Book Review: When Generations Collide

This book is worth reading as an introduction to the problems of generational conflicts within the workplace. Written in 2002, it unfortunately misses some of the more interesting developments of the 2000s, such as the conversations that have been going on within NASA. The full title of this book is When Generations Collide: Who They Are. Why They Clash. How to Solve the Generational Puzzle at Work. It was written by Lynne C. Lancaster (a Boomer) and David Stillman (a Gen-Xer), who have formed a consulting business called BridgeWorks, which helps businesses cope with multiple generations in the workplace. The book and the company cover the typical Human Resources issues that can come up, including personality clashes, hiring, retention, departures, training, and benefits.

Aside from being informative (but very generalized...we're talking about groups of people, after all, not individuals), When Generations Collide is also entertaining, as it provides real-world examples from Lynne and David's work interactions (they couldn't stand each other when they first met). The book also provides examples from the workplace that really help the reader understand how differences in expectations up and down the generations can create tension or misunderstandings.

It might or might not surprise the reader to learn that the primary differences between the generations (Millennials, Generation X, Baby Boomers, and Traditionalists--a combination of the Silent Generation and Greatest Generation) concern questions of values. And here, I think, is where the book shines, because it demonstrates how those values express themselves across a variety of work situations, from communication style to giving feedback to defining "retirement." The authors also make the point that these clashes directly affect both turnover and the bottom line. With multiple generations likely to fill the workplace for years to come (the Boomers aren't going away silently...heck, my Silent Generation parents are all still working), this problem isn't going away any time soon.

One of my readers, Rolando, has written a couple of thoughtful emails in response to my postings, one of them on the generational issue. I believe When Generations Collide answers one of his questions:

I really would appreciate any advice you have on "what management wants to hear?" OR "How does management like to hear things?"

It is not so much the first question where the book can help as the second question. The point is not to tell you what to think or even how, but more about how you express yourself, whatever generation you are. Again, understanding that these are generalities (for instance, I behave and think a lot more like a Traditionalist or Boomer in some things, very much like the Xer in others), here are the guiding emphases for the four primary working generations:

• Traditionalists (born 1900-1945): "Build a legacy." The emphasis for this group is on long-term loyalty to the organization, doing a good job, and moving up the traditional ladder. Growing up in a mostly male or white-male-dominated military-style culture, they tend to just say, "Yes, sir," and go do the job, whatever it is, with a minimum of complaint, fuss, or talk.
• Baby Boomers (born 1946-1965): "Build a stellar career." With such a large generation competing for work, the Boomers are very competitive, with their elders and peers. Because of their sheer number of peers, emphasis on idealism (they were taught that they could do anything), and their willingness to challenge authority, the Boomers were able to change some aspects of the stoic Traditionalists's organizations. They tend to be very protocol-oriented and status-conscious since they had to "play the game" and compete to get ahead.
• Generation X (born 1966-1980): "Build a portable career." Growing up in a period when many institutions were under assault, changing, or falling apart (example: the divorce rate tripled during this period, with my own family being one of the casualties), Xers do not have a great deal of faith in institutions as a whole. As a result, Xers tend to build up a set of transferrable skills so that they can be "safe," regardless of where they end up. In the workplace, they are often "looking out for number one," but are willing to join teams if said teams offer a minimum of time wasting. They are almost natural-born consultants and are uncomfortable in positions of leadership.
• Generation Y/Millennials (born 1980-2000): "Build parallel careers." For the most part, this generation has grown up in a period of plenty under the tutelage of affluent Baby Boomer parents. This affluence and Boomer influence means that Millennials have been ingrained with the notion of a multi-faceted, "well-rounded" resume. Over-programmed at times, Millennials grew up with not just academics, but also sports, group memberships, dance, and travel experiences. Raised in more democratic households, Millennials often had a voice in family decisions, so they are used to giving feedback to adults, receiving feedback, and being listened to. In the workplace, this translates into a very short or nonexistent period of wanting to give input into the running of businesses ("dues paying" grates on them), but they also tend to be more loyal than Gen-Xers if they are provided with work that offers many different types of tasks and that is meaningful to them.

