Leaders of the past would love to be in our shoes. Leaders of the past would love to have the opportunities the generations that have to live beyond the box.
Every generation has had individuals who live beyond the box, people who did things differently. I subsequently changed the world, whether it be through music, running a business or creditfree.
These individuals transformed the way humans behave. Not many of us in this room would have lived through the groundbreaking events of the 20th century, but we live with and benefit from the changes they brought about and I’m sure.
We all admire the works of Martin Luther King and Rosa Parks. How both they and the civil rights movement the world creating meaningful and lasting change? They are just two examples of people who live beyond the box, so here’s, a question for you: can you imagine the impact leaders of the past would have had if they were born within generations.
Ed generations, ed of the cohort born between 1995 to 2010, we’ve, become the first limitless generation, a generation who no longer needs to create a full strategy. In order to reach an influence, thousands of people, we just create a tweet think of the power this holds.
Every single gender has a platform with which they can voice their opinions and ideas. I mean you only need to open your phone, and you ‘ Ll, probably find any one of your friends talking about a trending news topic as if they were a some sort of expert.
This concept alone takes our entire generation and puts us beyond the box. Why? Well? Because my parents grew up being told you’ll, be seen and not heard, whereas I’m growing up in a generation where I can reach a thousand people like that so instantly our generation is super different.
But what does this mean for a gender? Well, it means that for the first time ever, we are able to pursue our passions at any location at any time with any identity but, most importantly to any uncapped level.
Let’s. Take a look at the world of music: firstly, learning music, a usefully super-expensive. It leaves us without surprise that here in the UK, the Royal College of Music in London has the highest number of privately educated students of any university in the UK.
At fifty five point – nine percent, which is staggering compared to the national average of seven percent, but this is changing. Now education is more accessible than ever before, who, here, hasn’t been educated by the school of YouTube free of charge? If you have a passion you can pursue it, education and money is less of a restriction, but looking at music, specifically, there are other seismic shifts that have caused the industry to change.
For example, previously, in looking to make a career out of music, you needed a label there’s, a fundamental requirement. It required you to reach out to the right people to then have your music invested in.
Only then could you go out to the masses. Well, you would be hidden behind a PR team. They created your narrative, they push for you to have sets on TV and radio. They grew your following you, the artists were just a small cog in the machine.
You were firmly positioned within the box, but now now we’re, seeing Jen’s, editors grow huge followings and gain huge success of the music from their bedroom, a bedroom that’s, probably in their parents house.
But these individuals, aren’t just artists. They’re, lyricists publishers, tour manager, PR team, backing vocals bass; guitar, they do it all and they don’t even need to leave their bedroom. So no longer are we just a small cog within a machine.
We, the entire ecosystem, in which the machine is placed. I’m sure we all have a dozen or so friends who regularly upload music to streaming sites, probably for fun. What’s really interesting is out of those dozen you’ve, probably got two or three who receive tens of thousands of views, which means that for the first time ever, a young person is able to derive an income from their passion.
I mean previously, if you was 16 and you wanted to make an income from music, let’s say you’ve had to go busking on a street corner, practically begging for cash, but now we don ‘ T need to ask our passions in this case, music are being seen by enough people to be deserving of an earning and its own right, and I want to reiterate: this is not uncommon.
One example would be: a friend has had a piece of music go platinum on a streaming site, and this has led to him winning a prestigious place at the world’s leading music school. He was just pursuing his passion using the opportunities available to him, creating music in a niche area that he enjoyed listening to and now he creates music on a professional basis, but it’s, not just in music, where we are following our dreams and Our dreams are subsequently gaining us a following, but we’re, seeing gen zetas pursue modeling acting journalism, comedy even athletics, and these are just some examples of passions and potential careers that generations that are pursuing, while still in school.
But it goes beyond just careers or just making a bit of extra pocket money. Gens letters are now even starting businesses. Did you know that the cost of 10 business failures today is the same as one business failure 10 years ago, so the roadblocks for Gen zeros in terms of starting a business have been lifted.
One challenge that even I faced was you look young right, so people judge you based on what they see not on what you say. They look at you and instantly write you off, because, just by looking at you, they’re, going to presumably have no real-world experience whatever that means, but gen Zed is now thanks to online platforms, able to show their passion and knowledge for a field Without age discrimination, but it goes beyond that: it’s, not just how we look is how we’re, programmed it’s, not just the 2d.
It’s, the 3d. We are programmed so differently to any part generation. We are growing up super savvy. We are all marketing experts and we’ve all been developing a personal brand from the minute we join social media.
So what does this mean? Well, the new world has been molding us into these mini Trailblazers, and we don’t even realize it, because to us is all natural, so it probably leaves us without surprise that 70 % of Jan’s.
Edwyn surveyed said they want to start their own business and statistically 15 % of them will do it before they leave high school, but the real amazement comes from those who are going beyond enterprise to even starting charities.
Can you believe it young people starting charities? Now, starting a charity site which seems unimaginable and securing government funding that’s, a different world away, but everywhere you look within generations ed.
