4-Quarter Lives

Avivah Wittenberg-Cox
  • 5.0 (4)
  • Society & Culture

You are likely to live longer than you think. Are you ready? Science has gifted us ever longer, 100-year lives. This impacts… everything! From couples and careers - to companies and countries. We’ll interview the experts who are exploring the consequences – and the individuals applying it to their own lives and choices. Generational and gender expert Avivah Wittenberg-Cox talks with people designing new ways of living, working and loving at all ages – across life’s 4 quarters. elderberries.substack.com

  1. 4d ago

    Richard Smith - ReThinking Retirement - Longer Financial Lives

    In this week’s 4-Quarter Lives Podcast, Avivah Wittenberg-Cox is joined by pensions expert Richard Smith for a conversation about money, longevity and the decades we spend planning for a future we can’t predict. Smith explains why the average UK worker now juggles three or four separate pensions across a churning career, and why almost 80% of people have no idea what they hold in total. The two explore the coming UK pensions dashboard, which will finally connect over 100 million scattered records, and unpack why an income figure people can relate to matters far more than a headline pot. They turn to the harder questions Q3 raises — how to spend when you don’t know how long you’ll live, why even wealthy savers freeze at decumulation, and why women face a double longevity-and-pensions gap. Throughout, Richard argues for awareness delivered with what he calls a pensions hug. Richard Smith is a UK-based career pensions professional who began in pensions administration and has spent the latter part of his career focused, in his words, narrowly and deeply on one topic: pensions dashboards. He helped the UK government define the data standards underpinning the dashboard technology ecosystem and has held roles across the programme since. Now working largely pro bono and independently, he is a leading consumer-advocacy voice for the initiative. He has toured Belgium, the Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden and Norway researching how other countries connect citizens’ pensions, and advises fintechs on making pension data understandable to ordinary savers. Get full access to 4-Quarter Lives | Elderberries at elderberries.substack.com/subscribe

  2. Aug 20

    Anne Button & Rachel Cohen - Change Makers in Midlife, Making Longevity Learning Accessible

    In this week’s 4-Quarter Lives, Avivah Wittenberg-Cox is joined by Anne Button and Rachel Cohen to explore how universities can support purposeful midlife transitions at scale. Anne and Rachel co-developed Change Makers, a 15-week programme based at University of Colorado Denver, designed for adults navigating their next chapter. Built for accessibility, the course runs evenings, blends online and in-person sessions, and costs under $4,000. That design choice also brings in people who are still working, often overlooked by traditional, year-long, high-cost programmes. They explain how Change Makers follows a clear three-part arc. Inner reflection helps participants reassess identity, values, and strengths. Outer exploration opens up new options through speakers, peer exchange, and real examples. Integration turns insight into action through short, practical 12-week plans that build momentum. A standout feature is the peer advisory process. Small, rotating groups help participants test ideas, voice long-held ambitions, and move from stuck to forward motion. Anne and Rachel share stories of alumni who have redesigned careers, stepped into community leadership, launched new ventures, or found new ways to contribute and engage. The conversation also looks beyond the classroom. Change Makers is influencing university thinking on lifelong learning, workforce participation, and ageing. Its alumni are feeding into local media, policy discussions, and community initiatives, reframing older adults as experienced contributors rather than liabilities. Looking ahead, Anne and Rachel outline plans for a fully virtual programme, a stronger alumni network, and a wider national reach. Their shared aim is clear. Help more people age with confidence, direction, and impact. Anne Button is the founding director of Change Makers at the University of Colorado Denver. She designed the programme to fill a gap in higher education for midlife adults navigating transitions in work and life and thinking intentionally about what comes next. Anne focuses on making this kind of learning practical, affordable, and accessible. Her work positions universities as active players in longer careers and ageing societies. Rachel Cohen is a gerontologist, social worker, and founder of Aging Dynamics. Her work focuses on age-friendly communities, systems change, and helping individuals shape meaningful later chapters. Rachel brought deep expertise in ageing, community planning, and facilitation to Change Makers, where she co-led curriculum and peer advisory processes. She works nationally with organisations and cities to support longer, more engaged lives. Useful Links: ● Change Makers Programme at University of Colorado Denver: https://www.ucdenver.edu/change-makers ● Aging Dynamics: https://www.aging-dynamics.com ● Anne Button on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/anne-button-cudenver-change-makers-program/ ● Rachel Cohen on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rachelbcohen/ Get full access to 4-Quarter Lives | Elderberries at elderberries.substack.com/subscribe