If you found yourself nodding in agreement to any or all of these, you have some idea of what sorts of challenges are ahead for America's working generations. Again, I recommend this book as an introduction to the generational puzzle and as a starting point for thinking about communication styles. There are interesting times ahead, and education needs to happen at all levels for improvements to be made.

Transforming NASA

Again, some great comments from my readers: https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=3124283&postID=2398902107051507476. My responses are below.

Madi:

I particularly liked this:

I personally don't take major issue with our hierarchical structure and believe that it's essential in being an effective organization, especially given our size. I believe the question should actually be: "How do you transform the organization, into one where employees can openly contribute, in all facets of organizational operations?"

And this...

As an organization, we have leaders who have a vast amount of experience combined and are in positions to make decisions based on their knowledge and those very experiences

We do indeed have many, many smart people within NASA--our Gray Eminences who built Apollo and Shuttle; the next generation of managers, who are leading the current projects like Constellation, Ares, Orion, LRO, Kepler, etc.; and the new generation, who is gung-ho to bring in the dot-com ethos and a lot of new toys to the table to make things move more quickly. All of these experience bases need to be integrated in an environment of continued budget wariness, economic uncertainty, and increased activity in the private sector, which is understandably trying to recruit the best-and-brightest, wherever they can find them.

I also liked Tim's idea for a "NASA 101" class. Disney had something similar--a couple somethings, actually:

• "Disney Traditions," which is a basic indoctrination into the Disney culture and is, I believe, required of all cast members at Walt Disney World.
• "Disney University," where managers and salaried employees (independent contributors) learn the basics about budgets, HR compliance, marketing, etc. After 16 classes, I got a certificate of some kind that indicated I'd taken the relevant courses.

I also liked this from Tim:

The other important factor is to have managers trained in effectively evaluating advice from less-experienced employees. Clear expectations and a defined process for evaluating (and enacting!) new ideas are critical to empowering the employees. The whole system of training, evaluation, and feedback must be in place to support systemic changes in the organization.

Not sure what that would look like, but if I'm reading it correctly, it's an opportunity for every new employee to act and think like a consultant and for management to exchange ideas.

I did download and read the "Next 20 Years" article Nick recommended. It is useful reading, and nearly worth the $6.95 I paid for it. There are obviously other forces at work on NASA than just generations being born, making their impact, and retiring.

• We have the current recession, which might cause some folks to hold off on retirement
• An ongoing war overseas, which has increased concerns about the security of our cutting-edge technologies and reduced the number of tech-savvy foreign nationals who come here to stay
• A decline in the number of students studying STEM disciplines, which is constraining the "pipeline" for qualified scientists, engineers, etc.

It is, indeed, an exciting time to be in the space business, but that excitement is both positive and negative. There is great promise but also great uncertainty, and the challenges at hand are many-faceted. I've heard concerns that if NASA starts reviewing its overall mission or function, there is the likelihood that programs could be cut. This overlooks the potential that the discussions might improve the public's reception of the space program and might result in an increase the budget to do all the things currently on the agency's plate and more.

So, in addition to Madi's rephrasing of my previous question...

How do you transform the organization, into one where employees can openly contribute, in all facets of organizational operations?

We might also ask:

Assuming the agency makes this transformation, what should NASA do? This is a question for the agency and its employees, but also the taxpayers and our elected leadership.

Lots to do: where to start?

Following Up On Gen Y and NASA

Yesterday's posting on the latest "Gen Y presentation" produced some great, thought-provoking comments. Nick's response deserves to be quoted and responded to, so I'll do that below and try to comment where I think appropriate.

Re: “bigger challenges

”If you have any insight into what those “bigger challenges” are, I’d love to hear them. We’re actually going through a process of sorts right now to identify them and I’d really like to get you involved in those discussions.

