Hello yeah! At a Burning Man picnic with the man of the hour, Larry Harvey. (Taken with Instagram at Meridian Hill Park) View high resolution

Hello yeah! At a Burning Man picnic with the man of the hour, Larry Harvey. (Taken with Instagram at Meridian Hill Park)

Wasting minutes to save pennies. Gas lines in the #FourthTurning. 

Not requiring children to learn cursive … and a perspective through the lens of generational theory. Short version: The Homeland Generation experiences being “smothered” in childhood by the environment GenX parents / adults / GenX-run institutions touching children’s lives. Nomads (today’s GenX) - neglected in childhood by the Artists (Silent Gen), raise the next generation of Artists (Homelanders) who will, when they are adults in mid-life, once again “smother” the children they raise … and so it goes.

Why are Deborah and Janet so successful?

A couple of years ago, I wrote a post about the cyclical naming of babies and how generations and Turnings (per Strauss and Howe) impacts popular baby names. A few days ago this earlier post came to mind when I came across an article about the most popular baby girls’ names in 2009. (These would be the Homeland generation: the generation that shares the same archetype as the Silent generation, born 1924-1942.)

Check this out. Notice how the names sound to your ears and the image that you have with the personality that would match such a name.

  1. Isabella
  2. Emma
  3. Olivia
  4. Ava
  5. Sophia
  6. Madison
  7. Chloe
  8. Abigail
  9. Emily
  10. Addison
  11. Ella
  12. Lilly
  13. Mia
  14. Alexis
  15. Grace

Then look at the most popular female names of 1999, when Millennials were winding down but still Millennials. More Glamour Girl (my child is special) names. Listen to how the names sound and the personality you’d associate — sight unseen — with such a name.

  1. Emily
  2. Sarah
  3. Brianna
  4. Samantha
  5. Hailey
  6. Ashley
  7. Kaitlyn
  8. Madison
  9. Hannah
  10. Alexis
  11. Jessica
  12. Alyssa
  13. Abigail
  14. Kayla
  15. Megan

***

Fast Company has an article based on Linkedin data in which it claims the best names to name your baby and future CEO. In my eyes, this article would be much more valuable were the author and the good people at Linkedin to have given generational theory its due. The article (per Linkedin’s data) concludes the most-likely-to-be-CEO female’s names are –

  1. Deborah
  2. Sally
  3. Debra
  4. Cynthia
  5. Carolyn
  6. Pamela
  7. Ann
  8. Cheryl
  9. Linda
  10. Janet

Hmmm, let’s see. Most female (not male) CEOs are in their 50s. So what if we go back and find the most popular female baby names in 1959. (These would be the tail-end of Boomers.) There’s some correlation between popular names for baby girls some 50+ years ago and the more-common names of 50-something female CEOs today. Duh.

  1. Mary
  2. Susan
  3. Linda
  4. Karen
  5. Donna
  6. Patricia
  7. Debra
  8. Cynthia
  9. Deborah
  10. Lisa
  11. Barbara
  12. Pamela
  13. Sandra
  14. Nancy
  15. Kathy

And, not to leave the GenXers out of the conversation, I looked at the top female baby names in 1971 (GenXers are born 1961-1981, so this is the mid-point in the generation).

  1. Jennifer
  2. Michelle
  3. Lisa
  4. Kimberly
  5. Amy
  6. Angela
  7. Melissa
  8. Tammy
  9. Mary
  10. Julie
  11. Stephanie
  12. Heather
  13. Tracy
  14. Dawn
  15. Karen

Cyclical time. Cultural turnings. Rising trends and fading fashions. These things are part of the experience here on this lovely planet. Always there is something being born, something rising up, something being solid and powerful and something fading and moving toward death. To my mind, and as I continue to study generational theory, I find the (approximately) 20-year turnings that occur each time a new generation moves into young adulthood, one of the more compelling, informative and insightful bodies of work.

