Are we really incompetent? Are we a lost cause?
After viewing a recent report on Fox5 news in Washington DC, I decided to give my own take on this very relevant subject that is very aligned to the Secret Entourage mindset. Before I tell you my take on the future of Generation Y, I want you to understand more about why Generation Y is perceived as reckless and incompetent to some…
There are a few things that do need to change about Generation Y in order for this generation to be the one to change the world rather than help it go down in flames. Generation Y currently is faced with three major issues, issues that could potentially harm all of our futures if not addressed and fixed quickly.Keep in mind that not all of these apply to everyone, however they do apply to most that are part of this Generation. I, myself, am part of Gen Y but simply don’t fall into this category.
1. We expect instant gratification: This is our greatest flaw. Most Gen Y’s expect reward without real work. Known for their weaknesses in falling for pyramid schemes / MLM programs simply due to the fact that making lots of money without work seems to be their growth model. This is both a positive and a negative, as much time can be wasted pursuing something that doesn’t exist like an empty dream of making millions and doing very little work for it.
2. We are industry experts or pretend to be: Just because we hear something on the news or read something on a blog and it clicks with us, we become industry experts and push that opinion on others. In other words, we preach something we just learned and speak of it as an opinion despite it never having been our own and we don’t back it up factually cause it would take too much work.
3. We don’t value history enough, therefore don’t plan ahead: There are so many financial events that repeat themselves and yet it seems like we are never prepared for them, its simply because most of us live day by day, and not such much for the past, present and future which creates problems as we transform from people with growth potential to survivors that simply eat, play and sleep never increasing their game to the next level.
4. We spend and don’t save. This is by far one of the worst qualities found in most Gen Y’s. We love to wastefully spend and simply have no value for money or its importance. Many of us have backing through families that worked hard to accumulate wealth so this cushion exists for some of us that makes it feel like savings is unnecessary as long as we get what we want when we want it.
But WHO are we…
I always have this analogy that I talk to my car friends about our Generation to put this in perspective for them… 10 years ago, we liked cars and started driving them and owning them. We used to hang out at local fast food joints and everyone used to roll their Honda and Acuras, others with muscle cars and then started the craziness of tuning and its mainstream street appeal… Then, suddenly you don’t see any more Hondas and Acuras tuned on the streets, especially none of the new generations as they were in the past and many of those tuning shops went out of business, others evolved to tune other things that are not Japanese… Then suddenly comes this craze 3 years later that is all high end European BMW and Mercedes and the tuning continued but evolved to more precise and expensive levels…. But now this has not ended unlike the Japanese market, instead it has taken two shapes. One that continues to tune high end European and the other that evolved into the Exotic car market. All these changes are not new generations interested in the same tuning parts, these are all Generation Y’s evolution through the car markets as we evolved in the job market.
Here is how I see it…
Like it or not there are two sides to Generation Y, those that get it and those that will get it late BUT all will get it at some point.
Those that fail to get it are those that always put a negative twist on everything, pretend to have money, talk a big game when they have nothing, and dream so large without a real plan. Their plan is to follow anothers footsteps into success but the problem is that because they are industry experts after reading two lines, they believe all they read so they don’t question things as they want to believe in this business of getting rich quick. These are the exact people that should be on Secret Entourage daily, so they get educated and change their perspective on life and growth and not so much follow a guy that works at Primerica and earns nothing but yet tells people he makes 30K a month and drives a 97 Maxima.
Those that get it, will use their negatives to turn them into positives… We may not want to work hard the rest of our lives in Corporate America to make average money, but we are not going to sit back and wish for a miracle, we are going to do something about it and create or build something that we can use to leverage our dreams. We are the creators of Facebook, MySpace and many other online resources, all of which may be looked at entertainment by some but are really unbelievable innovations that have shaken and redefined the world of business and how it is perceived. We may not like to save but we will spend openly on things that matter to our growth instead of clubs and drinks, and by being willing to spend, we take risk which can be turned into profit. Despite not really being industry experts we will take time to research things that interest us on a deeper level, and then will really become industry experts, unlike our counterparts that read one line, we will read the entire book… We are that rare breed that drives exotic cars at a young age, that same breed that gets looked at by every old person as arrogant, and misbehaved because we know how to enjoy and celebrate our success, this is the Gen Y that will lead this economy into innovation and change.
There is a lot of real potential that can and will come from Gen Y, some of it already has but the only way we can drive our economy forward is if more of us wake up and stop wasting time but instead become leaders and drive our own lives everyday.
