This is a postcard written from one side of the Great Millennial Switcheroo to the other: Hey, what's it like over in that location? Do y'all remember what we were thinking back on this side?

To capture this moment of the Great Crossover, the Fast Visitor-Roper Starch Worldwide Survey asked members of the Fast Company customs to gauge the earth of work in terms both sublime and ridiculous, to exam the attitudinal waters for what really matters and for what barely registers. Is information technology the things of the moment — the ever-changing diary of who's hot and who'southward not, the celebrification of practically everything — that stir united states? Or is it the stuff of serious New Twelvemonth's resolutions — piece of work that makes a deviation, life that feels in balance, the stuff of caput and heart, wallet and well-being, fortune and family — that moves the soul? Which causes more head scratching? The prospect of waking upwards to a world in which too many of the microchips that control everything from the coffeemaker to the microwave, from the Mars Pathfinder to the Nissan Pathfinder, choose this particular morning time to misbehave? Or the ongoing challenge of figuring out, once all the millennial dust has settled, exactly what kind of piece of work will satisfy us, how much money will prove to exist enough for us, what securely shared values will tie usa together as a community, and which people volition keep to earn our admiration for their contributions?

In the spirit of millennial madness, we approached this survey with an appropriate mixture of amusement and amazement. Later all, if you tin't pit Nib Gates against Oprah Winfrey in a popularity contest when the clock strikes 2000, when can you exercise it? Haven't you always wondered how celebrities and CEOs mensurate up as companions on a hypothetical airplane ride? And whose bumper-sticker words of wisdom exercise a meliorate chore of putting the final brand on our times — Jerry Seinfeld'southward, Forrest Gump'southward, or Nirvana's? Sure, we're in the heart of a global business organisation revolution. But if y'all can't dance at the revolution, do you really desire to be a role of information technology?

Still, despite our attempts at frivolity and foolishness, the Fast Company community once more answered our questions with unswerving smarts and seriousness of purpose. What we discovered was, in many means, what we expected. At the plow of the millennium, the Fast Company crowd shows little evidence of euphoria or panic, of wild revelry or broad-eyed insurrection. This customs remains focused on the work at hand, maintaining a subdued sanity, a reasoned arroyo to the present and to the time to come. Immense wealth may be falling from the skies, only Fast Company readers aren't jettisoning the values that brought them this far. They value performance over glitz. They seek disinterestedness for themselves and for others.

Oh, past the fashion, in the popularity race, information technology'due south Beak Yard. over Oprah W.

Work, Money, and the Web

You find yourself with five job offers. Y'all are equally qualified for each job, but the pay, the hours, and the organizational culture are very different in each example.

Yahoo!, the Cyberspace search-engine visitor, offers $100,000 a yr in salary, along with options for 1,000 shares (currently worth more than than $150 apiece), which you'll arrive 5 years. The hours are around-the-clock — Silicon Valley Time. The people are immature, and the place is intense but fun.

Goldman Sachs, the investment-banking business firm, offers $100,000 in salary and a guaranteed bonus of at to the lowest degree $100,000 a year. The hours are intense. The civilisation is both cutthroat and highly politicized. But if you survive, the payoff volition exist big.

Ben & Jerry'south, the ice-cream company, offers a bacon of $75,000 and the possibility of a small bonus and small stock options. The hours are reasonable. The office is in rustic Vermont. The people are easygoing. And you get all the ice cream you can eat.

Procter & Hazard, the consumer-products manufacturer, offers $100,000 in salary and the likelihood of a pocket-sized bonus. Yous'll work in Cincinnati, where people are dainty. The hours are reasonable — yous won't have to work many nights or weekends — and everything about the place is stable and anticipated.

The Peace Corps volition pay you $20,000 a twelvemonth plus living expenses for ii years. You'll work long hours in muddy quarters somewhere in Eastern Europe, but the place and the people promise to be fascinating. You lot're guaranteed to go your old job dorsum later on you complete your two-twelvemonth stint.

Which job would y'all choose?

Yahoo! — 24.0%
Goldman Sachs — 8.ix%
Ben & Jerry's — 33.1%
Procter & Gamble — 29.6%
Peace Corps — 4.4%

Which job would yous turn down first?