Another reader comment from "1963" actually anticipated some of my thoughts:

Perhaps I'm just another grumpy old man, but sometimes these Gen-Y inputs sound like folks who demand to be respected before they have paid any dues that can be respected. While it takes smarts to come up with a good idea, it takes wisdom to know how to get it implemented in a large, political bureaucracy. And while we can complain and wish that NASA wasn't a large, political bureaucracy - the reality is what it is, and the odds of it changing are low. But does that mean we give up? Or does that mean we use our smarts to work the politics in our favor?

Here's what work comes down to for me: performance, process, politics, and people.

• Performance boils down to the content: do you know your stuff? Are you conversant enough with the actual work being performed? Depending on the complexity of your job, mastery of it could take anywhere from one hour to one month to one year to a lifetime. I look at this shakedown part of a job as ending when I know enough to understand the tasks and boundaries expected of the content. No one respects "the new guy" until s/he has been around long enough to know the business and make positive contributions. In some jobs, the new-guy perspective is wanted/valued/respected up front (consultants come to mind), while in others a "new guy" might be anyone with less than 10 years of experience. I've heard of such organizations, and the only way to win them over is to get down enough of the language to let the others know you can speak it.
• Processes are the things one must do to function in the organization: do you know where to get office supplies? Do you know how to get information from one group or another? Do you know which forms must be used to accomplish tasks?
• Politics are pretty straightforward as well: what are the organizational and power relationships within a particular work group? Woe to the newbie who starts talking about their politics or telling jokes in the first week without a complete understanding of the local norms. Office politics also define the boundaries of how you advance your own agenda (once you understand the content and the processes).
• People are who you have to work with, day in and day out. Do you understand what drives your coworkers? Do you know who knows what you need to know? Knowledge of individual motivations can be different from political knowledge. You might find someone who plays a very smooth political game, but once you get to know them one on one, you might find that they hate the game but play it out of sheer self-defense. This doesn't mean being best-buddies with everyone in the office, but it does mean having more than a vague realization of the other personalities in the room.

The point of all these basic definitions is that you need a knowledge of all of them to be truly effective in any workplace. And, as I was a pain-in-the-neck twentysomething 15-odd years ago, I can tell you that I learned most of these lessons the hard way by trying to do or fix things MY way first without bothering to learn the way things worked around me. I get the whole youthful enthusiasm thing and the desire to change the world and fix things that are obviously broken right now. However (again, after butting heads with more than a few managers in the hospitality and defense industries), I eventually had to learn to slow down, find out why things operated the way they did, and then figure out the most effective way to use the system as it is to move things in a more positive direction.

Admittedly, this is my personal approach, and might not work with everyone. However, I sometimes sense that youthful impatience in the presentations OpenNASA produces, and I've talked to enough people (like 1963) to know that Gen Y's desire to come in and fix/change things without "learning the system" or "paying their dues" can grate. Obviously, the world is changing and Gen X and the Boomers aren't getting any younger. But the Xers and the Boomers have been with the organization a bit longer, and so have a better handle on what's going on, how to get things done, and what to expect of this or that decision/idea. And there's also seniority to consider. Some people are not eager to be shown the door to make room for someone half their age, especially in the middle of a recession. I'm not saying that's what you're saying, but that's how some people perceive the presentations.

One thing I've noted especially among the young is a distinct impatience with "war stories," those long rambles that can come out of the mouth of older folks (you know--anyone over 30) about some event way back in the Dark Ages (like, the 1990s). Eyes roll, sighs blow forth, and the youth crosses their arms, hoping the lecture or story will end soon. But those stories are a great deal of how human beings and institutions carry on institutional knowledge. I've heard folks talk until they're blue in the face about "knowledge management systems" and "collecting lessons learned," but the fact remains that if someone's got a question about a particular type of problem, they're more likely to march down the hall, collar an old-timer ("graybeard" being the un-PC term) and ask, "Hey, how did you solve X on Shuttle/Apollo?"

I don't think the impatience problem is a particularly Gen Y problem. Like I said, I had it myself. It's just something to think about. It's not all about the new toys/technologies. Sometimes it's about the stories and the relationships you build. One thing I'd like to see NASA try is a pairing-up of graybeard mentors with rookie engineers/scientists as a living means of knowledge transfer.

