Generation Now

The one thing I hear a lot of recently is people referring to the next generation of people coming in to businesses. They tend to have lots of names ranging from the New Millennials, Generation Y or even the Facebook generation. Whatever you call them, the one thing that I do know is the undeniable effect that are having on businesses throughout the world.

I have recently returned from the Microsoft World Wide Partner Conference (WPC) in Orlando and during the keynote speech from Satya Nadella he played a video about North American Eagle, a company who are working to break the British land speed record. What the most remarkable thing about this video was not the awesome speed that would excite any petrol head, nor was it the technology and analytics capability that would excite even the dullest of techies, but for me the most unbelievable part was the IT Director. Why I hear you ask? The answer is simple, look at his picture below.

 

This is a kid who can be no older than 25 is not only the IT director but is responsible for a multi-million project that could potentially change the world forever. Crazy right? Well perhaps not. 

IT has changed so dramatically in the last 5 years that even the most technically savvy people are struggling to keep up with the pace of change. This is why companies like North American Eagle and my company Cloudamour are now looking for the next generation of people to help grow our businesses because they just get technology and understand how empowering it is. It’s sewn in to their DNA and the sooner businesses understand this, the sooner they can start to really benefit from their perspective and capabilities.

I am proud to say that apprentices account for 20% of my workforce and if you needed any examples of the positive effects they have had then you only need to know that we've gone from Start-Up to the Microsoft World Wide Cloud Partner of the year in 2 years (no land speed record but it's quick!).

Whilst I was thinking about this blog, I woke up this morning for my daily consumption of Twitter. After skimming through a few posts I was greeted by a newly released video from Microsoft promoting Windows 10. For me this really drummed home the importance of employing the next generation of kids as well as clearly demonstrating how IT is rapidly changing. Check out the video below.

What is really exciting for me is that I have recently had the honour of being asked to join an elite group of business leaders called Trailblazers which is a Government initiative that are responsible for defining apprenticeship standards. Suffice to say If I was excited before WPC, I cannot describe how energised I feel now; I mean I could be responsible for helping the next Brandyn Bayes!

In summary this is no longer about Generation X or even Generation Y, this is Generation NOW and if you don’t start adopting a policy around employing them, the only people that will be breaking records are your competitors!


Mitchell Feldman – CEO & Founder of Cloudamour - @feldmannews

For more information on Cloudamour - https://cloudamour.com For more information on trailblazers - http://bit.ly/1fhLf7f
For more information on North American Eagle - http://www.landspeed.com
For more information about Windows 10 - http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/10