There are young people doing it. Every imaginable issue agenda is running a campaign of some sort: oh Sh in plastic. Mental health, animal rights, you name it there is a gens etta, promoting and unifying the voice of young people, but why they doing it? Is it because for the first time ever, we ‘
Ve actually got a platform to voice our opinions, or is it because for the first time ever we are being brought up told you can do this voice your opinion. We want to hear what you think. So when we look at stories like Greta Sundberg, maybe we’re left without surprise that Greta thumb burg.
A leading climate change activists who recently spoke to our MPs in the UK, calling for fast and real action, explained that Britain has an absurd response to climate change, even arguing that our future has been sold for us now.
Greta thumb burg, slotted, the school strike for client movement in August 2018, and this has since taken off gravely let’s. Just take a step back for a second Greta Thun burg. A fifteen year old at the time started a movement initially by skipping school and six months later, this movement has taken off to become a worldwide phenomenon.
Not only is Griffin mobilizing thousands across the world, but she’s influencing millions via the Internet. She’s, influencing discussions in multiple Parliament’s around the world and influencing new movements to form all around the world.
Due to her inspiration, Greta is the perfect example of a generations. Ad campaign gone well generations. Ed campaigns are groundswell of genuineness. Now thousands of new genset campaigns do slot every single day because it’s so easy to do so.
A lot of what is produced is often empty. By that I mean it lacks substance. So how many times have you seen a company use charity as a vehicle in order for them to gain hype and sales for their company? So if you’re, a gens etta or someone looking to attract Gen Z, you need to be really careful because gens that are more astute than ever it ‘
S said that we have an 8-second attention span, meaning that anything generic simply does not stand out if the ABS we swipe on. So if you’re, a musician looking to gain a following or a business owner, looking to gain sales – or maybe you’re, the leader of a movement wanting to grip Generation Z, you need to be socially aware promoting a 100 % Authentic message and that message needs to be consistent, because if it’s, not Jen said we ‘
Ll, see right through you. Some people may question you know. Is this opportunity for everyone to create a campaign or mass, actually a good thing, but, in my eyes, is truly awesome? Never before has there been more competition, but what that means is, if you have the ability to stand out.
That means whatever you’re doing, is really special. It’s, something which maybe is a one in a generation campaign. So if you’re standing out, people are buying into your movement. People are supporting your motion.
Your potential reach is now infinite, thanks to mainly platforms like social media, so young people now have the opportunity to do bigger things than ever before. Small people can now do incomprehensibly, big things.
So when we generations had come together for a collective cause, we don’t just leave the box behind we blow it out of the water. But that brings me back to my original question. Can you imagine the impact leaders of the past would have had if they were born with a generation said? Could the suffragettes of 1907, who recruited 50,000 members in the UK, have instead recruited 55 million across the world or could the bus boycotts of Montgomery in 1955 have instead been the bus boycotts of the United States of America? The world is changing an ever-increasing pace.
The fabric of life progressed more in the 19th century than the two previous centuries combined the 20th century, even quicker, still led first by industry, then technology and in the latter half of the century.
Obviously there was a huge push for equality across the board, namely with the civil rights movement, but now we’re progressing at a quicker rate than ever since the year 2000. In just the last 19 years, we have seen the development of cars that drive themselves, computers that teach themselves currencies sustained by algorithms, with no further human input.
We’ve even had medical discoveries, notably with stem cell research and arguably the coolest. We’ve, taken a photo of a black hole, so you name it it’s happening. We’re living rapid change, but not only are we living rapid change, we’re driving it.
There are some queries if it’s that easy. Why isn’t every gender, a multi-millionaire or a leading activist? In fact, if gens that are so impressive, why they only influencing government and not running government? Maybe it’s, because we’re, not currently utilizing the opportunities we’ve got out our fingertips on mass sure.
Some people are using them and we’re, seeing more and more young people creating and driving change than ever before from a younger age. But how can we encourage more to make the most of this opportunity? Are you, are you using your opportunity to live beyond the box? It’s tricky by no means do we have the perfect hand, we have new expectations.
We are expected to be wise beyond our years. We are expected to be a force for good and we are expected to be a global citizen all whilst being ourselves by no means two generations that have the perfect hand we haven’t know easier than any other generation.
We just face different challenges, but then again you could argue that other generations, don’t, have the same opportunities that generations that have so surely we’re in a better position. If you look at it that way now I really do want to emphasize.
This is not a social media talk. I’m, not here to say that social media is what has made Gen Z, so amazing, because it’s way more than social media, but what online platforms have allowed us to do is we can now create, learn, try, fail and Publish in an easier way than ever before, which is meaning that we’re developing skills and traits that kids, our age have never historically been able to develop, because these are traits you would have only been able to develop.
Once you’re in the working world, so this new world around us is allowing us to mold into more mature human beings. I mean it. The we’re able to pursue our passions in a more impactful way than ever before generations.
Ed, you have no limits, have a look at the leaders of the past, whether it be the modern-day leaders, amel gonzales, married Courtney or Greta thon Berg, or compare them to Thomas Edison Rosa Parks, those kind of leaders, all of them had one commonality passion.
They had a genuine passion for their field, so if you as a gen setter, have a genuine passion for your field. Embrace this opportunity, you’ve, got to live beyond the box, because I have no doubt that leaders of the past would love to be in your shoes.