Re: “brain heavy”

That’s an interesting point. I made this presentation in particular with the Digital Astronaut (DA) project in mind – which, is brain heavy. Academics, scientists, doctors, and all that stuff. I’ll give some more thought to your observation but one thought I have on this subject is even the folks “bending metal, installing wiring, turning wrenches, and welding structures” have ideas they’d love to share. In fact, those ideas are some of the most valuable ones you can get because they are the ones who are “doing it.”

Good point. My "four P's" above would apply to this group as well.

I think there’s a pretty big misconception behind the “Gen Y” label and how it’s been spun that’s its all about the technology and fancy web 2.0 gadgets. That’s not how I see it for sure, and as a project manager, my goal with DA is going to be able to figure out how to utilize the functionality of collaborative technology without creating barriers for people to contribute. It’s a starting point, not an ending point, and something I know will take quite a bit of continuous iteration to get right. That will probably mean not using all the bells and whistles on whatever website we put up. It will also mean augmenting whatever we do with other ways of interaction. I definitely get that and it’s a big part of our plan. I’ll try to do a better job of spelling that out next time – heck, maybe that’s a whole other presentation in itself. Hmm….

Okay, that makes sense. But, again, some people might not be comfortable with your new digital environment. I experienced one of my first neo-Luddite moments this week when I learned that I've got to transition from Office 2003 to 2007, which has a completely different interface for Microsoft Word. Okay, go ahead and laugh, but I've been using the same interface professionally, with moderate changes over the years, since 1996. That's 13 years of using the same program, but by golly, I know the system I've got, and can play it like a Stradivarius. Now I've got to readjust all of my usual keyboard and mouse rhythms. My productivity will drop for a few weeks (or months) as I spend time deciphering the new menus, taking classes to learn a whole new set of shortcuts, and in general grousing about the evils of Bill Gates and his merry band of outlaw programmers. All I'd ask is that you consider the user habits of other (older) audiences.

Re: Contributions

You talked about how these tools will enable people to make fundamentally better contributions than they might make f2f. That’s something that I flush out more verbally in the talk itself, and hopefully I’ll find some time to write those notes up into a post on opennasa.com sometime soon, but essentially… yes. Again, I’ll go back to the DA project. Even the team I work with is spread out across the country. I wish we werent’ because we all much prefer F2F meetings. Part of what we are building will be built out of necessity for us to collaborate on our own project! I think that’s great and will really
help drive out the requirements, which will help us clearly articulate exactly what contributions we are looking for. We hope to have this flushed out when we launch a few months from now. But one of the major goals of the DA is to gather input from scientists, coders, doctors, students, academics, and people from all over the place. The contributions themselves can be in a few different buckets, including improving the actual code structure of the model, adding to the knowledge base behind the model, and building on the “hypothesis” of the model to run experiments and simulations and ultimately help us develop countermeasures and buy down the risk of sending humans on long duration space flights. Our eventual website will have the audiences clearly defined as well as what contributions we’re looking for. It will no doubt be a big challenge, but also one that would be immensely valuable if we can accomplish it because it won’t be just NASA funded scientists and engineers looking at the problem any more, but others as well. I’m convinced that broadening our scope of input will
help provide better solutions in the end.

Re: Global Marketplace

I think DA is a good example of what this can look like for NASA. Not everything can be out their for external collaboration for the reasons you highlighted. But there is a portion of what we do that can. If we open up the items in our work portfolio that can be collaborated on publicly, it would help us leverage our already overworked internal resources. The DA is about human physiology and science. There’s a huge reliance on knowledge from the medical profession, which is an opportune thing to open up to an outside community of collaborators.

