I didn’t seek out this group—quarter-lifers, loosely defined as people in their mid-twenties to early thirties. In fact, when I started coaching over 20 years ago, I purposefully identified my niche as those aged forty-six to sixty.
It’s certainly easy to see why people in this age group might seek out coaching, and why more and more resources are showing up for dealing with one’s quarter-life crisis. And now that I’ve had the privilege of working with so many clients in this age group, I’m noticing what I enjoy about it.
Here are some of these observations, and what those of us in other age groups can learn from quarter-lifers:
A passion for growing and learning
For my coaching clients and students, this doesn’t just mean reading books or attending lectures. They want to take this new information and reflect on it. They seem to inherently understand the need to process lessons in real life and, in doing so, interact with people in different life stages to get their perspective. And I can tell you, it feels good being on the other end of this equation.
“We do not learn from experience. We learn from reflecting on experience.”—John Dewey, American psychologist and educator
A new way to lead
For years, my generation has been talking about how command and control leadership is over. For quarter-lifers, this leadership style is not even in their muscle memory. It’s not where they turn by default; they’re much more collaborative by nature, with no defined hierarchy. Yes, someone needs to make a decision and have a bottom line, but it’s all much more fluid.
They seek coach training because they don’t want to take responsibility for the work of those they manage, but have their people take responsibility for their own work. To help them do the job, without doing the job for them.
Sometimes they’re put in roles where this seems to be expected. And they say to me, their coach, “That’s way too much energy and work—I want a life outside of work. And it’s not good for the person, either, because they become dependent on me.”
Again, we’ve talked about this leadership concept for years—they’re actually living it.
What trends are you seeing in your coaching practice? What do you notice that’s different about coaching people in their mid-twenties or early thirties?
Head, Heart, Hunch