profit, so I wouldn't be so sure that the future of the economy won't move toward a less-profit driven model. When we compare the generational differences with Maslow's hierarchy of needs, for one reason or another (some argue its because of the lack of direct violence during our childhoods), we see that Gen Y/Millenials are concerned with self-actualization more than anything else. Whereas our parents were more concerned with love and belonging, asking "Where do I belong?", Millenials are more likely to ask "How can I make a difference?". In a quick experiment, go ahead and ask a Boomer what they take into account when thinking about changing jobs, almost guaranteed they'll ask questions like "Do I have strong relationships here?", "Have I been at this company for a long time/How much have I invested into this firm?" whereas Millenials are more likely to ask "What has the company given me?" and "Have I done anything significant at this firm?". 

So to loop back to Gates' indignant rejection of the future of our economy- I'm just not that convinced that this is such a ridiculous idea after all. Although it's probably true that community based progress will not be THE main model, I do believe that it will become A main model because of its draw for the emerging generation. Community-based cloud evolution isn't that crazy after all...