Today is the tenth anniversary of the little purple pill. Although I personally think that big pharmaceuticals should spend more time trying to cure diseases that are part of the scourge of poverty (like malaria and TB), it is noteworthy that one of the biggest money spinners over the past decade has been Viagra - the erectile dysfunction pill developed by Pfizer.
Viagra is one the best case studies for what companies must do to benefit from the ageing Boomer generation. As the generation born after World War II, who came of age in the swinging 60s, they were never going to be coy about sex, and certainly did not want a mere biological issue like “getting old” stand in the way of their preferred lifestyle. They are a generation that believes in choice - their choice! So, medicines that deal with hair loss, sagging skin, sexual slowdown and other age-related conditions were always going to be successful. Pfizer got there first. Others have - and will continue to - follow.
The Boomers are the “youngest”, healthiest, richest and most powerful retiring generation of all time.
I found a great website today which takes the lampooning of this part of Boomer management lore a step further. And it will save you about $ 25,000 in consultant’s fees, and two days of your time. The Dilbert website has a corporate mission statement generator that does a brilliant job of churning out the standard garbage that most away days do. 
I am not talking about the scourge of child soldiers, ruthlessly recruited by rotten guerrila armies around the world. The Millennial generation are the group of young people born in the digital, wired age. Depending on which definitions you use, these young people were born from 1984, 1989 or 1990 through 2000, 2005 or 2010. In general, these are the children and teenagers of today. And the oldest of them has started finishing school.
A new generation of students - those born Internet-ready - is working it’s way throught the school system, and is about to hit the workplace, with all of its training rooms and courses. This “Millennial generation” (sometimes called “generation Y”) has a distinctive set of characterizing traits and unique learning interests that presents a serious challenge to existing educational institutions and methodologies.
One example of this caught my eye in the latest 
I am sitting in a full day session with Gary Hamel. I didn’t pay enough money to be alone with him, so I am sharing the hall with a few hundred other people, representing many of South Africa’s top corporates and leading businesses. Gary has been great. I enjoy his style (his PowerPoint slides are are shocker, but he is a relaxed and engaging presenter). His content is compelling. He knows his stuff. It’s been woirth the time and money investment.
Here I sit, at another conference without power. Don’t get me wrong - I am not talking about the content. I am at Gary Hamel’s latest thing: “The Future of Management”, a full day session with the innovation guru himself. “Live and in person”, just as the advertising promised! The guy is good, and probably the best academic on the issue of innovation in business. So, the content is great.
Regular readers of this blog will know that many of the contributors are passionate cricket fans. (For our American readers, that’s the mysterious game that, in its purest form lasts five days and can end in an exciting draw!) Our fanaticism for the game is shared by at least 1 billion Indians. The world’s largest democracy has just had an unprecedented auction for international cricket stars, for the newly formed Indian Professional League. In the league, a number of Indian provincial teams get to “buy” international super stars to play with them. Each team can only have a maximum of 4 of these stars on the field at any time. They must also have four players under the age of 22 from India in the teams. The rest of the team is Indian. The bids in the auction will be paid to the player as a salary (I think I saw correctly that the Indian players in each team will be paid the same as the top paid international super star in their team). The contract is for three years.
Today the world wakes up to the most expensive oil ever. Those who believe in market dynamics of supply and demand will have an interesting time explaining this. The problem with oil is not that there isn’t enough oil around, but rather to do with where the available oil is to be found.
In the past six months, a slew of free online services has popped up to answer this question, offering widgets for budgeting, automatic bill pay, mobile alerts, and social networking. All are fighting to be the anti-Quicken. Although Intuit’s venerable personal-finance software commands 70% of the market, its $30 to $100 price tag, hundreds of features, and required hour or two a week of data entry are unlikely to appeal to a generation raised on Halo and diagnosed with ADD. Sure enough, Quicken’s 15 million users have an average age of 47. If personal finance for most folks is like personal hygiene–an unpleasant chore motivated by necessity–Quicken is Old Spice.
People band together online to date, discuss politics or lose weight. Now a US website called 
Pfizer has recently launched a wonderful new initiative for their most talented staff: the outsourcing of the drudge work associated with most jobs. It’s quite a simple concept, really - top end, talented staff spend a fair proportion of their time doing admin or dreary work that does not best utilise their talents. If you could someone else to do that work for them, you’d free up your top talent, keep them focused (and excited) and get more out of them. Nice.
The latest Economist has a short note on an interesting trend: the massive increase in selling prices of artworks. This has been a great investment trend over the past few years. But, now, the trend has hit emerging markets, so to speak. Russian and South African artists, in particular, were singled out in the article (read it 
I get questions every month from businesspeople looking for something about the newest generation of workers. They’d like an updated version of Twentysomething or Beyond Generation X, books I wrote in 1991 and 1996. Along with Bruce Tulgan’s Managing Generation X, they’re the classics on managing and motivating young employees. The thing is, the young employees we were talking about in those three books are well established in the workplace today, and the next generation is showing up with a whole new perspective, a different set of values, a distinctive work ethic. They’re as different from Generation X as they can be. By and large, it’s the Gen-Xers who are managing them, and who are looking for help in understanding just what the Millennials are all about. Thus this article. I think you’ll find a fairly comprehensive treatment of Millennial employees.
This is how new markets are made, and how worlds are changed! Today, Tata released their latest car. It was a car that all of their rivals said could not be made. About 5 years ago, Tata announced that were going to build a car that would cost less than 100,000 rupees, or US$ 2,500 (the price of a DVD player in most luxury cars).
It’s 40 years later! Prepare yourself for a year (or at least a few weeks) of breathless nostalgia as the Baby Boomers put on their misty eyes and remember back to one of their most defining years as young people (and just when you think it’s over, the 30 year reunion of the “summer of ‘69″ will be upon us next year).
The prospect of a Zuma ANC presidency is becoming more and more of a reality and with it a scenario so long feared by the chattering classes. The prospect of a Zuma ANC presidency is becoming more and more of a reality and with it a scenario so long feared by the chattering classes.
Over the years I have been doing presentations about attracting and retaining talent, I have watched global lists of “Best Companies to Work For”. Very consistently, SAS Institute, a privately owned software company based in the USA, has been rated as one of the very best. 
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