Yahoo! — fourteen.7%
Goldman Sachs — 36.0%
Ben & Jerry'south — four.seven%
Procter & Take chances — 4.i%
Peace Corps — 40.5%

Sanity. Balance. Butterfat. Sure, people desire the big bucks, only most of them would rather accept a life. Nearly two-thirds say that they would chase their dreams in Vermont or Cincinnati — yes, Cincinnati — before toughing information technology out in Silicon Valley or in the gray canyons of Wall Street. Why? Ben & Jerry's and Procter & Gamble aren't new-economic system stars, only they promise a certain normality of pace, of community, of values. Ben & Jerry's, more to the point, promises proximity to Chunky Monkey and Phish Nutrient.

An entrepreneurial minority (more men than women, and more young people than old people) are pumped to live life nonstop at Yahoo! in substitution for the prospect of an enormous payoff — well, someday. But that minority is a smaller flock (just 24% of respondents) than Net hype would have us believe. Mayhap we actually aren't all that envious of Web millionaires. We're certainly not envious of investment bankers: Large bonuses can't compensate for the grinding piece of work or the all-consuming schedule at Goldman Sachs. Why make an obscene amount of money when all yous tin can spend information technology on are absurd suits and take-out Chinese? A telling slice of data: Goldman Sachs is only slightly more desirable than the Peace Corps, an arrangement at the opposite terminate of the economic spectrum.

Sooner or later, this survey indicates, information technology'southward non about money. At the turn of the millennium, we know besides well what it costs to get really rich: taking enormous risks (and winning), or making enormous sacrifices. In almost cases, the really rich do both — or else they're incredibly, outlandishly lucky. Most of u.s. hope for a lucky suspension. But while nosotros wait, nosotros content ourselves with more-modest accomplishments. A life of sanity and $100,000 a year suits us but fine.

Equally for the Peace Corps, forget information technology. That organization is actually the to the lowest degree popular option among respondents between the ages of 20 and 29. Noblesse oblige has its limits. For many people, information technology would seem, sending a cheque each twelvemonth to the United Style is plenty.

From each of the following pairs, pick the organization that y'all call up will be more than successful x years from now:

Merrill Lynch — 43.half-dozen%
East*Trade — 56.4%

Toys 'R' Us — 48.9%
eToys — 51.1%

Peace Corps — 43.5%
Service.com — 56.v%

Barnes & Noble — 45.viii%
Amazon.com — 54.2%

Full general Motors — 81.5%
AutoNation — 18.5%

Time — xc.2%
Slate — 9.viii%

American Airlines — 44.7%
priceline.com — 55.3%

Wal-Mart — 72.5%
eBay — 27.5%

These findings assist explain the reluctance of respondents to commit to two years in the Peace Corps. Service.com doesn't even exist, yet a solid bulk of those we surveyed retrieve that information technology's going to eclipse the Peace Corps within a decade. In other responses, the confrontation between dirt world and e-world points up the strengths and failings of the new online stars. Respondents run into a time to come for Due east*Trade because the existing brokerage system is and then obviously flawed. And eToys and Amazon.com are already kicking the respective posteriors of Toys 'R' The states and Barnes & Noble. True, they're both losing a ton of coin, just they're likewise making central changes in the way we buy stuff. And although American Airlines will no doubt be flying planes in a decade, priceline.com has carved out a powerful intermediate position as ticket consolidator to the masses. Which company adds more value? Our respondents say priceline.com.

But not all dotcoms are created equal — or evaluated with the same rosy optimism. Only 27. 5% predict that eBay will beat out Wal-Mart over the side by side decade. And while consumers may hate the erstwhile-economy auto-buying experience, relatively few of them have bought into the notion of getting their motorcar via AutoNation. And Slate, in this forum, received a vote of little confidence — a reflection of its relative obscurity, perhaps, but also a sign that information technology lacks utility: Readers oasis't figured out what an online magazine is expert for.

Your rich aunt dies and leaves you a windfall. The terms of her will are unusual. You get $100,000 if you lot want to spend the inheritance right now. Yous become $200,000 if you invest it for at to the lowest degree 10 years. Or you get $300,000 now if you give it all away to clemency. Which choice would you option?

