I’m not trying to cause a big s-s-sensation,
I’m just talkin’ ’bout my g-g-g-generation…
I am skeptical that “talkin’ ’bout my generation” is a helpful thing to do. I don’t actually know to which generation I belong. I was born in 1963, a year which by all accounts is on the generational edge. Some experts lump all Boomers into a group of 71 million in the United States alone. Others divide Boomers into two segments, the first starting around 1943 or 1944 and ending at 1954 or 1955, depending on which marketing website you visit. Likewise, the second segment ends in 1960, 1964, or 1965 depending on the analyst. And while Gen-X gets squeezed between Boomers and Millennials, it starts anywhere between 1960-1966 and ends somewhere between 1977 and 1980. I don’t know if I am Boomer, a “Generation Jones” or a member of Gen-X.
Confusing things further is my personal experience, which has been far different from the generalizations made by marketing analysts and sociologists. The choices I made as a teenager prevented me from joining in the affluence of my generation, which along with other factors means that while I actually had the information to join in on the ground floor of Yahoo! and Google, those same choices prevented me from exploiting that information. Add to this the fact that my management career has led me to work alongside members of every generation – not just Boomers, but Gen-Xers, Millennials, Silents, and even G.I.s. How I think and what I cherish has been developed by interaction with ALL these generations. Finally, personal circumstances led me to reject much of what those of my age are expected to hold most dear.
And don’t try to dig what we all s-s-say,
talkin’ ’bout my generation
All of this has led me to the belief that the ideas and resulting actions of individuals are far more important than the movements of a generation. Is it important that Steve Jobs was a Boomer, Elon Musk a Gen-Xer, or Mark Zuckerberg a Millennial? Absolutely not. What is important is that each of these men have drastically changed our lives through their contributions to technology. The same can be said about leaders in politics, finance, and religion belonging to the same generations. What matters is the personal contributions they made attempting to make life better, not which generation to which they belong.
Considering all this has helped me see my own generation in a new light. While those who know me can tell you that I am hyper-critical of the Boomer generation, I now realize that generalizations are distinctly unhelpful. I am learning to look toward people of all ages who inspire me to be a better person, husband, employee, boss, and follower of Christ.
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