  3. Aug 13

    Jane Moffett - Women Wrote the Map First: Navigating longer lives

    In this week’s 4-Quarter Lives Podcast, Avivah Wittenberg-Cox is joined by Jane Moffett, author of What Next? and the Founder of KANGAROO Coaching, for a conversation about the life stage still awkwardly labelled retirement. Moffett argues the adjustment after leaving work can take up to seven years, because stopping work is a major psychological transition involving shifts in identity, values and meaning — none of which can be hurried. She maps six recurring challenges, from the manner of leaving to the reshaping of time, structure and relationships, and pushes back on the pressure to name a purpose, offering meaning as the more useful word. The conversation turns to gendered career shapes — the male mountain versus women’s rolling landscape — the layer of Q3 women hitting their strongest decades, and why so few couples do this thinking together. Both agree: start early, and don’t go it alone. Jane Moffett has spent thirty years supporting women through major life transitions, particularly the points where the professional and the personal intersect — becoming a mother, leaving the workplace, returning after a career break. Her interest in the transition out of work grew from conversations with friends of her own generation: the first large cohort of professional women to have built full careers, and to face stopping work with no blueprint to follow. Finding nothing written for women in the UK on the subject, she researched and wrote What Next?, a six-part map of the challenges of redefining retirement. Useful Links: Book - From Retired to Defined Get full access to 4-Quarter Lives | Elderberries at elderberries.substack.com/subscribe

  4. Aug 6

    Dr. Denise Taylor - The Longevity Dividend: Age, work and opportunity

    In this week’s 4-Quarter Lives Podcast, Avivah Wittenberg-Cox is joined by psychologist and author Dr Denise Taylor, who after more than 50 years of work stepped away from client practice to write. Taylor argues that most people misread Carl Jung: the second half of life is not about striving differently, but about going inwards. She unpicks the assumption that work means paid work, and questions the language now forming around 60-year careers. The conversation turns to identity — who am I without my job? — and to the health and financial foundations of later-life agency, including the idea of voluntary simplicity. Taylor describes writing her new book, ThriveSpan, in the four acres of woodland she bought during lockdown, structuring it as paths through a wood rather than chapters. Her closing permission is simple: you have more time than you think. Dr Denise Taylor is a psychologist, career coach and author who has worked in retirement and later-life for more than 40 years, beginning as a welfare officer at Royal Mail running pre-retirement seminars in her twenties. After a corporate career and a long practice in careers coaching, she completed a doctorate and turned to writing full time. Her books include Rethinking Retirement, Career Coaching for Midlife and Beyond, and ThriveSpan, Walking Gently into What Matters Now, with Olderhood Unfolding — 52 essays on ageing — to follow. She writes for the iPaper, publishes academic research, and works from her own four acres of woodland. Get full access to 4-Quarter Lives | Elderberries at elderberries.substack.com/subscribe

  5. Jul 30

    Rob Nathan - The Second Career Revolution: Holistic careers for longer lives

    In this week’s 4-Quarter Lives Podcast, Avivah Wittenberg-Cox is joined by Rob Nathan, occupational psychologist and career coach, to ask why the three-stage life — education, work, retirement — is proving so stubborn. Recorded on his 77th birthday, Nathan argues the systems around us were built for shorter lives and have not caught up, while individuals get financially and socially bound into their employers. He draws on William Bridges to separate change from transition, and unpacks the self-limiting beliefs that keep people stuck at the edge of the diving board. The conversation turns to cultural contrasts — the respect afforded elders across Southeast Asia against a Western workplace that reads older workers as slower and replaceable — and to the case for career conversations and multi-generational teams. Nathan closes with whitewater rafting and his own definition of a good fourth quarter. Rob Nathan is an occupational psychologist and career coach of more than four decades. He set up his own practice in 1978 and now directs Career Counselling Services, whose training and coaching work he is expanding into Southeast Asia. He commissioned, edited and co-authored The Holistic Career Conversations Handbook, including a Chapter on Career Conversations to The Holistic Career Coaching Handbook, and an earlier co-authored career title was serialised on television. He designed the Thrive at 55 programme for people rethinking work in later career. Alongside his practice he holds a master’s in creative writing, writes short stories, and runs shared reading groups for elders with Age UK. Links: * www.career-counselling-services.co.uk * https://www.routledge.com/The-Holistic-Career-Coaching-Handbook-A-Guide-for-Managers-and-Employers/Nathan/p/book/9781032802350?utm_source=cjaffiliates&utm_medium=affiliates&cjevent=7d2ae9f1873a11f1806700590a18b8f7 * https://career-counselling-services.co.uk/accredited-career-coach-training/ * https://career-counselling-services.co.uk/advanced-icf-career-coaching-certificate/ * https://www.linkedin.com/in/robnathanccs/ Get full access to 4-Quarter Lives | Elderberries at elderberries.substack.com/subscribe

