Jared Cohen, director of Google Ideas—a global issues think tank for Mountain View-based Google Inc.—got hooked on Gen Next after speaking to the Newport Beach-based issues group in 2008.
Now he’s one member of a group of young, well-to-do executives—some part of prominent families in the county—who pay $10,000 a year to be members of Gen Next.
Gen Next is a hands-on group with a national and global bent. It works on and funds projects in education, security and economics.
Google’s Cohen and two other Gen Next members even founded an offshoot, New York-based Movements.org. The nonprofit helps support young online activists across the globe.
“We are looking to be a catalyst for change,” said Paul Makarechian, chief executive of Newport Beach-based Makar Properties LLC and founder of Gen Next.
The group looks to seed ideas or generate national attention for projects or causes Makarechian said.
Gen Next gives “members the opportunity to be consequential,” said Dan McClory, managing director of Irvine-based Hunter Wise Financial Group LLC, an investment bank focused on midsize companies. “The common bond of the network is that, like me, these are extremely busy people who want to leverage the talent they have.”
Gen Next has five chapters, including ones in Seattle and Los Angeles.
The founding Orange County chapter is the largest with more than 60 members.
Gen Next has about 150 members in all.
The nonprofit is made up of business owners and executives mostly in their 30s and 40s. There are older members, including Paul’s father, Hadi Makarechian, a homebuilder and developer.
“We call it a psychographic—not a demographic,” said Michael Davidson, chief executive of Gen Next. “We try to find high energy people who want to shape the world.”
Some local members: Alex Bathal, co-president of Tustin’s Raj Manufacturing LLC; Bill Lyon, chief operating officer of Newport Beach-based William Lyon Homes Inc.; Shawn Baldwin, partner in Newport Beach’s Sunrise Co.; and Autumn Strier, president and cofounder of Irvine-based nonprofit Miracles for Kids.
Invitation Only
Membership is by invitation only.
Two members have to nominate a prospective member, according to Davidson. Then the majority must agree on the member.
Investment banker McClory is a newer member.
He had been eyeing the group but said he was reluctant to join, thinking it might be just another time zapper.
“As I look at it now, it helps me leverage my time,” he said. “It can help act as a filter for all kinds of content, education material, charitable causes and extracurricular involvements.”
Gen Next’s Davidson said the group is designed to lure and accommodate busy people.
“We needed to create a model that was attractive, to give people the type of leverage they want, to get them off of the sideline,” he said.
Gen Next seeks to educate members through speakers, global fieldtrips and other means.
“You take any remarkable person, you give them more information, more tools, and a network and they will do great things,” Davidson said.
Last year, Gen Next put on more than 100 events, hosting a number of speakers.
Past speakers include: Bob Schieffer, chief Washington correspondent for CBS Corp.; John Connors, former chief financial officer for Microsoft Corp.; John Ashcroft, former U.S. attorney general; Craig Barrett, former chairman of Intel Corp.; Rep. John Boehner; and Condoleezza Rice, former Secretary of State.
Gen Next doesn’t pay its speakers.
Many members are part of the Young Presidents’ Organization, a global group that helps executives be better at business.
“YPO is wonderful for issues surrounding personal growth, family and business,” said Kevin Maloney, president of Santa Ana-based QuantumSphere Inc., which makes catalysts that have applications such as lengthening the life of electric car batteries.
Gen Next goes beyond business, he said.
“It’s motivated me to get more involved,” Maloney said. “It’s made guys like me feel like I can make a difference.”
The group goes on annual educational trips.
This year, members are going to Russia.
In October, members traveled to Brazil, where they met with leaders in government and business.
They also toured the stock exchange in São Paulo.
Brazil has a parallel stock exchange for charitable projects, the Environmental and Social Investment Exchange.
It was at the Brazilian stock exchange where McClory connected a few dots.
“A light went off in my head,” he said.
McClory said he figured Brazil’s social stock exchange might be a great way for Gen Next to help fund schools that some members already had planned to build in poor neighborhoods in Rio de Janeiro.
“It’s a project that really excites me,” he said. “It’s something that I would’ve never been exposed to had I never been a part of Gen Next.”
If all goes well, McClory hopes to bend the ear of his friend, Robert Greifeld, chief executive of Nasdaq Stock Market Inc.
“I’ll say ‘Bob, why did we have to go to Brazil to list one of these things? Why aren’t we doing it on Nasdaq?’ I’ve already let him know it’s coming,” he said.
Political Roots
Gen Next is nonpartisan but has some roots in politics.
In the early 2000s, members started Generation Next, a political action committee.
They found that many of their peers weren’t that interested in politics. Members wanted a broader appeal, so they evolved into an issues group, Gen Next.
For members who like politics, there is an offshoot, the Gen Equity political action committee. About 20% of Gen Next members participate in Gen Equity, which vets and endorses candidates.
“Politics is an important tool,” Davidson said. “But it’s one tool of many.”
Another arm is the Gen Next Foundation for funding nonprofits.
Google’s Cohen said he was surprised at the passion of the members.
“I’ve never thought of myself as much of a joiner,” Cohen said. “I met these incredible young people from a diverse set of fields who had a passion about topics I care about. I went from someone who doesn’t join things to someone who’s incredibly passionate about this network.”
He said he regularly taps Gen Next members.
In the aftermath of the 2010 earthquake in Haiti, Cohen called on Gen Next members to help track down satellite radios as part of his work for the State Department at the time.
Gen Next is set to be part of a Google Ideas Summit Against Violent Extremism to be held in Ireland in June.
Finding ways to counter extremism is the thrust of Gen Next’s security focus.
“There’s no single profile of a violent extremist other than the fact that they’re young,” Cohen said.
Gen Next also works with London’s Quilliam Foundation, a think tank that tackles extremism.
New Gen Next chapters are planned for Nevada, New York, San Francisco, Dallas, Denver and Chicago.
“If it were up to me, we’d have a chapter in every major metro,” Makarechian said.
Now living in Nevada, Makarechian is working on getting a chapter started there.
“My goal is try to get this organization to several thousand members,” he said. “I’d love to break 1,000 under my leadership.”
Makarechian said he started the group because he felt compelled, given his good fortune.
“My dad fled a revolution—his country imploded,” Makarachian said of his father, who fled Iran with his family during the Iranian Revolution. “We take for granted the fact that we have a free democratic system.”