$100,000 to spend at present — 15.6%
$200,000 to invest now — 77.0%
$300,000 to give to charity now — 7.4%

If you opted to take the $200,000 inheritance from your aunt, in which i of the following would y'all cull to invest the coin for the next 10 years?

General Electric stock — fifty.two%
Authorities securities — 29.seven%
eBay stock — twenty.1%

On the face of it, $100,000 sounds like a lot of money. Merely before you lot blitz into anything, let's do the numbers. Have the $100,000, and that'south all you become. Give away $300,000 to charity, and, if you're in the top subclass, you get a revenue enhancement deduction worth $99,000. That mode, yous'll earn some philanthropic warm-and-fuzzies (and perhaps a groovy PBS tote handbag), and you'll end up merely $one,000 brusque of where you'd be if y'all took the cash up front.

Sadly, most of us aren't in the meridian tax subclass, and warm-and-fuzzies don't pay the kids' college bills. Fewer than ane respondent in ten is prepared to travel the philanthropic path. Only most aren't taking the cash up front either. These are blast times — and what stirs the soul of a generation weaned on a 17-year bull market is the opportunity to strike it rich in stocks.

The unmistakable message from more than than three-fourths of the survey respondents: This 18-bicycle economy will go on on trucking. More than to the point, General Electric will. Respondents who chose to invest are more than twice every bit probable to sink their coin into GE every bit they are into eBay. Jet engines and industrial controls will still be effectually a decade from now, even if Jack Welch won't. Internet auctions? Who knows? And government securities? Who cares?

Much has been said and written in the media about the sudden riches that entrepreneurs and investors have made from the Internet. Have you lot, or has anyone you know, fabricated a lot of money by investing in, working for, or starting a Net company?

"I personally have made a lot of money from the Net" — 2.three%
"I and people I know have made money from the Net" — 9.2%
"I haven't fabricated money from the Net, but people I know have done so" — 20.7%
"I don't know anyone who has made a lot of money from the Cyberspace" — 65.2%
"Really, I accept lost money on the Net" — 2.iii%

Remember about this: One-third of our respondents have made money from the Cyberspace or know someone who has fabricated money from the Internet. What exercise we know most this i person in three? For i thing, he's more likely to be a human being than a woman: By two to 1, more men say that they have fabricated money from the Internet. Those men are also likely to have higher-than-average incomes. And they're more likely to exist among those who, at the start of our survey, said that they would prefer to piece of work for Yahoo! or for Goldman Sachs. And what of the residual of us — the sorry two-thirds who have missed out on the boom of a lifetime? We're scooping Cerise Garcia at Ben & Jerry's, and nosotros're proud of it. Our personal values, if not our stock values, are in the right place. And we're hoping similar hell that this Net bubble pops real soon, so that nosotros don't feel like complete morons.

CEOs and Celebrities

Which of the following CEOs would you virtually like to work for in the new millennium?

Bill Gates, Microsoft — 32.9%
Michael Eisner, Disney — 25.i%
Jeff Bezos, Amazon.com — nine.ii%
Steve Jobs, Apple Estimator — 7.ii%
Jack Welch, Full general Electric — 6.9%
Margaret Whitman, eBay — vi.5%
Michael Armstrong, AT&T — half dozen.0%
Lou Gerstner, IBM — 3.5%
Jack Smith, Full general Motors — 2.9%

Time for our dazzler contest. A dream team of execs vie for validation from the online throngs. When the votes are counted, there's no surprise virtually who's strutting abroad with the cubic-zirconia-studded tiara: Bill Gates is the richest guy in the world, and he has dominated the loftier-tech globe for at least the past decade. Microsoft remains undeniably, outrageously successful — as hundreds of its millionaire employees and alums can adjure. Hitch your career to Gates, and you're practically guaranteed an enriching ride.

Disney'due south Michael Eisner has put up groovy numbers throughout his career, creating an entertainment Leviathan — however some contempo droppings in Mouseland. Here, he finishes well ahead of Jeff Bezos, who honchos the Internet's hottest retailer but who has nevertheless to demonstrate that he knows how to turn a profit. GE's Jack Welch, arguably the finest manager of the past 50 years, finishes out of the coin — a function, in large office, of low support from lower-income respondents.

