In the nine months since I stopped blogging about nonprofit conversations and ideas, many of you have been inquiring, “What happened?” There were thousands of regular readers. Thank you for your concern.
I am not dead. Or sick.
However, I have given birth to something new. I now have a different profession. And I have written a book. During this transition and professional re-creation, I have had to fight harder than at any moment in my life. Boomers, as strategists and creative people, are becoming endangered and widely dismissed. My generation is at the whim of a society now in an obsessive fascination and hot pursuit of all things Millennial.
I am at war with those who are stamping an early expiration date upon my generation’s talents. Talk about an injustice and a cause. Ageism is a vile form of discrimination. It will affect 100 percent of the population in every generation who does not die early. I have had to fight ageism as a creative person for the last five years. I finally found the path of victory.
I am certainly not against Millennials and the critical skills they bring to the table. We Boomers need to embrace what they know. But they and the world must understand what critical skills Boomers bring to the table, talents that scintillate with the wisdom and experience of years. Both generations need these skills to be integrated for what society needs.
My new profession, executive manager of Third Space Initiative at the USC Annenberg School of Communication and Journalism.
Five years ago, I began to teach the most creative of the Millennial generation, as an adjunct professor in the Masters in Communications Management program at Annenberg. Teaching this group from all over the world has been the most wonderful professional experience.
Recently the Dean of Annenberg, Dr. Ernest Wilson III, asked me to assume the leadership of an initiative he created called Third Space, a global re-conceptualization of what the role of Ccommunications should be in a digital-driven world, how communications assumes center stage and its importance in the process of innovation. My responsibilities, under the direction and in collaboration with the Dean, are the creation of dynamic, interactive Third Space workshops, and the facilitation of those seminars within Fortune 500 companies and major organizations. While we will be spreading Third Space thinking to these businesses, we will be opening up possibility for new talent to enter the marketplace as Annenberg students are educated in Third Space thinking.
So far the list of business interactions with Third Space, that we are establishing, extends across the largest international corporations. Learning community organizing from the nonprofit world, I identified and assembled members of an Advisory Board, communication leaders in the community who, together with the Dean, are helping me.
My forthcoming book, “The Boomer Rebellion,” shines a spotlight on the injustice of ageism and the casting of Boomers as now irrelevant in society, whether professionally, personally or as social activists.
The book advocates that Boomers return to their 1960s roots of protest, bringing the generation back together through rising up against the issue of ageism, taking it on as our legacy accomplishment to change the world.
In the second half of the book, the manifesto, I build the Rebellion through 10 big ideas that will have the power to capture the imagination of thousands, moving digitally to activate masses of people in multiple generations.
The Boomer Rebellion demonstrates how creativity now trumps strategy, and that big risk-taking ideas are the engine of change. No cause or business can be built today without creativity seizing the lead, followed by the implementation of big, risk taking ideas.
Laced through the book is “The Journey,” my own struggle facing hard realities and learning how to transition from being branded irrelevent to emerging as vital and in-demand.
Mr. Wexler is responsible for the design of a seminar product and training for business executives, as well as the marketing, administration and implementation of all Third Space creations. He may be contacted at garywexler.com