Re: moving forward

If you’ve been following the discussion as Bart and I have, you hear a lot of feedback given that we need concrete examples of what this looks like at NASA (versus just talking about it). Although I do think there is a lot of education and awareness that also needs to be done (hence the presentations), I couldn’t agree more. Unfortunately, its not as easy as just being able to implement some of this stuff for the average joe at NASA for a host of reasons. Luckily, I’m in a place now that I really have an opportunity (and authority) to share a knowledge asset (the computational model that is DA) with the world and work with others on further developing the body of knowledge and digital
analogue for all to use. My hope is that not only will NASA benefit, but that people around the world will benefit by using DA as an “innovation incubator” of sorts. I see the government’s role as one of an integrator of knowledge and a facilitator of collaboration – ultimately providing the right ingredients to enable innovation and keep pushing science and exploration forward. The idea of a lone genius, sitting in his office cubicle, coming up with “the great idea” is mysterious and romantic, but maybe a bit unrealistic. True innovation happens when you have knowledge brokers taking even old tried ideas, and applying them in new ways. I’m hoping the DA helps make that happen.

When it comes to making better contributions, the primary arguments I've read--on NASAWatch and elsewhere--focus on "Showing me the money." We need high-power, high-efficiency, high-capability, low-weight spacecraft and launch vehicles. How will DA or other collaborative enviroments bring about those results? Back up those answers with data, and your agenda will move forward swiftly.

I look forward to viewing DA in more detail. Again, I would like to throw in a recommendation or two from a technical writer's point of view.

• Who is your audience? I'm guessing web-minded people, yes? Well, that will probably mean a younger audience, meaning you might lose an older audience. You need to consider alternate delivery methods for those of us addicted to hard copies. Booklets, handouts, white papers, and other more traditional media, while passé in some quarters, are still traditional and acceptable media for conveying messages within NASA.
• Also, what do you want your audience to do or how do you want them to react after using the information on DA? This means designing your application, interface, and outputs with particular needs in mind.
• How much data does your audience need to accomplish what they will want from the product?

Anyway, this was a really long response, but as you can probably tell, one that I’m passionate about. I’d love to talk to anyone who has any thoughts, in particular about how to create an online, open-source, computational model of human physiology (digital astronaut).

My response was pretty long, too. If you made it this far, congratulations. Thanks for continuing to prompt and provoke debate, Nick. There are things to be done on all sides of the debate, including mine.

Marketing Space to Multiple Audiences

A friend sent me an article from Workforce Management on Gen Y. Then I got a PowerPoint and paper by Mary Lynn Dittmar and a story by Leonard David about that generation and their relationship to space. Blah, blah, blah. Can't we get off of this topic for a little while?

I wrote my master's thesis on using targeted marketing, and my target audiences included women, minorities, and environmentalists (mostly because there were plenty of references to be found in the English department). The point being here that Generation Y is not the only audience NASA needs to be concerned about. That's why I've written about Gen X and Baby Boomers. "Generations" are easier and less politically charged than the three groups I chose for my thesis. However, the arguments I posed then (and sharpened in a presentation at the 2007 ISDC) are still worth considering.

The easiest way to explain my approach for each of these target audiences is to break them down by their respective top motivators and issues now. My argument is that space advocates should not start with space first, but with Earth-based issues first, and then work our way up toward space by showing how space-related technologies can offer solutions or alternatives to those problems. If we start with the great, von Braunian Vision of a Grand Future in Space, we will lose at least half our audience because most people just don't give a flup. For each of my audiences, I tried to address both those things that inhibited their resistance to (or disinterest in) space as well as those things that are of keen interest to them. It's a mixed bag, but the emphasis is on meeting our audiences more than halfway by understanding what is motivating them to respond in certain ways.

Marketing Space to Women

Relevance of space - The biggest issue one confronts in researching women's reactions and relations to space is that they fail to see the relevance of space activities to their own lives. To which, I responded, "What about jobs, healthcare, or educational opportunities!?" Notice that I didn't mention rockets once.
Space / science / engineering “boring” - This is a tougher nut to crack for a couple of reasons. First there is the nature argument, which states that every individual has particular interests and enthusiasms, and that no amount of preaching or outreaching is going to like them any better. The problem with this approach is if you observe that more men than women are in the sciences, it could be a function of lack of interest (in which case you're stereotyping) or ability (in which case you're a sexist who's stereotyping). The nurture argument states that women/girls don't care about science or engineering because they aren't encouraged enough when they are younger. If anything, I've been told that girls are getting the bulk of encouragement in schools these days while imaginative or technically minded boys are not. Most of the reports I've read on discrimination one way or the other have been andecdotal, so I will just table the nature vs. nurture issue for now and suggest approaches to overcome the "engineering is boring" perception. We should emphasize the fun, challenge, problem-solving opportunities to be had in the science and engineering fields and to overcome the lack of encouragement issue by making a more concerted effort to reach girls and women.

