Chapter 11. A Generous Generation

Mira Inbar, an M.B.A. student at the University of California at Berkeley, traces her first stirrings of altruism to her childhood in southern Florida. In fact, she proudly declares that she has been "a committed environmentalist since I was three years old." She remembers feeling appalled by the rapid encroachment of commercial development on the natural habitat in her community. "When I was little, there were orange groves, wooded areas, herons, and cranes everywhere," she says wistfully. "Then I saw everything I called home disappear and turn into strip malls."

Inbar remained true to her values and went on to receive a bachelor's degree in biology and environmental studies from Oberlin College. She envisioned herself becoming a conservation biologist, but after a research stint in Costa Rica studying butterfly decline around coffee plantations, she suddenly yearned for something with greater impact. She moved on to work for nonprofit groups in Peru and Washington, DC, but finally headed for business school because she says she realized that companies hold the key to major environmental gains. "I knew a lot about insects, but not much about finance and accounting before Berkeley," she says. "After I get my M.B.A., I'd like to work in a company that's trying to change business as usual by integrating environmental criteria into everything it does."

While still at Berkeley, she is active in a student social responsibility club and is leading an initiative to cut energy consumption and make the university's Haas School of Business "carbon neutral." In explaining her generation's commitment to the environment, Inbar says she believes that young people are searching for meaning and connections beyond themselves. "We grew up in a culture of greed inundated with messages about being as rich as possible," Inbar says. "But some of us are scared about where the world is headed. If I want to have children, I had better devote myself to the environment."

Some critics accuse the millennial generation of pursuing shallow, self-centered dreams of fame and fortune. But there is really much more depth to this generation, as exemplified by millennials like Inbar. No doubt millennials seek personal success and recognition, but many of them also believe they have a higher calling. Indeed, more than 60% of 13- to 25-year-olds said they feel personally responsible for making a difference in the world, according to a 2006 survey by the communications and marketing agencies Cone Inc. and Amp Insights.

These days, millennials are certainly busy trying to live up to that responsibility. They are promoting clean energy policies at their high schools and colleges to help combat global warming. They are raising relief funds and public awareness of the crisis in Darfur. They are forgoing a boozy spring break at the beach to feed the homeless, rescue sea turtles, and work at shelters for victims of domestic abuse. After college graduation, some millennials are even putting their careers on hold and teaching in poor neighborhoods.

Millennial M.B.A. students like Inbar are bringing a new sensibility to business schools, the traditional training ground for investment bankers and management consultants. "Today's M.B.A.s are looking for unconventional ways to use their leadership skills in society and do much more than make money," says Paul Danos, dean of the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College. "It's very likely that their path to success will include a blending of corporate and public activities. Ethics, sustainability, poverty, health, and global economic development are just as important to them as balance sheets and marketing studies." But, he adds, millennials may have to struggle "to resist the tempting lucrative opportunities for top M.B.A. graduates if they want to contribute to society in a major way."

Why do millennials feel such a strong philanthropic instinct? America's education system clearly deserves some of the credit. Many millennials were encouraged or even required to perform good deeds to graduate from middle school and high school. Giving back has become second nature to them. At the same time, television and the Internet brought millennials closer to such calamities as Hurricane Katrina and the bloody strife in Darfur. The impact of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, may also be a factor. Millennials were shaken by that traumatic day and witnessed the heroism of rescue workers and volunteers at Ground Zero in New York City.

"One bright spot coming out of the 9/11 tragedy is a surge of interest by college students in serving their community," says Steve Goldsmith, chairman of the federal Corporation for National and Community Service. According to a report by his organization, 3.3 million college students volunteered in 2005, nearly 600,000 more than in 2002. Similarly, the Higher Education Research Institute at the University of California at Los Angeles found that two-thirds of college freshmen in 2006 considered helping others to be an important value, the highest level in 20 years.