I like bald-headed men. A couple days ago, I was watching (salivating over) the ipad 2 promo video. I noticed a lot of baldness on the spokes-guys. That handsome kind of baldness … and it got me thinking about how generational archetypes approach life phases. One of the core experiences of the Prophet generation (today’s Boomers) is that they first fight a new phase of life and deny the personal implications, then they embrace it, call it Good, and shift cultural attention to their current phase of life and the wisdom/value/awesomeness that only they can impart about Where They Are In Life. (Love ya guys … hope you can laugh at yourselves a bit.) Remember all those Rogaine and Hair Club for Men commercials? My GenX young adulthood years were filled with them. Now, I understant that it was Boomer men in mid-life (42-62) fighting against (how Boomer) their transition to midlife. And as I remember it, hints of baldness on men — except for a few who could carry it off with panache — was not hot. It was anything but: long wispy strands of hair combed over bald tops, toupees, hair plug plants, 50-year-old men with bad hair dye-jobs. You get the picture. Come GenXers into midlife and look at the cultural shift toward baldness. (Remember, GenXers are born 1961-1981 and are 30-50 years of age in 2010.) Bald guys are hot. Even men in their early 30s often shave their heads. It’s a look. It’s a statement. And it’s common. Being bald  — which for most men is really an act of embracing hair loss and “the inevitable” by shaving off their thinning hair — is taking a step forward, rather than fighting progress (in accumulated years). It’s an “I am what I am” thing. When I tweeted the other day about the iPad promo video and the preponderance of bald (and/or really close-shaven) men in the video, a friend sent me a link to this song: Bald-headed Men. It’s kind of an ode to bald-headed men and the women who love them.

I like bald-headed men.

A couple days ago, I was watching (salivating over) the ipad 2 promo video. I noticed a lot of baldness on the spokes-guys. That handsome kind of baldness … and it got me thinking about how generational archetypes approach life phases.

One of the core experiences of the Prophet generation (today’s Boomers) is that they first fight a new phase of life and deny the personal implications, then they embrace it, call it Good, and shift cultural attention to their current phase of life and the wisdom/value/awesomeness that only they can impart about Where They Are In Life. (Love ya guys … hope you can laugh at yourselves a bit.)

Remember all those Rogaine and Hair Club for Men commercials? My GenX young adulthood years were filled with them. Now, I understant that it was Boomer men in mid-life (42-62) fighting against (how Boomer) their transition to midlife. And as I remember it, hints of baldness on men — except for a few who could carry it off with panache — was not hot. It was anything but: long wispy strands of hair combed over bald tops, toupees, hair plug plants, 50-year-old men with bad hair dye-jobs. You get the picture.

Come GenXers into midlife and look at the cultural shift toward baldness. (Remember, GenXers are born 1961-1981 and are 30-50 years of age in 2010.) Bald guys are hot. Even men in their early 30s often shave their heads. It’s a look. It’s a statement. And it’s common. Being bald  — which for most men is really an act of embracing hair loss and “the inevitable” by shaving off their thinning hair — is taking a step forward, rather than fighting progress (in accumulated years). It’s an “I am what I am” thing.

When I tweeted the other day about the iPad promo video and the preponderance of bald (and/or really close-shaven) men in the video, a friend sent me a link to this song: Bald-headed Men. It’s kind of an ode to bald-headed men and the women who love them.

Deals for Deeds

There’s Groupon. There’s Living Social. And if you live in the Bay Area, there seems to be a new iteration each week of the let’s-buy-together coupon approach. I’ve used both Groupon and Living Social, but am a bit bored by the same sort of offering: Let’s all buy and we’ll save. I mean, it’s cool, and different, and I like it, but it’s so repetitive that my interest in these sites plummeted quickly.

Then I discovered Deals for Deeds. They take the Groupon model but funnel some of the profit back to a local (key point to remember) charity. And they’re city-focused.

Does this have Millennial written all over it, or what!

