A new era

This months newsletter caused a stir, so here is the full article from trendwatching.com
GENERATION G | "Captures the growing importance of 'generosity' as a leading societal and business mindset. As consumers are disgusted with greed and its current dire consequences for the economy—and while that same upheaval has them longing more than ever for institutions that care—the need for more generosity beautifully coincides with the ongoing (and pre-recession) emergence of an online-fueled culture of individuals who share, give, engage, create and collaborate in large numbers.

In fact, for many, sharing a passion and receiving recognition have replaced 'taking' as the new status symbol. Businesses should follow this societal/behavioral shift, however much it may oppose their decades-old devotion to me, myself and I.”

Three trend-drivers for GENERATION G:

1. Recession and consumer disgust
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Photo courtesy of vxla

The current financial meltdown has led consumers to be more disgusted than ever (if that’s even possible) with greedy corporate execs who just don’t care. Many in the corporate world are so far removed from what is now an immensely better informed, more opinionated consumer arena, that their (non-)communications, their (inter-)actions, their entire behavior is deeply out of tune with what consumers want and expect in the years to come.

This didn’t happen overnight of course. The financial crisis was just the straw that broke the camel's back: consumers’ negative and raw emotions stem from too many brands who decided to stop caring a long time ago. In most cases, this starts at the top, with share-price-obsessed execs not generous to (or caring for) their employees, who in turn stop giving a damn about actual customers*.

Some fun (US) stats from Reputation Garage:

* As few as 13% of all Americans place their trust in big business (and it's not much higher for other mature consumer societies!).
* Only 39% of employees in a Watson Wyatt survey said they trusted senior leadership.
* Some three-quarters of US consumers feel that companies don’t tell the truth in advertising.
* Three-quarters of employees in big companies observed violations of the law or company standards in a 12-month period.

* Now, there are of course brands and executives who do get it, and those tend to be the ones that pop up as leading examples in our trend briefings ;-)
2. Longing for institutions that care
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And yet...the need for the opposite of greed (that would be generosity!) is never greater than in challenging times. Challenging times see people craving care, empathy, sympathy and generosity. Now, with a full-blown recession having set in, expect to hear even more about caring, as that’s what consumers and citizens will demand from governments and organizations: someone to take care of their jobs, their savings, their fellow citizens. This need becomes extra poignant in societies where individualism is the new religion, and thus every person, young and old, rich and poor, has been told by society that he or she matters as an individual.
3. For individuals, giving is already the new taking, and sharing is the new giving
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However, in essence, GENERATION G isn't about anger and recessions: the larger and more lasting trend is passionate, empowered individuals (if not entire generations) being more willing and able to give, to share, to collaborate; to be more ‘generous’ in many ways. Which in turn has made generosity one of a new set of status symbols.
Rich individuals

For a long time, in the world of the super-wealthy, not engaging in a little philanthropy has meant a serious loss in status. Over the past few years, billionaires logoaround the world have been upping the ante for other financially independent individuals by giving away really big chunks if not all of their fortunes. In fact, it's impossible these days to be very rich and not to donate uber-generously to charity: the benefit to one's social capital completely trumps the monetary gains from keeping one's financial capital sitting in an account. Being generous is seen as a class act, while greed is, well, out.
Now, will the rich donate less to charities in difficult times? Of course. But while economic prosperity dictates the size of gifts and donations, generous behavior has already become the long-term norm.
Any individuals

But. The most important driver behind GENERATION G is a wide variety of consumers and citizens being more generous. We're talking the collaborative / free / creation / crowdsourced / gift / sharing movement* that—especially online—has unlocked in entirely new ways the perennial need of individuals to be appreciated, to be loved, to feel part of the greater good, to contribute, to help... To basically find status and gratification in something other than consuming the most or the best.

Don't think this a passing phenomenon: younger generations practically live online, while over the last dozen or so years, virtually every prediction of how the web would infiltrate the 'offline' world has proven too conservative. As our favorite online guru, Kevin Kelly, rightly stated a few years ago: ‘online culture is the culture’.

So... Everything seems to have aligned to make generosity (“liberality in giving or willingness to give”) a leading theme in the business arena this year. As always, companies can learn from consumers, though it's not a 'want' but a 'need': companies need to mirror this societal shift if they want to regain their relevancy. We’re talking truly becoming a caring brand—one that is generous to customers, generous to employees, generous to the environment, generous to social causes, and so on. We know you know this: GENERATION G is more about context and timing than out-of-the-blue insights.