THE MARK OF Z

IN A RECENT issue of Forbes magazine, Andersen Consulting’s chief executive and managing partner George Shaheen said: “The changes coming in the next 10 years threaten everyone, including us.”

He added, ominously, that only one in three chief executives of multinational corporations fully understands how this revolution will roil the future. Only one in 10 has a clue about e-commerce, another top Andersen partner says. And the rest? “They’re scared to death,” Shaheen claimed.

Andersen sells its clients on the theory that a massive electronic revolution will radically change all business. A year ago, I would have dismissed this as hype. With all the new interactive tools, telecommunications changes, marketing database programs, Web sites and services, I felt only some of us really had to get out there and get our feet wet. It seemed there would be lots of time to learn and wait for the eventual shakeouts.

Today, I’m not so sure. I, too, have seen the electronic future and it belongs to our grandchildren. More accurately put, it’s not entirely that huge Generation Y everyone’s been talking about lately. It’s more the kids who tag along on their coattails. It’s everyone under 10 years old right now, a hefty, growing cohort that will change the face of the brave new digital world.

Let’s call these fearless electronic adventurers Generation Z-but I hope someone thinks up a better name soon. My first clue was my grandson, a beautiful, healthy boy of exceptional intelligence (grandma’s opinion). But with or without my opinion, there was indeed something different about Jonathan that I hadn’t seen in little kids before: He was a true digitally weaned child.

By the time he was a year old, he used his toy cell phone “to talk to mommy.” When he wanted to make music, he chose a tune simply by pushing a button on his own CD player. When he wanted action on a screen, he turned on his toy “computer.” Same for his little electric train. He could start it up or stop it, honk its horn and amble along beside the train track long before he learned how to set up the ride itself. Everything he knew began with pushing a button to make specific things happen.

He made voices come and go, pictures run and stop, furry animals and other digital toys come alive and interact with him. And he got audio encouragement for doing it right! Except, of course, when he also applied this to the television’s remote control (he loved TV from the start), the dishwasher, mom and pop’s cell phones and the clothes washer and…well, you know. He was in control. Or out of control, depending on who was speaking.

Then there’s Sarah. She’s 8 and has been on the computer for nearly four years. She can program American Doll characters to address her on screen and download Spice Girls songs from one of her favorite Web sites. In addition to spelling, math and science games, she uses her computer to make personalized birthday and holiday cards for her friends and family.

She has her own e-mail address on her mom’s computer and recently exchanged e-mail addresses with a new friend while on vacation in Florida. In school she regularly communicates via e-mail with a “key pal” living in Mexico. Meanwhile, she’s learned how to research the Internet for a class assignment on white-tailed deer and an elementary school publication has recently made her an offer for a CD on basic programming!

There’s also Andrew and Susannah. As far as they’re concerned, computers, CDs, VCRs, Walkmans-they’re all part of life, just like television. Susannah is 8 years old, in second grade-and already on the Internet. Andrew started picking at the computer sitting on his mother’s lap as a baby. At age 5 he’s using it to learn reading and writing. And he already sends and receives e-mail (with a little spelling help from his mom).

Both Susannah and Andrew have owned Walkmans since they started walking and use them for listening to books on tape as well as music. They’re accustomed to visiting Web sites of their favorite TV shows, downloading data and interacting. “Writing” means word processing, “games” means computer.

None of these typical kids has ever had to “learn” the computer. They simply take it for granted. Many get started at 18 months, before they’ve even mastered a toothbrush! There’s already a Web site devoted to such youngsters (Junior Net), with several new ones in the offing. These subscription-based private Web sites ensure “safe playgrounds” with e-mail, bulletin boards and plenty of exciting experiences.

Although such children 10 and under follow the Y generation, they won’t be seen as the computer whizzes that represent Gen Y. Being a computer whiz won’t mean anything special to them since they’ll all be whizzes by our definition. They’re as intrinsically digital as their tools and toys-from cell phones, pagers and handheld computers to robots and virtual reality games.

By age 2 these kids already have a different relation to inanimate objects-they look for the buttons and keys to animate these things. They may not have patience for helping mom and pop and grandpa with computers (as teenagers do now), nor will they be very good teachers if they are asked to help, simply because they won’t go through a computer learning process themselves. Once they read and spell, they’ll inherently sense how to push the keys and fiddle around to find out the rest. They’ll be surfing the Internet-fast.

This means a very different relationship with parents and, ultimately, friends. The computer or television screen will be much more the focus of their lives as the teacher and giver of information, the means of communicating and interacting. Any child whose family can afford a computer and a server will have democratic opportunities for preschool learning, associations and experiences that never existed before. The cyberworld will be Gen Z’s apple.

I must add that all the parents I talked to made it clear these cyber kids also spend a lot of time away from their computers. (A computer’s use is rationed in most families, a little like television time in the past.)

Generation Z will also mean healthy kids that still like to throw a ball, shout and run and enjoy family picnics. But when marketers start to notice these Zs within 15 years or so, it won’t be like it is now with Generation Y. If the Internet was the new medium for Gen Y teens, I suspect there may not even be a medium of choice for Gen Z’s. At least they won’t perceive a need to choose. They’re just waiting for a credit card to begin shopping.

Right now we’re beginning a fast-moving, major shakeout period. The opportunities are huge, and so are the questions. However it turns out, Generation Z-an estimated $34-million-plus market by 2015, is quite likely to be the first real market with total digital integration.

It’ll be a savvy market with a vast free flow of information through it. Because appearance, ethnic and racial characteristics-even gender-can be all but obliterated in an interactive digital environment, it’ll be a culturally integrated market that might even be brighter (since knowledge is power) than Gen Y-smart enough to let individuality make a strong reappearance as social and other barriers fall away. The Z’s digital environment will encourage and prepare them for entrepreneurship, offices at home and electronic collaboration in future careers. I see them growing up very quickly and, of course, livinglonger than any generation before them.

Watch kids under age 10 operate and listen to them, and you can understand how the future will be different. Sure, they’ll still need love and nurturing, but it’s unlikely many will be sitting on grandpa’s knee for sage advice or tugging mom’s skirt in search of answers-not with the Internet at hand.

Can you imagine Z-Geners writing a letter and putting it in the mail? Can you see them yakking for hours on the phone when they’ve got e-mail? Can you picture them hanging around the malls or shopping with parents when they can hang out in special-interest chat groups, interact with the newest stars and performers, then shop at Delia’s or Droog’s Web sites?

Will they be cynical as well as sophisticated? Will they be filled with the traditional values of Gen Yers or will they have new global values of their own? Will they be tangled up with soul searching or will they be seeking material things? Will they be listeners and viewers instead of readers? If you plan to be in business 10 to 15 years from now, it pays to keep a close eye on these Zs.

There was a commercial for Cisco Systems this past winter that showed shots of young children from all walks of life all over the world. In the end, the children came together in a group facing the screen. They all looked out at us as a voice-over asked, “Are you ready?”

I can almost hear myself replying, “LISTEN TO THEM. We don’t have much time!”

Joan Throckmorton is president of Joan Throckmorton Inc., a DM consultancy in Pound Ridge, NY.