To better serve clients, advisors should be aware of differences both within and between the generations, according to several presentations and discussions at the 2018 Schwab IMPACT conference in Washington, D.C.

In opening the conference, Bernie Clark, Schwab’s head of advisor services, put generational planning at the forefront of the discussion by explaining how the custodian thought of each generation’s experiences with the financial crisis.

For example, the oldest mass generation in the U.S., the “silent generation” born before the post-World War 2 baby boom, escaped from the financial crisis relatively “OK,” said Clark, because they were already through the earliest stages of their retirements as the value of their investments began to decline.

The baby boomer generation, on the other hand, had seen “great times in the market, but lost a lot too. Most boomers, even today, felt that they don’t have the economic well-being to move into their post-work lives,” said Clark.

As the baby boomers transition to retirement and begin to spend down their assets, more advisors are focused on affluent members of younger generations who are waxing in both influence and wealth. But advisors should be aware that there are deep differences between Generation X and the millennial generation and their elders, said Mike Van Wyk, vice president of consumer research for the Capital Group’s American Funds, in a Tuesday presentation entitled “Millennials to Boomers: Better High-Net-Worth Planning By Generation.”

“Each of these generations are around 70 million people, so when you talk about them as a generation, you’re generalizing for a group of 70 million,” said Van Wyk. “My point of view is that it’s extremely useful to think about the generations, but only if you ground yourself clearly in the life experiences that these generations went through.”

Once you have an understanding of how people in different age groups experienced their formative years, he said, you can get a better sense of how they will navigate life changes.

For example, millennials, who are between 22 and 37 years old, have grown up through a period of rapid technological change in which the power of a home computer has shrunk down to devices that fit in pockets and on wristwatches.

Millennials also experienced traumatic political events, like the September 11 attacks in New York and Washington, D.C., as well as numerous school shootings, and tough market and economic events like the global financial crisis and subsequent Great Recession. More important, these things happened to them in their formative years, said Van Wyk.

Generation X, on the other hand, comprising those between ages 38 and 53, spent their formative years amid the development of the home computer. They also grew up in an era where a much larger portion of women were entering the workforce, so they’re at times referred to as “latchkey kids,” said Van Wyk.

“They’ve been raised being given a lot of independence, which made them more of a do-it-yourself generation,” he said. “That’s part of the reason they’re skeptical about experts and the reason they usually go to relying on themselves for decision-making.”

Generation X also started saving for retirement around the time of the dot-com crash in 2000, and endured the financial crisis and recession, so they have experienced somewhat flat equity returns throughout their lives.

The baby boomers, between the ages of 54 and 72, came of age amid the rise of television media, a series of high-profile assassinations and the Vietnam War. They were of high school, college and grad student ages when a new era of activism started, giving them more of a voice and a direct role in the political events of their time.

“For baby boomers, if they invested and stayed in, their attitude is that the market delivered for them,” said Van Wyk. “Over time, the market has created a lot of wealth, and baby boomers have the ability to look back and feel good about the returns they’ve received in the marketplace.”

He gave advisors some pointers for working with each generation based on research American Funds has conducted. Most millennials, for example, don’t identify themselves as such—so advisors should be careful about using the generational label. But millennials also consider themselves financially savvy and see themselves as conservative investors.

They believe learning more about finances and investing is extremely important, said Van Wyk, yet also tend to trust expert advice, though they are also likely to vet that advice online and within their social networks. Fifty-six percent of millennials surveyed by American Funds also claim to work with a financial advisor.

“These are savvy adults with high expectations,” he said. “The way to make it clear what the relevance of your financial advice is, is to tie it to a financial life event, because many of them think of financial advice as being relevant only to retirement.”

Generation Xers much more willingly embrace their label, and have a strong work ethic. Because all Gen Xers came of age before the advent of online social networks, they tend to have much tighter circles of friends. Family is core to Gen Xer identity. When American Funds asked each generation whether they thought that their generation was unique, millennials were the most likely to say yes while Gen Xers were the most likely to say no.

Generation X also has trust issues, said Van Wyk, as American Funds’ research shows that they trust their own judgment twice as much as they trust advice rendered by a financial advisor.

“They are laser-focused on retirement, but the challenge is that they’re trying to go it alone,” he said. “They’re the least likely to work with a financial advisor and the least likely to say that they are conservative investors.”

Despite their connection to the freewheeling years of the ’60s and ’70s, baby boomers closely identify with traditional values, respectfulness and work ethic, said Van Wyk. Their generation is settling into retirement, and despite worries about a retirement crisis, most of the respondents in the American Funds studies express contentment in retirement—30 percent of retired baby boomers said retirement was going as well as they had expected, with another 60 percent saying it was going better than they had hoped.

Yet baby boomers are also worried about issues like health care and taxes, said Van Wyk, and as the generation continues to leave the workforce, many find that retirement doesn’t come as expected.

“It doesn’t always come on time for boomers; only a quarter of them have it come at the time they thought it would,” he said. Van Wyk also said that extra time should be taken addressing boomers’ fears about health care in retirement, and that volatility will challenge the contentment of many members of this generation.

“Use their experience,” he said. “They’ve been there and seen the ups and downs.”