"What resonates most with the college students I meet is the possibility of making a difference," says Matt Kramer, president of Teach for America, which places college graduates in teaching positions in low-income communities. "We entered a phase after September 11, where more young people looked up to people like Bill Clinton, Laura Bush, Bill Gates, and Barack Obama. They became the rock stars of society." Indeed, many millennials were drawn to presidential candidate Obama because his message of change matched their idealistic vision of a better world. Some millennials even took to calling themselves Generation Obama.

Although some millennials crave wealth, many say they quickly find that money alone isn't rewarding enough. "I was essentially helping rich people get even richer," says Tracy Cheung, describing how she began feeling after working a few years as an analyst in Lehman Brothers Inc.'s main private equity fund. "At first, the investment world seemed like a way to make a lot of money, gain useful skills, and really be in the thick of things," she says. "I had been raised with the idea that success means a big salary because my family had come to America from China without a lot of money. But I have concluded that I need to make just a minimal amount of money to be happy and that it's more important to feel that I can identify with what I'm doing for my career."

She decided that a career devoted to social and environmental issues might just provide the elusive meaning that she and other millennials are seeking. But she didn't abandon the business world for an environmental activist group. Instead, like Mira Inbar, she headed to Berkeley for an M.B.A. degree. After graduation, she took a position in PG&E Corp.'s M.B.A. leadership development program in hopes of working on renewable energy and strategic social responsibility projects for the San Francisco-based utility company. Her path is characteristic of many millennials, who choose to work from within the system. "I like the thought of going to work for a company that has enough financial resources to make a meaningful difference," Cheung says.

To be sure, the millennials aren't candidates for sainthood. Their good intentions are certainly commendable, but they aren't entirely selfless. Some have volunteered for public service projects partly so that they could beef up their resumes to impress college admissions officers and corporate recruiters. "Getting into college is so competitive," says Cheung, "that people do try to differentiate themselves with public service activities on their applications."

Although the millennials may be quite passionate about changing the world, they are hardly the first generation with such ambitions. Indeed, many millennials are the children of activist baby boomers who staged sit-ins and boycotts to protest the VietnamWar, the plight of migrant farm workers, discrimination against women and minorities, and environmental pollution. This may be the generation for Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth documentary about the perils of global warming, but it was the boomers who helped celebrate the first Earth Day in 1970.

Now nearly 40 years later, it is perhaps fitting that activism is moving from the streets to sites on the Internet. Some new charitable endeavors are wisely reaching out to millennials where many of them spend the most time—online. Instead of traditional phone calls and mailings, more activists are using the Internet as a grassroots organizing tool. Cause-orientedWeb sites give people ways to communicate with like-minded individuals, volunteer their time, and contribute small sums of money to their favorite charities. For example, DoSomething.org, a networking site for budding young activists, connects them with a host of causes running the gamut from animal welfare and teen homelessness to global poverty and gay rights.

On the popular Facebook social networking site, a start-up called Project Agape has launched the Causes program with the goal of empowering individuals and achieving "equal opportunity activism." Facebook users are encouraged to recruit their network of friends to support their pet cause. By spring 2008, the cancer research campaign had attracted the most members—more than three million—and donations of more than $60,000.

But as millennials grow older and take on more career and family obligations, some skeptics wonder whether they will live up to their professed commitment to make a difference and tackle such global problems as climate change, poverty, and AIDS. "I want to know if their desire to change the world is a passing fad or a core component of this generation," says Cam Marston, founder of the consulting firm Generational Insight. "I think it's too soon to know that."

Already, though, some employers have noticed conflicting behavior among millennials. For instance, Michael Kannisto, global staffing director at contact lens maker Bausch & Lomb Inc., has become a bit cynical about millennials' dedication to the environment. "They claim they are socially conscious and talk a good game about global warming," he says. "But they have a voracious appetite for consumer goods and want to drive cars rather than take the bus. When it's convenient, it seems, they want to save the world."