About two or three years ago, Pastor Mensa Otabil, a renowned Ghanaian Christian Statesman, delivered his annual 31st December night Message, what he normally calls the “Crossover” and called each and every Ghanaian and every human being to be a generational thinker. What he meant was that we should think about the future well-being of our children, our grandchildren, our great-grandchildren. That we should think about the future of our environment, about the future of our water-bodies and think about the future of everything that will make our existence as human beings bearable, worth living and more enjoyable. If we refuse to think about the future of all that affect us and our children and begin to act with the end in mind and to do things that will prolong the enjoyable longevity of life, then we will be sowing seeds that will wipe away our existence on earth. For us to be generational thinkers and to sow for generations we first need to realize that there is a future for generations after us; we can then do these below for them: • Knowledge management is “the process of storing, managing and providing access to the store of knowledge within an organization.” The organization here could also mean your house or home or home office or your own organized recordings and storage of knowledgeable materials. Future generations can benefit immensely from present generation and past generation if knowledge is stored and made more accessible to them, they could then add or amend and improve upon what has been passed unto them. This means education is one number for the present generation to pass unto the future generation. Current younger generation can use classroom education as well as very practical education to equip themselves for the future. The classroom education alone does not provide enough preparation and do not equip people for real life situations. It is the day-to-day real life situations that people need to live life on earth not abstract unrelated life education. Education for current younger generation should therefore be like how the medical professionals do it, classroom plus fieldwork. All students should be made to face and endure practical real life experiences to condition themselves for the unexpected real life “weather conditions”. If you are an entrepreneur, a business owner, a medical professional, an accountant, an architect, a lawyer and so on and your children or one of your children or your friends’ children or your nephews or nieces or your colleague human beings want to learn from you because they know very well you are good and that you can impart something knowledgeable unto them, it is always better to teach them the practical real life situations in the profession. These are what they will need when they get out there. They would need some theories, but they can learn those themselves if they so desire. When the current younger generation has experienced the real life education plus the real life experience, everything else would follow. They would live happy. They would live life being well-informed and well-educated and experienced in real life situations. They would then continue with sustainability development and the world shall continue to be a place to live in. • Business Ownership, after the children and younger generation have gotten the education from present older generation, we need to know that they might not have the opportunities to practice what they have learnt and get the real life experiences; present older generation should therefore own businesses and other money-generating ventures that younger and future generations could use for their future benefits and well-being. Education alone is not enough, if people get the education but don’t have systems and places where they could apply what they have learnt, they wouldn’t get the desired real life experiences, and they would be ill-equipped and not fully prepared to take life opportunities. Supposing, you just decide to give only education to your son or daughter in accountancy, but you don’t have an accountancy firm, and no one else has an accountancy firm, where would your son or daughter apply what he or she has learnt and get the necessary experiences to face life? If you set up a water factory and someone else also sets up a meat factory, etc, now, then eventually, future generation will come and add to these having learnt from you and your organizations. • Real Estate Investment, the value of land always appreciates and never depreciates. Future generation would be in better positions to take life opportunities and turn them into achievements, inventions and discoveries if present older generation thinks about the future of future generation and prepare for them places where they could lay their heads and working tools. If they are left to come and fend for themselves by paying so much rent to other land owners for their residential and business purposes, then present generation would have not thought generationally. Present generation would have not thought about the future of future generations. Future generation will then have to start from the scratch before they struggle to achieve their aims and objectives and if they are not able, then the cycle may continue unabated. Investment in real estate could be in any part of the world, just that tax and other legal issues are different in all countries, the issue is to invest in real estate and when future generations come and take up the mantle, it would be up to them to change designs, directions, styles, locations, colours, types, etc for their own tailored made, all they need is continue for generations after them also to continue, till Thy Kingdom comes. • Portfolio Investment, to think generationally means to invest in other areas apart from business ownership and real estate now for future generations. Diversify your investment into other income generating ventures and activities. Invest in treasury bills, unit trusts, mutual funds, shares, bonds and others for future generations. It is not only the rich, who should invest, the poor and the middle class can all invest. Portfolio investment is good, because everybody could invest in mutual funds, treasury bills, unit trusts, shares, etc. You need just small amount like Ghc5.00 or more to start to invest in mutual funds and unit trusts in Ghana and it is like that in many countries. Once you start small, you build on it till you have a storey building of those products, you were buying, you could then leave them for your children, for charities etc but making sure to teach how and why it is good to invest, so they too would continue to play the game. You would all be winners from generation to generation. • Philanthropy, the younger present generation should be taught how to give back to society cheerfully and wholeheartedly. For me, money is worthless if it is not shared. That is why I belong to those, who define money as the ability to give. Therefore to be able to give more, then you need more of it. If we need more of it we can only get more of it if we give back to society at large. Money is gotten from societal setups and therefore once you get it from them, then you should be philanthropic more than enough to give back to them in various ways. Society would then continue to make you rich, else society will shun you one day, one time and the future will look bleak and doom. Long term sustainable financial prosperity is maintained when there is philanthropy and the rich and even the middle class learn to give back to society. Think generationally, think about the future needs of humanity and do something now that will sustain the natural beauty of life. ©, 2011, Godwin-Xavier Ayeebo Email: gayeebo@gmail.com Blog: www.g-xavierayeebo.blogspot.com