The Young and the Restless
By Clay Risen

Brad Newman can work a crowd. A skilled handshaker, an ardent hugger and an occasional backslapper, Newman floats around a packed room effortlessly, inserting himself into conversations with ease. Newman is the founder, president and sole full-time employee of Early Twenties Inc., which held its first "summit" on Dec. 3 at the Westin River North Hotel in Chicago.

Newman, 24, is also a "millennial," the word of the day for people aged 15 to 25, and the summit was half coming-out party for the company and half pep rally for the recently graduated and, in many cases, recently laid off. The summit's website promised recruiters and headhunters, and more than a few of the attendees expressed disappointment at the lack of either. Instead, they found a few authors pitching books, a Bally's table and two people who called themselves "life coaches." Many left after the keynote speech.

"If even one person benefited from tonight, then I'm happy," Newman said, undeterred. And, judging from his words, things can only go up from here. "Dave Matthews started out playing little bars and clubs in the Carolinas, and look where he is now."

Newman's optimism may be grating, but according to surveys of recent college graduates, it's hardly abnormal. The last few years have seen a spate of studies, articles and books describing the likes and dislikes, hopes and dreams of the current "it" generation. Alternately known as "the Echo Boom," "Net Geners" or "Generation Y," they may quickly replace their Boomer parents as the most intensely studied group of people ever. They're eager, honest, hardworking — think Beaver Cleaver with a T1 connection.

And Newman is part of a growing movement of people in their mid-20s trying to define for themselves what it means to be a "millennial." His cohorts include Scott Beale, a D.C. political activist and founder of Millenial Politics; Jedediah Purdy, a fellow at the New America Foundation and author of "For Common Things"; and Alexandra Robbins and Abby Wilner, authors of "Quarterlife Crisis." They are each putting a different spin on the politics, values and future of a generation that has barely gotten up on its own two feet.

While the Early Twenties Summit couldn't have happened 10 years ago — Newman relied heavily on Web marketing, and the company began as a Web portal — it's hard to imagine recent grads even three years ago turning up on a Monday night to meet life coaches and listen to motivational speakers. They'd more likely be out spending dotcom dollars. But the summit drew about 150 attendees, and for obvious reasons — these are the people who were in college during the New Economy. They watched upperclassmen graduating into $75,000 salaries, and maybe even started in one themselves, only to be laid off months later when it all collapsed.

Mike Stoller, a life coach with a table at the event, said that he'd seen an increase in clientele since Sept. 11 and confirmed that young people are suddenly much more concerned about their future than just a few years ago. "People in their 20s are either searching for a career or are in a career that isn't fulfilling for them," he said. (Asked to clarify what a life coach does, Stoller said he "works with people to get where they want to go and to see what stops them.")

The speaker portion began in typical Thus Spake Zarathustra-cum-corporate-event style; the lights went out and, accompanied by dramatic music, a series of familiar images flashed across a video screen. The Berlin Wall coming down, a space shuttle taking off. Interspersed were phrases like "those who prevail are not the weak" and "those sounds you here are opportunity knocking."

Which was funny, because as the video ended the dramatic score was replaced by a jaunty disco beat. The lights went up and Newman bounded on stage. Decked out in a black suit over a black T-shirt, Newman had all the energy of a Tony Robbins in training, rolling out such phrases as "success early on will pay huge dividends down the road" with ease. Newman called the keynote speaker, Dr. Jack Groppel, one of his "heroes," and said he had read his book, "The Corporate Athlete," in two days. Coming from Newman, this seems plausible.

Groppel, a former physiology professor at the University of Illinois, is a founding partner of LGE Performance Systems (he's the G). His talk, complete with PowerPoint slides and video clips, focused on creating "performance on demand"; what this means was unclear, but it seemed related to what Groppel called being "aware of what will work for you so you can go to the next level."

A tall, trim man who could easily pass for a Fortune 500 CEO, Groppel relied heavily on by-now-standard presentation tricks — audience participation, heavy technology references and a grab bag of eerily arcane words, such as "automasticity," "environmentalize" and "contentment rituals," the latter, apparently, being the new term for "hobbies." It was hard to tell exactly what Groppel was trying to communicate; beneath the lingo lurked a slightly advertorial tone — "we have a whole instrumentation to help you with truth and purpose" — and yet the speech was too vague to pass as good marketing. Rather, it came across as boosterism for those aspiring to executive status — "You are a corporate athlete! You are the ultimate athlete!" read one slide.

The attendees, mostly black-clad white urban professionals, well wired and well coiffed, stayed true to their recent-grad personalities and sat in the back rows during the speeches. They laughed politely at Groppel's limp business humor ("he's covering his assets") and raised their hands when prompted with questions like "how many of you are engaged in your jobs?"

Groppel ended his speech with "savor the moment and love the battle," and as he left the stage a sizeable chunk of the audience left the summit. The next speaker, Dale Irvin — a standup comedian who specializes in corporate events — stood in the wings, growing visibly agitated. "You're losing your whole crowd," he could be overheard telling Newman. "What is this?"

But his demeanor changed radically as soon as he was on stage — all smiles, a true performer. His routine was hit and miss, relying on the standard standup retinue of shopping, hair loss and hotel jokes, not the best topics for a post-Seinfeld crowd. His delivery was Garrison Keillor on speed; his blazer and khakis shouting middle management to Groppel's CEO. Irvin has poofy, swept-back preacher hair and, listening to him, one imagines he missed his calling in the pulpit.

All of this — the videos, the life coaches, the corporate empowerment — had an air of self importance; or, better, an air of reassurance masking itself as self-importance. An emergency shot of self-help advice for a generation raised to believe it was above the bourgeois trappings of its parents. That it could be rich and brilliant and chic and bohemian all at the same time, only to realize that its self-impression was a myth supported by the wealthiest economy in world history. Prepared for a life of abundance, they find themselves scrounging for every business card and handshake they can find in the hope that it might turn into a good job.

Even more, these are the progeny of the inventors of generational self-obsession, and it's no surprise that they're in such need of encouragement. They've grown up with it. They're the kids who heard Mozart while in the womb, who were rushed from school to soccer to piano to tutoring to homework to bed, all in the hope of making the Ivy League. They've been told their whole lives they're special. No wonder so many of them have life coaches.

Such desperation was evident in two attendees who reported disappointment with the event. "I thought there'd be more recruiters, more professional networking," said one, a young woman who preferred not to give her name because she was a friend of an organizer.

"They needed more corporate sponsors," said the other, a young man who also opted for anonymity. He had been recently laid off, he said, and had come to the event hoping to meet with recruiters.

Ironically, for all the underlying tension and offers of professional help at a price, the most balanced words came from Dale Irvin. "It's gonna work out," he said. "When I was 25, there was Vietnam and a shitty recession. When my father was 25, there was World War II. But the bad stuff doesn't last forever." In other words, chill out.

E-mail Clay Risen at risenc@yahoo.com