George Eby Mathew

About the Book: Grey Matter: How generational diversity transforms the way we live, work and lead

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The average life expectancy globally has doubled since the 1800s. People live longer. They lack in experience but 8-year olds today have more knowledge than university students from a century ago. Information and knowledge have exploded. With more generations living and working together, harnessing diversity and unlocking generational wisdom is crucial for modern communities and societies to flourish.

 

Not all human efforts are tapping into generational diversity. For example, marketeers’ need to demographically segregate populations to segment and target their audiences has only helped to magnify differences. Understanding inter-generational differences help to bridge the proverbial generation gap but it is the microtrends of technology, globalization, and ethnic assimilation that convolutes what psychologists and sociologists have grappled with hitherto. The digital revolution alone has further virtualised the imaginary part of what Yuval Harari calls a dual reality that consists of physical and imaginary human realities. Millennials are technology dependant. Technology is their reality. Trade and travel accentuate it. With inter-cultural spawning, ethnic and cultural boundaries are blurring to the extent that demographic characterisation of “people like us” are no longer about race, ethnicity, or class but about ideas, beliefs, experiences and lifestyles. Thanks to globalization, two sixteen-year olds living on either side of the planet have more in common than two sixty-five-year olds in the same community.

 

What generational trends define modern society and popular culture? What insights should community and business leaders need to lead people in various life stages in their common need for enlightenment, fulfillment, achievement, belonging and security yet differ in what these mean to them. Through his second book, Grey Matter: How generational diversity transforms the way we live, work and lead George Mathew answers some crucial questions and hopes to empower his readers across generations with insights demonstrating that generational diversity is an asset to be celebrated and nurtured in life, work and leadership. George takes a story telling approach to build his narrative balancing his personal experiences with the existing body of knowledge on intergenerational dynamic amplifying the trends that challenge what defines “our generation” and “people like us”. He then aims to open a dialogue between the generations to transform how we live, work and lead.

 

About the Author: George Mathew

George Eby Mathew is an Indian-born Australian author influenced by different cultures and as many beliefs and traditions. Raised in Africa and having lived and worked in Asia and the West, George fell in love with people, culture and traditions early in life. It wasn’t long before he wanted to tell his own stories. George uses his affinity to the GenX generation to bridge insights from the baby boomer generation before him and the millennials after him.

 

Graduating in India with a degree in electrical engineering, George worked as a technology journalist in Mumbai covering the emergence of India’s software industry in the 90s. He later worked as an industry analyst for Gartner, before joining one of India’s largest software companies, Infosys, as an R&D executive and business consultant. He then joined IBM briefly as a senior executive before going solo. In these roles he travelled the world eventually making Sydney home in 2007. Grey Matter: How generational diversity transforms the way we live, work and lead is his second book. His first book India’s Innovation Blueprint: How the world’s largest democracy is becoming an innovation superpower (Woodhead-Elsevier, 2010) looked at the birth of a nation through the pangs of under-development, corruption, and failed leadership to produce a global force in science, technology and engineering.

 

Pages: 280
Format: Paperback, e-reader formats Availability: Global
Category: Non-Fiction