I surprise: Information technology turns out that in that location are CEOs for men and CEOs for women. Gates, he's a guys' CEO: 36% of men, only just 26% of women, desire to work for him. Eisner, he's a ladies' homo, drawing 32% of women's votes. Welch and Armstrong appeal to men. Women like Bezos and Whitman. (Is this a Cyberspace matter?)

From each of the following pairs, pick the person whom you would rather sit next to on a cross-country flying:

Jeff Bezos, CEO of Amazon.com — 44.3%
Michael Crichton, novelist — 55.seven%

Michael Eisner, CEO of Disney — 54.2%
Bruce Willis, thespian — 45.8%

Beak Gates, CEO of Microsoft — 58.1%
Oprah Winfrey, talk-show host — 41.ix%

Lou Gerstner, CEO of IBM — 40.vi%
Michael Jordan, retired basketball thespian — 59.4%

Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple tree Computer — 49.1%
Alan Greenspan, chairman of the Fed — 50.9%

Jack Smith, CEO of General Motors — 56.eight%
Jeff Gordon, race-car driver — 43.2%

Jack Welch, CEO of Full general Electrical — xl.5%
Bill Clinton, president of the United States — 59.v%

Margaret Whitman, CEO of eBay — 58.2%
Maya Angelou, poet — 41.eight%

And which of the following CEOs would y'all least like to sit down adjacent to on a cross-land flight?

Michael Eisner, Disney — 15.8%
Jack Smith, General Motors — 15.6%
Bill Gates, Microsoft — 14.6%
Steve Jobs, Apple tree Computer — 13.seven%
Michael Armstrong, AT&T — xi.8%
Jack Welch, General Electrical — viii.7%
Margaret Whitman, eBay — viii.0%
Lou Gerstner, IBM — vi.three%
Jeff Bezos, Amazon.com — 5.6%

Don't think that big-time CEOs don't care about these 2 questions. Large-time CEOs have big-time egos. And deep down, they want to be liked. Admittedly, some of the matchups were lopsided from the first. Michael Jordan tin can take anyone one-on-i; Gerstner doesn't have that Wheaties-box smiling, and he tin can't dunk. And whatsoever investor with money on the line would kill to spend half-dozen hours next to Greenspan, the man who — more than any other living beingness in the free world — dictates the movement of stock prices: "Hey, Al, what's up with Eastman Kodak?" That could be why you lot never run across Greenspan flight on commercial airlines.

But who would have figured Gates to beat Oprah, mayhap the most pop woman in the nation, then handily? (Again, this is a gender thing. Guys, by more than than two to ane, pick Gates; women, by almost 3 to i, want to fly with Oprah.) Or Eisner to squeak past matinee action-hero Bruce Willis? Certain, Willis is slightly past his leering, wisecracking prime, but on that red-eye back from the declension, wouldn't he exist more amusing than Eisner? And who would accept thought that Jack Smith would beat out Jeff Gordon? Consider this vote a testament to the power of achievement over glitz.

Below we list four pairs of workers, along with their estimated pay. Would y'all say that each person — relative to the other person in the pair — is paid too much, about the right corporeality, or besides little?

Jack Smith, CEO of General Motors: $3 million

Paid too much — 59.9%
Paid about the right amount — 35.six%
Paid too trivial — 4.half-dozen%

Full general Motors union assembler: $42,000

Paid too much — 12.6%
Paid about the right amount — 62.v%
Paid too lilliputian — 24.nine%

Sean Puffy Combs, rapper: $54 million

Paid also much — 91.0%
Paid nigh the right amount — 8.seven%
Paid as well little — 0.three%

Entry-level Washington, DC schoolteacher: $31,000

Paid too much — 1.five%
Paid about the right amount — 21.3%
Paid too little — 77.3%

Tiger Woods, pro golfer: $26 million

Paid too much — 76.0%
Paid about the correct amount — 23.2%
Paid as well piddling — 0.nine%

Us senator: $136,700

Paid too much — 32.1%
Paid nigh the right amount — 50.5%
Paid besides little — 17.iii%

Margaret Whitman, CEO of eBay: $43 million

Paid too much — 85.3%
Paid about the correct amount — 14.one%
Paid too little — 0.six%

Experienced Java developer: $150,000

Paid too much – 22.8%
Paid near the right amount — 68.4%
Paid too trivial — viii.9%

Okay, this was a breathy setup. We acknowledge it. Multimillionaire CEO-celebrity versus hardworking Joe Average. What did we await?