From here on, I'll deal with issues that do matter to women today. My "scientific" method for determining these issues was to go to a variety of web sites catering to women (Oxygen, etc.) and scan their subject headers.
Health Care - This is an easy win for space advocates, as space-based hardware and activities have resulted and continues to provide medical spinoffs and innovations that benefit everyone.
Children’s Education - Mothers concerned about their children's education should be easily persuaded of the value of space-related studies, as the importance of math / science education becomes ever more important for overcoming our nation's science / engineering gap compared to other competing players.
Environment - This, too, is an easy sell, as more than half the U.S. population describes itself as "environmentalist" in some fashion. This could be everything from conscientious recyclers to zodiac boat drivers for Greenpeace, but the sentiment still deserves to be taken seriously. Space assets are one of the most critical assets our nation has for environmental monitoring today. Space life support systems have also been used for Earth-based applications, such as water purification. And for the future, one can invoke the value of non-polluting, "low carbon footprint" energy sources such as space solar power and helium-3 fusion. We're not there yet, but if these space-based power sources can be tapped, the benefit will be incredible and the investment more than worthwhile.
Taxes - Okay, I went a little into science fiction land here, but I still believe this as a Reagan free marketeer: An expanded economy = more people able to afford taxes, and the expansion of human society into space means an expanded pie. That translates into more opportunities, more jobs, more potential taxpayers, and more people capable of paying for our nation's commitments.
Said space economy would also expand faster through tax incentives ("Zero G, Zero Tax"), which means tax cuts for people willing to invest in space ventures.
Social Security - As I noted above, an expanded economy can better afford social programs.
Jobs / Workplace Issues - The space economy provides more opportunities for more people. However, this demonstrated demand and improved opportunity for women in aerospace, science, and engineering fields must be shown.
Relationships - A spacefaring society will have need for healthy relationships and families, simple as that.

Marketing Space to Minorities

My "scientific" method of vetting my approaches to selling space to minority groups was to ask a couple friends who don't match my WASP complexion or sex. Again: talking to the audience helps.

Mistrust of majority / social distance - There are several ways the mostly WASP-male space advocacy community can overcome these issues, including: outreach, going where the people are, demonstrating care for minority issues / activities through actions, not just employing words or money, and possibly learning a second language. This means, in short, stepping out of our comfort zones and making the effort.
Relevance of space / what’s in it for me now? - After overcoming the initial social distance problem, the old question of relevance comes up, as it did with women. Fortunately, the answers are the same: jobs, healthcare, and educational opportunities!
Jobs / Workplace Issues (e.g. Fear or expectation of discrimination in the science/engineering fields) - Efforts must be undertaken to demonstrate that the space economy provides more opportunities to more people than ever before. As a goofy fallback, we could always talk about the “Star Trek” paradigm (IDIC?) of many different faces on the spacecraft. Trek was pretty revolutionary in the late 1960s. Today, Generation Y expects a diverse crew wherever they work.
Children’s Education - Childhood education is a primary concern of parents in any group, majority or minority. Again, math and science are critical to our nation's future, and the jobs that come with them will keep America strong and its citizens prosperous.

Marketing Space to Environmentalists

It is still my contention that environmentalists represent a very important and overlooked set of allies for space advocates. I saw that someone has written a book on this topic recently, so it's not that far out of an idea. However, since I haven't read it yet, I'll simply offer my thoughts on issues where space and environmental advocates share common ground.