  6. Jul 23

    UBER - Designing for Everyone: Accessibility as Innovation

    In this week’s 4-Quarter Lives Podcast, Avivah Wittenberg-Cox is joined by UBER’s Briana Gilmore to explore how ageing, disability and mobility intersect — and what that means for the future of work, cities and independence. Briana reframes ageing not as a demographic segment but as an access issue, shifting the conversation from “senior markets” to systems that either enable or restrict independence. She introduces self-efficacy — the confidence to navigate the world predictably — and shows how it erodes when environments fail to adapt, not because of personal limitations. Applying the social model of disability to ageing, she argues that disability lies in environments, not impairments, opening fresh ways to design products, services and cities. Along the way she unpacks the tension between safety and autonomy, the dignity of risk, and how this thinking reshaped Uber’s approach to older users — and what age-friendly cities truly require: meaningful choice. Briana Gilmore is Head of Global Accessibility Policy at Uber, focused on disability access, ageing and inclusive mobility. With a background spanning global migration policy, public health and urban planning, her work examines how systems shape access to resources, movement and independence. A long-time disability advocate, she integrates the social model of disability into product and policy design, challenging traditional assumptions about ageing and adaptability. At Uber, she leads efforts to expand access for older adults and marginalized communities, Get full access to 4-Quarter Lives | Elderberries at elderberries.substack.com/subscribe

  7. Jul 16

    Alastair Greener - Lost in Translation: Communicating across generations

    In this week’s 4-Quarter Lives Podcast, Avivah Wittenberg-Cox is joined by Alastair Greener, speaker, consultant and author of Generationally Speaking, to unpick what we get wrong about generations at work. Alastair argues that much of what we label generational conflict is really about life stage, and that organisations stereotype at their peril: his research across six generations found we are, on average, only about 65% “stereotypical”, meaning a third of people won’t match the labels applied to them. The conversation explores a striking gap: just 6% of HR leaders report overt generational friction, yet almost two-thirds believe better intergenerational communication would boost productivity. Avivah and Alastair dig into the overlooked Q3 workforce, the value of multi-generational teams, and three strategies leaders can adopt now: omni-channel communication, “tangling” the generations within teams, and recruitment that genuinely matches onboarding. Alastair Greener is a speaker, trainer and consultant specialising in intergenerational communication, helping organisations turn generational difference into a source of engagement and productivity rather than friction. His book Generationally Speaking, published in November 2025, draws on his research with 4,000 people across six generations and all socioeconomic groups, examining how each generation prefers to communicate and how far the stereotypes really hold. After a career in the corporate world, Alastair now works with major organisations on communication, culture and multi-generational teams, with a follow-up study and a second book already in the pipeline. Get full access to 4-Quarter Lives | Elderberries at elderberries.substack.com/subscribe

  8. Jul 9

    Charlie Rogers - The Courage to Become Undefinable: Life beyond labels

    What if the most valuable thing you can become is... undefinable? In the first episode of the Longer Lives Need Better Maps summer series, Avivah Wittenberg-Cox talks with Charlie Rogers, founder of the Undefinable Community and author of Undefinable Life Design. Together they explore why younger generations are rejecting traditional career paths—and why their search for identity mirrors the questions many people face later in life as they transition into a new Q3. Charlie introduces his idea of the “golden thread”: finding the unique connections between your interests instead of defining yourself by a single job or profession. The conversation ranges from portfolio careers and AI to flexible organisations and the future of work, revealing a surprising insight: whether you’re 28 or 58, longer lives demand greater freedom to evolve. Perhaps the future belongs not to specialists—but to those willing to become undefinable. * Undefinable Life Design (book): https://mybook.to/undefinablelifedesign/ * Subscribe to Charlie’s Newsletter: * Work with Charlie: https://www.undefinablelifedesign.com/ Get full access to 4-Quarter Lives | Elderberries at elderberries.substack.com/subscribe

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5
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About

You are likely to live longer than you think. Are you ready? Science has gifted us ever longer, 100-year lives. This impacts… everything! From couples and careers - to companies and countries. We’ll interview the experts who are exploring the consequences – and the individuals applying it to their own lives and choices. Generational and gender expert Avivah Wittenberg-Cox talks with people designing new ways of living, working and loving at all ages – across life’s 4 quarters. elderberries.substack.com

Information

  • Creator
    Avivah Wittenberg-Cox
  • Years Active
    2022 - 2026
  • Episodes
    134
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © Avivah Wittenberg-Cox
  • Show Website
    4-Quarter Lives

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