10 Career Mistakes Boomers Made That Gen X Should Avoid

By Jeff Altman, The Big Game Hunter

Originally Published on Forbes.com in 2 parts Part 1 Part 2

One day, I woke up, looked in the mirror, and saw something I’d never seen before. There were things on my face that were in slightly different places. There was a little bit of grey in my beard and a closet full of clothing that had seen better days. At least my nonexistent hairline wasn’t sprouting!

As time went by, I came to realize these “rites of passage” were relatively inconsequential by comparison to the “hard knocks” some of my friends and I were taking that were decimating our careers. I will share the top 10 lessons my friends and I have learned the hard way:

1. Be cautious of reporting to someone from a younger demographic.

This can be a signal that your advancement opportunities have disappeared. Jerry, a Boomer, accepted an assignment reporting to someone from Gen X and never regained his leadership status within his organization. He heard many good reasons for why this happened:

“You are much more capable than the assignments that we have available.”

“We have something coming up with the new budget in January, so this is just to tide you over until then.”