Together (Buy collectively). Save (as in money)/Save (as in “help.”) Local (Millennials come behind GenXers who repatriated decimated cities and they bring brightness and smiling faces to the city.)

In Deals for Deeds … Gone are the big picture, generic, meaningful “save the world” messages of their Boomer parents. Repurposed is the GenX make-money-fast technology and tool that has proved rather successful for Groupon and Living Social. Refreshed is the perspective made possible through their Millennial world view.

And here’s what I find wonderful, smart and perfectly Millennial, they set specific and measurable goals, reach them and celebrate them. Remember, this is the generation that “rebelled” by not only meeting adults’ high expectations but excelled. (Employers take note: This generation likes clear, measurable, standardized steps to success.)

Their website is worth a look. Not only because it’s a smart and upbeat business, but because it is a window into what is possible with Millennial talent and perspective.

Having a good time!

How I so wish to get my hands on a decade-by-decade summary of “fresh” TV commercials for the last 60+ years. GE’s recent spate of dance-happy commercials is one that has certainly caught my eye.

The whole line dance, “we’re all together in unison” (yet each with our own bit of style) approach to corporate branding is so specific to the Fourth Turning and an era in which Millennials (the Hero generation) define the mood of the era. Millennials are The Common Man generation. They are the “we can make it through and have some ‘good times’ ” generation. They are also a generation that orients toward large, known brands.

Can you even imagine, twenty years ago when young adult GenX attitudes defined the era’s mood, that you’d ever see a commercial with several hundred people doing a line dance? For a behemoth corporation such as GE, no less? It would never have happened! Can you imagine how vile and hypocritical GE’s dancing elephant (Singing in the Rain) commercial would have seemed 20 years ago? And, yet, today, it seems rather right for the times.

In generational theory, the generation in young adulthood defines the mood of the era. And, that, folks, in the Fourth Turning, is the Millennials, the happy, singing campers; the uniform-wearing, bright-eyed good kids.

As is natural, cyclical and  balancing in generational progression, it’s rather refreshing to me to see a new vibe of young adulthood after 20 years of GenX’s free-market, cynical, Xtreme behavior/style/taste.

Rock on. Or should I say, dance on …

My commentary: GenXers are all about market transactions. While Boomers are about values, vision and inner inquiry — and that’s cool — it’s not what juices GenXers. Transactions, baby. Market transactions. You do this. I do that. We agree, we have a deal. We don’t agree, no deal. Check this out!  ***** newsweek: In a fit of trying to make parents more responsible, Florida state Rep. Kelli Stargel recently introduced a bill where public school teachers would be required to grade the parents of their students in Kindergarten through third grade.  Yes, you read that right…the parents. She’s all over the blogosphere and cable talk shows pitching her idea. “We have student accountability, we have teacher accountability, and we have administration accountability,” Stargel said. “This was the missing link, which was, look at the parent and making sure the parents are held accountable.”

My commentary: GenXers are all about market transactions. While Boomers are about values, vision and inner inquiry — and that’s cool — it’s not what juices GenXers. Transactions, baby. Market transactions. You do this. I do that. We agree, we have a deal. We don’t agree, no deal.

Check this out! 

*****

newsweek:

In a fit of trying to make parents more responsible, Florida state Rep. Kelli Stargel recently introduced a bill where public school teachers would be required to grade the parents of their students in Kindergarten through third grade.  Yes, you read that right…the parents. She’s all over the blogosphere and cable talk shows pitching her idea.

“We have student accountability, we have teacher accountability, and we have administration accountability,” Stargel said. “This was the missing link, which was, look at the parent and making sure the parents are held accountable.”

