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To kick off the new week, the following is a guest post from Cecilia Satovich, director of business development for Results Direct:

If there’s one thing that drives me crazy, it’s the rationale that social media won’t work for your association because you, personally, would never use it. At the heart of that perspective may be your experience as a baby boomer.

Here’s a brief review of boomer technology history…. in 1967, handheld calculators were invented; in 1972, the first word processor and first video game (Pong) were invented; and in 1979 cell phones were invented (big and clunky – remember those?).

By contrast, the net generation experienced a very different era of technological improvements at a young age. Everything these kids grew up with was an improvement on the aforementioned technologies. Here are some of the technology experiences of the net generation: home computers, email, Internet, chat rooms, Yahoo, Google, and even small, affordable cell phones all happened and became popular before the average netgen was 16.

Be honest - did you use these inventions to do homework and play with your friends? Or did you use these to do your job?

My point is that boomers experienced the same changes and approached them differently. Since boomers were 20-30 in the 80’s and 90’s, for them, email, the Internet, and cell phones became tools for work. For netgen, it became about network.

But “people like to network in person,” you say. Yes. Yes, we do like to network in person. But are your members sending their youngest employees to your annual event? Are your membership and annual meeting fees low enough for a person in the early stage or mid-management years of their career to afford it on their own?

If the answer to those two questions is “no” or “I’m not sure”, then I have to ask, what are you doing to offer netgen members the opportunity to meet one another?