The ane-sidedness of the response, however, makes a point. When it comes to pay, few respondents believe that the market place machinery is working very well — especially at the top of the economical nutrient chain. In an efficient market, riches should menstruation to some and not to others, according to their relative contributions to society. Puffy Combs makes a bundle because he solitary tin produce a service that others are willing to pay for. Americans generally buy this argument. But they too have a strong sense of equity: At a sure level, they believe, the market pays some people too much.

Respondents have no trouble, for case, with a Coffee programmer making $150,000, even though that's about four times the median U.S. family income. At root, that salary seems fair. That's considering in fluid, competitive labor markets — like the one for programmers — information most supply, demand, and pricing is well known. There's little dislocation, and hence petty room for farthermost results to occur. Similarly, automakers, and auto-making jobs, are plentiful enough to create a reasonable market place dynamic.

At the highest reaches of our economy, there'due south greater opportunity for dislocation, in part because pay is only loosely continued to bodily labor-pricing mechanisms. Margaret Whitman does not make what anyone has decided that she's worth; she makes a market-adamant, second-order derivative of that estimation, in the form of stock options. Those options may reflect her value, only it's more than probable that they reverberate a lot of stuff over which she has little control. When Tiger Woods takes domicile $1 meg from a tournament, the handbag is a attestation to his golfing prowess — non a strict valuation of his contribution to guild or his commercial value.

If you read the sports pages, you know that baseball player Darryl Strawberry — already recovering from cocaine habit — was arrested on charges of solicitation. Quondam teen tennis prodigy Jennifer Capriati did drugs and shoplifted. We know more about sports celebrities' personal lives than e'er before, and often what nosotros learn isn't pretty. Given that this is the case, how much do you concur with each of the following statements?

"Nosotros've lost the power to idolize sports stars every bit heroes, and that ability was comforting and salubrious."

Completely agree — 25.4%
Somewhat agree — 54.ane%
Completely disagree — 20.v%

"This is reality. Sports figures are human beings, but similar anybody else, and understanding that fact is salubrious."

Completely concur — 44.5%
Somewhat agree — 44.0%
Completely disagree — 11.5%

"Sports celebrities atomic number 82 grotesquely distorted lives — lives that are very dissimilar from anybody else's — and it'due south healthy not to idolize them."

Completely agree — thirty.1%
Somewhat agree — 47.one%
Completely disagree — 22.8%

Arguably, this isn't a question just about sports. Information technology'due south a proxy for our feelings about celebrity in general. There's a sense that the celebrification of everyone and everything cheapens what matters. All the same, when John Kennedy Jr.'s plane went down last summer, nosotros stayed glued to CNN for days. Celebrity both fascinates us and repels us.

That conflict shows up about clearly in our attitudes toward professional athletes. Nearly xc% of respondents agree, completely or somewhat, that sports stars are human, "just like everyone else." At the same fourth dimension, more than three-quarters say that players' lives are "grotesquely distorted" and "very different from everyone else'southward." So nosotros don't want to idolize them. Yet lxxx% of us also say that it was "comforting and healthy" to idolize sports icons in the good one-time days. If we could only find a manner back . . .

Yes, the results reverberate internal disharmonize. But they as well tell us that dissimilar groups take different opinions. Younger people are more probable to say that athletes are merely human; older people, to say that sports idolatry was once healthy and that information technology is now unhealthy. Higher-income folks tend to say that information technology is unhealthy. And, interestingly, in response to this question, women answer no differently from men.

