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Rating: 
Summary: Know Your Audience: First and Foremost - How Old are They?
Review:
'Know your audience' is the first rule of communicating, and an essential tenet of dealing with people is to know them, especially if you want to persuade, motivate, or get them involved.
This book provides a fascinating look at how demographics can shape attitudes, beliefs and, most important, actions. The authors maintain that: "Demography, the study of human populations, is the most powerful-and most underutilized-tool we have to understand the past and to foretell the future.
Demographics affect every one of us as individuals, far more than most of us have ever imagined. They also play a pivotal role in economic and social life."
Boom, Bust and Echo is a very unique and interesting book; it is well worth reading for the insights that it provides into the behavior of consumers or, as the authors claim, at least two-thirds of that behavior.
Rating:
Summary: Know Your Audience: First and Foremost - How Old are They?
Review:
`Know your audience' is the first rule of communicating, and an essential tenet of dealing with people is to know them, especially if you want to persuade, motivate, or get them involved.
This book provides a fascinating look at how demographics can shape attitudes, beliefs and, most important, actions. The authors maintain that: "Demography, the study of human populations, is the most powerful-and most underutilized-tool we have to understand the past and to foretell the future.
Demographics affect every one of us as individuals, far more than most of us have ever imagined. They also play a pivotal role in economic and social life."
Boom, Bust and Echo is a very unique and interesting book; it is well worth reading for the insights that it provides into the behavior of consumers or, as the authors claim, at least two-thirds of that behavior.
Rating:
Summary: Still ahead of it's time and will be until people catch up.
Review: Having a bookshelf full of futuristic reading including Boomernomics, Next, Pig and the Python and the complete series by H S Dent and many books from Harvard press as well as every new economy magazine printed I found myself continuing to reach for Boom Bust and Echo as it has more backbone, the chapters contain more substance and historical data to back it up. I commend this book to be carried at all times with a copy to be kept by the bed.
Rating: 
Summary: Interesting read but methodologically unconvincing
Review: The problem with this approach is the simple assumption that a commodity enjoys demand depending on what age group it appeals to, and what is the percentage of this group within a country's population overall.
That is exactly the main argument of the author: show me the population trends, birth rates, percentage of age groups, and I will tell you what's going to be in demand. This assumption needs to be defended more thoroughly, however. Education is a good example. Although birth rates declined in the US for the last 20 years, more people get university education today compared to the past. Obviously, the economy of the 21st century demands that. Grouth or decline rates of the population cannot be the only major independent variable predicting demand.
Rating: 
Summary: Excellent for anyone interested in Generations
Review: While I am not a Canadian, I am quite sure that Foot's extensive research and theories hold quite well. I train and consult with organizations on the issue of diversity and generations on a regular basis, and this book was excellent reading for those who want to see that the "generations" diversity dimension is not limited to the United States. Books on generations run the risk of making sweeping generalizations, but one must recognize that generations do indeed have distinct archetypes. Foot does what other authors do not often do, and focuses on the effects the generations will have on Canadian society rather than dwelling on the traits of each generation. Many of his theories can not be proven for years to come, but it does help marketers, managers, and anyone in society or business understand one aspect of why people disagree. Using categories such as education, transit, companies, and other societal issues, Foot examines how each generation will change the societal outlook. This is extremely helpful for those who wish to make affect society in a positive way. The United States' has a developed archetype for generations dating back to the 1500s (thanks Howe and Strauss), but it appears Canada is not that far along in developing traits and generational personalities. In many ways this is good...it provides less information for those to stereotype with. However, my guess is that books such as this will peak the interest of the Canadian population and future generations will be as neatly defined as Generation X and the Baby Boomers are in the United States. (Good or bad, you make the call.) So, this is definitely a great book for foundational knowledge for Canadian generations. Foot is clearly a student of pop culture, and this book is likely the first of many that will address this topic.
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