(Reblogged from newsweek)
When I first saw the ads for Men of a Certain Age, I was curious. See, I — an early wave GenXer born in 1963 — am “a woman of a certain age.” I thought/figured/assumed the show was a GenX creation that naturally arose from the shift occurring in America’s culture as all the generations moving up into a new phase of life. Then I saw the photos and looked more closely at the actors. Ack! In my eyes I saw one GenXer and two Boomers, and a quick fact check proved me right. Worse, the show is touted as being about “a group of college buddies keep their friendship going long after they’ve graduated.” Alas, the actors are born in 1954, 1957 and 1962, which makes them — in real life — anything but college buddies or in the same age range. Still a little curious, tonight I watched the show for a few minutes but felt no vibe toward it. No chemistry/energy/hilarity or complexity that connected me to the show. I’m curious to know about my generational cohorts in mid-life and how my generation — like each one before it and each one after — will define mid-life in its own way. But I didn’t find many clues from the show. This mix-matched casting of a show about a phase of life but one that mixes the generations of its cast is a missed opportunity in my view. On my pulpit I stand again: knowing the work of Strauss and Howe and understanding that generations are defined not by demographers but by a “shared age location in time” is the juice and the magic in understanding so much of the change, the trends, the challenges and the possibilities that await communities, businesses and governments. Strauss. And. Howe.

When I first saw the ads for Men of a Certain Age, I was curious. See, I — an early wave GenXer born in 1963 — am “a woman of a certain age.” I thought/figured/assumed the show was a GenX creation that naturally arose from the shift occurring in America’s culture as all the generations moving up into a new phase of life.

Then I saw the photos and looked more closely at the actors.

Ack! In my eyes I saw one GenXer and two Boomers, and a quick fact check proved me right. Worse, the show is touted as being about “a group of college buddies keep their friendship going long after they’ve graduated.” Alas, the actors are born in 1954, 1957 and 1962, which makes them — in real life — anything but college buddies or in the same age range.

Still a little curious, tonight I watched the show for a few minutes but felt no vibe toward it. No chemistry/energy/hilarity or complexity that connected me to the show. I’m curious to know about my generational cohorts in mid-life and how my generation — like each one before it and each one after — will define mid-life in its own way. But I didn’t find many clues from the show.

This mix-matched casting of a show about a phase of life but one that mixes the generations of its cast is a missed opportunity in my view. On my pulpit I stand again: knowing the work of Strauss and Howe and understanding that generations are defined not by demographers but by a “shared age location in time” is the juice and the magic in understanding so much of the change, the trends, the challenges and the possibilities that await communities, businesses and governments.

Strauss. And. Howe.

Nonprofit orgs raising funds on eBay

My guess is you’d find a GenXer behind this idea: The Arc of Butte County has an eBay store and sells antiques, clothing and collectibles as a fundraiser for their organization. Arc chapters are found across the U.S., if not beyond, and serving developmentally disabled and/or mentally retarded people and their families.

Why do I think a GenXer is most likely behind this? Because GenXers, as a generation, move through life never quite trusting institutions to be stable or there to serve them. So they’re always cobbling together solutions that make them less dependent on institutional structures. Come the “economic crisis” and “declining tax revenues” … and now many a nonprofit organization and human service agency find themselves dependent upon significant government funds that are not as abundant and forthcoming as in prior years.

Hey, this is not as big of a problem when you’ve got GenXers at the helm. The mindset of this generation is often actually a bit relieved when things are more broken than others previously believed. And solutions abound if you just know where to look

I love the Ebay store idea as it uses an existing resource (very GenX), is market-oriented rather than needy (sales vs pleading for funds), is environmentally tender reuses items and finds continued value in “the discarded”) and opens up a market outside of the Big Players and Corporate Chain Stores (niche markets, long tail are very GenX orientations). 

Granted, the Arc, and all Arcs, need and get government funds. And their work tends to be good work by good people for a population that the government needs to provide some government funding for services. Still and all, being at the mercy of government funding and philanthropy is a passive position. Having a Ebay store, even if it only makes a percent or two of their revenue is a step in a direction away from full reliance on never-fully-trustworthy (to GenXers) governments and institutions.