Maybe the truth is that there are heroes, and then in that location are heroes. This community recognizes the value of operation and tends to acquaintance accomplishment with worth. Mistakes and bad behavior don't go unnoticed, simply they can be overshadowed past a brilliant business decision or by one swing of the bat.

This Millennium — and the Next

Which of the post-obit statements comes closest to your view of the new millennium?

"I marvel at the opportunities that lie ahead for today'south children. Because of technological innovation and global connection, their world volition seem limitless compared with ours" — 41.2%

"I worry about our children's hereafter. Tomorrow's globe is fraught with gamble and danger, and we're not providing the education or the values that kids need to steer a sound course" — 46.iii%

"The world doesn't change much in a unmarried generation. The opportunities and risks that today'due south children will face are going to be virtually the same as those that we confronted" — 12.5%

When it comes to a vision of our children's time to come, half of us are wildly optimistic, and half of united states of america are profoundly troubled. Simply i in viii believes that our children's lives will exist pretty much similar ours. Notably, 53% of female respondents envision a time to come world "fraught with risk," compared with just 42% of male respondents. Men tend to marvel at their kids' opportunities. The young and the poor tend to worry; the old and the wealthy tend to curiosity.

Let's think about the 22nd century for a moment. Which scenario best describes what the workplace of the 22nd century volition exist similar?

"Star Expedition": Gratuitous from concerns virtually material needs, people will focus instead on personal fulfillment — 23.9%

"Star Wars": Nigh people will dedicate their lives to one of a small group of huge, hypercompetitive organizations — 32.7%

"Dauntless New Globe": Personal relationships will yield in importance to scientific management — 25.i%

"Mad Max": In a dour world marked by violence and poverty, nearly people will piece of work merely to survive — 18.iv%

The new millennium is just just upon united states, and you want us to think almost the adjacent one already? Our respondents predict a distant time to come that has much in common with the present. Large companies dominate the economic landscape. At the level of the private, it's a separate conclusion: Scientific management may override homo values; or, say about as many respondents, we may be and then well provided for that we will be able to move personal fulfillment to the peak of the agenda. Some say both: Work volition go routinized, and self-discovery will become a primary focus of activity. Then in that location are the voices of doom, predicting that it will turn out badly, actually desperately.

There is also a dark side to all of these forecasts: Contrary to new-economic system-speak, the future is not ours to create. The next millennium is coming, and we exercise not control our ain destiny.

Which of the following statements comes closest to capturing your thoughts about the final years of the second millennium?

"Greed is good" — x.five%
"Life is like a box of chocolates" — 21.2%
"Here we are at present, entertain usa" — 17.0%
"Shagadelic, baby!" — ii.ii%
"The futurity'south so bright, I have to wear shades" — 12.3%
"I did not have sexual practice with that adult female" — 8.5%
"Yadda, yadda, yadda" — 28.three%

No wonder that forecasts for the next millennium vary from dim to bleak: As we shuffle out of the 1990s, nosotros are bound by a collective moral confusion that borders on indifference.

Forrest Gump'south goofy announcement on life ("a box of chocolates"), the selection of 1 respondent in five, has an upbeat ring to it. Only it's besides inherently fatalistic: "You never know what you're going to get." These are not the words of people who believe that they command their ain destiny. Gordon Gekko'southward utterance, "Greed is expert," is so '80s, but at least it has the band of confidence (and, afterward conviction, a short stint in a minimum-security facility).

Even worse, Nirvana's need to be entertained reeks of jaded passivity, and Clinton'due south wondrous nontruth smacks of outrageous cynicism. And the winning phrase that pays: Seinfeld's "Yadda, yadda, yadda," the ultimate testament to resigned indifference. On this score, respondents were in sync beyond lines of gender, age, and income.

Here's our take: Economic or geopolitical achievement doth not a millennium make. We all seek satisfaction of a different sort. Truth. Beauty. Justice. Meaning. Soul. And on those counts, the concluding years of the by century didn't deliver. So enough, already, with the old millennium. Been there, done that. Yadda, yadda, yadda. Whatever.

Additional questions and answers from this Fast Company-Roper Starch Worldwide survey are bachelor at www.fastcompany.com/online/31/survey.html

Visit Roper Starch Worldwide on the Web (http://www.roper.com).