Global Warming / Climate Change - Mind you, the pro-space community is just about as divided on this issue as the general public--about what the actual trends are, and what their sources are--but most folks in the pro-space community will agree that space provides excellent platform for collecting hard data. The “Greenhouse effect,” after all, was discovered as a result of Venus lander data (what more might we learn from sending additional probes or people to Mars?). And, as noted earlier, solar power satellites or helium-3 power sources could reduce carbon emissions.
Space hardware (spinoffs) have also made contributions to fuel efficiency and fuel cell development here on Earth.
Alternative Energy - See above.
Green Living & Design / Recycling - Learning to live within human-made limits on other worlds can help us learn how to reduce resource depletion here on Earth.
Biodiversity - Let's assume for a moment that we know particular species are on the verge of extinction. Using the Moon as a place to store DNA samples of Earth’s life forms makes sense. This is a space-based version of the "doomsday vault" they just built in Norway.
Pollution - Again, space-based alternative energies can reduce the amount of pollution caused by mining for and burning fossil fuels. Also, mining for metals on asteroids reduces strip mining and chemical contamination of water supplies here on Earth.

And that's essentially it, folks. We've got a lot of different target markets out there. Much as the nationalist in me wishes that "shared narratives" were still possible, I'm afraid our culture is becoming increasingly Balkanized and fragmented, and one-size-fits all marketing messages are a thing of the past. Perhaps the exploration, development, and settlement of space could become that unifying narrative! It's up to space advocates to at least try. The more people we can get on this bandwagon, the better.

I will add a few caveats, cautions, and warnings here because I think they warrant mention:

• Understand your audience’s viewpoint, but don’t pretend to be something your not (i.e. wear a high school jacket, dress like a rapper, use dialect)
• Don’t insult, pander, or condescend to your audience
• Don’t contradict yourself or your group’s message (e.g. espousing capitalism one week, communism the next)
• Don’t engage in class warfare (i.e. divide and rule)
• Don’t make promises you can’t keep
• Don’t lie

And here are some summary points that I'll throw in from my presentation:

• Space advocacy combines technical communication, politics, and marketing. Space advocates need to learn all three.
• Space advocates need to use audience analysis to meet the needs of their potential audiences.
• Different audiences require different messages.
• Space advocates need to start from existing needs and work up to space rather than attempt to start from an overarching message from above and work down.

The space advocacy community should still operate from some core principles, including freedom, tolerance, capitalism, religious plurality, and scientific progress. If we can't even agree on fundamental ideas (in the American community), then no amount of targeted marketing will help us. But in the meantime, let us begin to reach those new audiences. We have to start somewhere.

Marketing Space to Baby Boomers

I’ve put this off long enough, but it needs to be said: we still need to market space exploration, development, and settlement to Baby Boomers (born ~1948-1963, now aged 45 to 60). Why? The answers are simple: they’re still a large chunk of the workforce—the vast majority of the aerospace workforce—they haven’t all retired yet, and they still have most of the money. As they do retire in earnest, they will turn into—if they have not already—crotchety, older versions of themselves, suffering from what Alec Guinness called the “vices of old men”: mistrust and caution. They will have their health care and Social Security checks to consider, and will not want anything interfering with federal spending on them—including NASA. It’s no surprise that AARP is now one of the most powerful lobbying groups in Washington, spending in the tens of millions every year.

We have one primary advantage with keeping space “sold” to the Boomer generation: they are also NASA’s primary supporters because they grew up with and helped launch Apollo. If you want to know what cultural events the Boomers experienced, a viewing of the movie Forrest Gump or American Graffiti will do nicely: Sputnik, racial integration in the South, the Bay of Pigs Invasion and Cuban Missile Crisis, the “space race,” the erecting of the Berlin Wall, the assassination of JFK and later his brother RFK, the marches and assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr., Vietnam, the “Summer of Love,” rock ‘n’ roll, the riots at the 1968 Democratic National Convention, Woodstock, and the various movements that would impact Generation X into the ‘70s and ‘80s.

