New Delhi, June 8 -- In 2011, when I decided to leave my first job after more than five years because it no longer felt fresh or challenging, my father was more upset by the decision than my then employers.

As a cookie-cutter boomer, he had worked at one organisation for nearly 40 years. Growing up, I had never heard him grumble about his job. He went about the six-day work week without fuss, made enough to take care of a joint family, and have a modest surplus, which let him indulge in his one passion: travel. He had wanted a stable career and comfortable retirement, both of which, all things considered, he has been able to achieve.

As an older millennial who came of age in the years of liberalisation and globalisation, I, on the other...