IT For Generation ‘Me’

Mon, 30 Jun 2008 14:51:12 -0400

Part 1: Who Is Generation Y And Why Do They Matter?

Spoiled. Demanding. Cocky. Fickle. These are just a few of the adjectives commonly used to describe the individuals born somewhere between the late 1970s and the mid-1990s, or Generation Y. Having been raised in the most child-centric era to date, Gen Yers such as myself are often seen as coddled, over praised, and suffering from a massive case of egomania. I’ve heard urban legends of presumptuous Gen Yers requesting six-figure salaries to go along with first jobs out of college, of breaking long-established hierarchies by casually chatting up the CEO, and even bringing their parents along on job interviews. With anecdotes such as these making their way throughout the upper echelons of corporate America, it’s no wonder that my peers and I have earned the moniker ‘Generation Me.’ A truly unique generation, we confound our elders – we speak a language littered with acronyms and abbreviations, we’ve evolved battery-powered appendages, and if one thing is certain, in our world, no institution is sacred. We’ve been raised to challenge authority, to speak our minds, and all along the way our successes have been celebrated with hearty fanfare. And with over 80 million members spending at a rate of $172 billion annually, we’re a force to be reckoned with.

A quick query for the words “Generation Y” on Amazon.com yields thousands of results. Titles such as The World According To Y: Inside The New Adult Generation, Managing Generation Y, and Millennials Rising: The Next Great Generation suggest that this is not a demographic to ignore. With the impending retirement of the Boomer generation, Gen Y is charging into the workplace and employers had better be ready.

Extremely tech-savvy, Gen Y is wired to the hilt and does everything online – shopping, gaming, banking, job hunting, networking, etc. And just because Gen Y is leaving school for the workplace, it doesn’t mean we’re checking our tech habit at the door. We’re a generation of multi-taskers and only truly comfortable when we’re doing ten things at once. Rather than trying to force Gen Y to conform to archaic corporate policies and hierarchies, employers should harness their technological prowess, their insatiable commitment to personal success, and their work ethic in order to get the most out of this new crop of workers.

And marketers would do well to alter their traditional brand recognition methods in order to reach Gen Y. Gen Y has grown up in an ad-saturated world and responds differently to marketing campaigns than their predecessors do. While the Baby Boomers came of age with the television (a device which talks at you while you sit captive, yet uninvolved), Gen Y has come of age with the Internet (which not only allows, but almost demands interactivity from its users). Gen Y wants to feel involved and engaged and brands that are determined to be successful with this audience are leveraging that desire.

Gen Y’s disruptive effect is being felt all over. Our instant gratification, on-demand mentality is changing the way industries do business. While in some cases this effect has proven disastrous (just ask the record industry), for the most part it has spawned innovation and new opportunities for growth. This blog series will explore more about Generation Y and how this powerful demographic will continue to disrupt every institution they encounter.

Green Technology Gains Traction In The Enterprise

Thu, 26 Jun 2008 13:54:16 -0400

Enterprise Customers Want A Green Approach And Vendors Are Listening

According to a report published by the US Environmental Protection Agency, data centers alone consumed about 1.5% of the total energy consumption in the United States in 2006. That’s double what it was in 2001 and it’s expected to double again by 2011 costing about $7.4 billion annually.

Realizing that efficiency and sustainability yield profitability, IBM, which has recently been named the #1 green IT vendor by Computerworld, has launched several green initiatives. A year ago IBM announced Project Big Green committing $1 billion per year to develop products and services for IBM and clients to reduce data center energy consumption – to create the “green data center.” In April 2008, IBM announced a new brand of server for cloud computing called the iDataPlex that not only uses 40% less power than a traditional server, but also uses water-cooling technology reducing the need for air conditioning.

Named by Fortune as one of the 10 green giants, HP is another IT powerhouse making significant inroads toward the greening of IT. HP’s Dynamic Smart Cooling technology claims that enterprises can reduce their cooling costs in the data center by 25-40%. And last November, HP acquired EYP, a consultancy with expertise in energy-efficient data center operations, bolstering HP’s ability to deliver data center services to the enterprise with efficiency in mind. HP has also recently announced research initiatives for HP Labs that will focus exclusively on sustainability.

Sun Microsystems is another major infrastructure IT player taking initiative to offer green products and services. Sun invests about $2 billion a year in research and development toward eco-friendly solutions. Sun boasts that the latest in its line of energy-efficient, CoolThreads blade servers outperforms those of its competitors in both memory and I/O capacity. In addition to green products, Sun offers a range of data center consulting services to assess enterprise data center conditions and to outline a plan to optimize energy usage and cooling.

Green concerns are increasingly more important to enterprise customers. According to data from Forrester Research, 50% of users surveyed said that their company takes environmental criteria into consideration during their IT procurement process. This percentage will only grow as energy prices continue to climb, the federal government enacts more stringent federal regulations, and environmental consciousness becomes more mainstream.

Tech M&A Talk | Updata Advisors

IT For Generation ‘Me’

Green Technology Gains Traction In The Enterprise

See Also