The Boomers were children of America’s post-World War II prosperity, as the Greatest Generation came home and set to building a peaceful, more prosperous nation than they had known during the Great Depression. The nation itself, while not exactly at peace, was not exactly at war, either. There was the Cold War, which threatened utter annihilation via nuclear war with the Soviet Union, and there were police actions in various places to contain communism, Vietnam being the largest of such conflicts. As the World War II generation set to remaking the world, their children, made comfortable by that world, had the time and leisure to change things. They were encouraged to speak their minds and were the first generation of “teenagers” that companies marketed products to explicitly. Unlike Generation X, who was told they would be the “first generation in America to do worse than their parents,” Boomers were told they could do anything. And in a nation that sent men to the Moon, such conceits were reasonable.

The problem with Boomers, if I may say so from my Generation X blogger’s soapbox, is that they set to remaking everything in their own image, from music to culture to the media to relations between the sexes to clothing, and not all of it was for the better. However, they were a large cohort, and so they had power. Jim Morrison, who was actually a pre-Boomer (born 1943), got the anthem just right: “We want the world and we want it now!” As in the French Revolution of 1789, everything was up for grabs, and subject to question or destruction if it didn’t please the masses. Down with marriage! Down with the church! Down with The Man! Down with the military! Down with bourgeois morality! The problem with throwing all those things out, as the French learned, was that the things that replaced them could be much, much worse.

But I’m getting off my track here, as I feared I would. The question before us is, “How do we keep the Boomers supporting space?” Again, the fact that they grew up with Apollo should count for something. We need to ask them if they want their Gen X and Millennial children and grandchildren to feel the same excitement that they did. Isn’t that worth something? Do they want their kids and grandkids to have the same opportunities that they did? Aren’t space exploration and development exemplars of unlimited opportunity?

Another angle: again appealing to Boomer self-interest, what about space-based medical research and spinoffs? Weightlessness results in weakened immune systems and loss of muscle and bone tissue, which are also problems affecting the elderly. Might space not provide an opportunity to keep Boomers younger longer?

Angle #3, the one Mike Griffin has been using now and then: We are in another space race, though a slower one, with the Chinese, Europeans, Russians, and eventually the Indians and Japanese. Do we really want to get that far behind again before we decide to catch up? Apparently so.

Angle #4: Emphasize the environmental benefits of space development. This can take multiple forms, from Earth observation satellites to space-based power sources (space solar power or helium-3 fusion). Along with this argument one can throw in the mining of asteroids and the Moon for metals and minerals that are becoming harder and more expensive to find. And mining itself is a dirty process, with ground water contamination often an unhealthy side-effect. Take those activities into space and import power from space. High-density energy sources from space allow for clean energy that does not require us to cut back our high-powered lifestyles.

Angle #5: Retiring Boomer scientists and engineers can have late careers as teachers, trainers, or mentors for the next generation. These retirement careers can supplant income lost from full-time jobs and enable Boomers to pass on their knowledge.

Angle #6: New vacation/retirement opportunities. Suborbital space tourism is already generating enough buzz to keep people’s eyes fixed on Mojave, California and other godforsaken spots as the next phase of cutting-age adventures. Imagine what orbital or lunar tourism will do. And what if we finally manage to build large-scale settlements at L4/L5 or on the Moon? Wouldn’t lower gravity be a benefit to any senior? (Of course they’ll have to be healthy enough to survive the lift to orbit first…)

Angle #7: Investment opportunities. The Boomers might be big fans of the welfare state, but they're also the same "Me Generation" that enjoyed the big gains of the '80s. "Greed is good," or so Gordon Gecko claimed. And like any good group of Americans, they're not above making a few extra bucks if they think a space venture is a good investment.

Angle #8: Space could provide some unique opportunities for estate and funeral planning. Consider the money being made on sending one’s ashes into space. And what about tax-free annuities that fund your grandkids’ settlement of the Moon or Mars? It’s a break for the Boomer, and if the kids decide they don’t want to live in space, they take the tax hit, not Mom and Dad.

These are just some thoughts I threw together for an ISDC presentation. No doubt there are others. The point being: we need to keep the Boomers interested and engaged in space activities before they decide that medical expenses and cash handouts are more important to them than the frontier that might make America rich enough to pay for them.

Now let’s see what sort of ruckus this will cause.