We often think of younger, more able-bodied individuals as the prime candidates for leaders and contributors in our society today. However, have you ever stopped to think about the leadership role played by senior citizens, and how they can work with the younger generations to unite the entire population as one tolerant and supporting generation?
Right now, there are 46.2 million senior citizens living in America, accounting for 14.5% of the total population. As a sizeable portion of our communities, senior citizen leaders are some of the most influential minds and presences in our society, approaching causes and injustices with wisdom they didn’t have during their youth.
Here are 5 characteristics of senior citizen leaders today:
- Experience: Senior citizens have one thing we can’t take away: their experience. They have lived a long and full life, witnessing events and formulating a pearl of wisdom that can only be time-tested. From this experience, they are able to make suggestions and contribute to ideas that they have seen either succeed or fail in the past.
- Communicative Skills: By the time you reach your Golden Years, you’ve learned everything there is to know about communicating with different personality types, groups, and individuals. Senior leaders are able to recognize what type of communication is required, and how to deploy it.
- Wisdom: Another time-tested skill, having situational wisdom is not something that can be taught in a classroom. It’s something senior citizens have aggregated over their lifetimes, leveraging their overall awareness and experience to make decisions that are rooted in practicality.
- Patience: Senior contributors have weathered a lifetime of grievances, aware of the patience that is required to be an excellent leader. Sometimes, not making a decision and waiting for the right opportunity or the facts to present themselves, is the best leadership move of all. Seniors teach us on a daily basis that instant gratification isn’t the answer for anything; patience is.
- Humility: Lastly, senior leaders excel at humility, aware that personal satisfaction and egotism aren’t the answer for the greater good. Stepping back and being part of something bigger, listening to others, and imparting their wisdom is what’s going to make the real difference.
In some cases, senior citizens feel moved to take up a cause in their elderly years to make up for the lost time. If they weren’t involved during their own youth, that doesn’t mean they can’t be involved today. Thanks to technology platforms, senior citizens can be big contributors to movements through social messaging software, social media, emails, Skype calls, and the list goes on.
Senior Wisdom
Senior citizens are not just focused on their own issues; they are focused on the issues that affect younger and future generations. Providing wisdom, insight, and experience aligned with youths’ ability to innovate, create, and push forward their energy and action, senior leadership is perfectly complementary to the movements of our time today.
If you’re needing a sounding board, someone to serve as an accountability partner, some coaching or training to “get ready to be ready” for these times.
At ECI we’re passionate about teaching and coaching Women for readiness in critical times of transition in life and work. Creating a frequency of leadership needed at this time and space. Express your Guts with Grace! Learn to Lead Like a Woman!
Written By: Evelyn Cosme MA, MS/Leadership Strategist/Executive Women’s Coach/Speaker/Trainer/Author/Spiritual Healing Advisor
Book a complimentary 30 min “Elixir for the Leader” Session Now!
http://www.calendly.com/evelyn-cosme5