Mitch Joel’s blog posting titled, “Marketers - I Believe The Children Are Not Our Future”, tackles a tangible issue facing marketing companies at the moment. While I agree with Mitch’s stance on the whole, I likewise must default to the theory that educational institutions shouldn’t cater wholly to the needs of corporations. Rather, the government should generally guide and fund educational programs that cater to new and/or emerging markets without influence. Otherwise, the learning process is tilted off its axis and becomes a forum to learn “answers to the test”–in this case the skills needed for a particular job function–rather than instilling knowledge and passion into vibrant young minds.

There is another layer to this problem and it is the institutional reliance on the almighty resume. I would bet that there are thousands of teenagers pulling computers apart in their basements and building ad-hoc networks. School might not be for them. There are also thousands more editing their own YouTube videos, designing Flash applications, or creating powerful social networking groups. Yet school mightn’t be for them either. Such types of independently-minded workers are all around us–they might simply lack the proper “corporate environment” at present to thrive. This is especially important in that money as a motivating force is less important now than ever. I have excluded people that operate small businesses for the sake of making a point here, but it’s important to note that such workers couldn’t possibly be in contention for such job openings because they perhaps value freedom, time, and creativity more than the average person. This makes them too costly to employ for the average corporation. But I digress.

Building a successful company involves growing its revenues, getting more focussed, hiring staff members in cycles, and aggrandizing the overall apparatus of a given company. The irony is that Web 2.0 and social media are areas in opposition to concepts like “corporation-building”, which involves skilful layering of executives, staff members, investors, and clients required to achieve success. In the new economy, more people are clearly interested in making their personal brands matter within specific corporate climates, which for obvious reasons is often a conflicting ideal vis-a-vis that of corporate prerogative.

At the end of the day, there are only a handful of “types” of people out there: leaders, workers, those in between, those on the outside, and the “owners” who serve to manage the leaders. Since more people want to be leaders or owners than ever before, it’s fairly clear to me that’s it’s going to take far more than pinpoint precision educational programs and goofy 2.0 office settings. We’re in this for the long-haul and corporations need to take responsibility to breed, train, and provide the opportunity for upward mobility based on meritocratic policies.

Perhaps the brand of the future will consist of dozens or hundreds of companies intertwined in a progressive new form of organization of equals. Equality is a rare concept in the business world though. That’s a lot of egos to check at the door.

Filed under: Rants, Economy, Social Media, Politics, The Future, Leadership, HR

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