Are you a Lark or an Owl?

The vast majority of people are either “Morning types” (or Larks) or “Evening types” (or Owls). This is governed by our own natural body clock and it is not something that we are at liberty to tinker with. You are at your most productive at the beginning of the day or the end of the day. Some jobs obviously suit particular types. Delivering the post or the morning milk is clearly a job for a Morning Type. Working in a nightclub is not!

You need to organise your working day around your type. If you are a Morning type, then plan your main tasks for the beginning of the day. It will be fatal to leave important (but possibly unappealing tasks) until after lunch. The afternoon will arrive, you will look at the task and decide that “as I am a Morning type, I’ll leave this until tomorrow morning.” Taken to its logical conclusion, tomorrow never comes and you can find yourself putting the task off until it is really too late.

If you are an Evening type you should plan those important tasks for later in the day. You should also arrange your meetings at this time when you are your most productive and most alert. Start the day with the routine tasks that don’t require a lot of brainpower. But beware of falling in to the trap of concentrating on the easy (and possibly more enjoyable) tasks throughout the whole day. This may sound simple but just take a moment to think about some of your recent working days. Have you been as productive as you should have been? If not, have you tried to address tasks at the wrong time of the day with predictable outcomes?

If you’re looking or new job, try to uncover the culture of the company that you are considering working for. In order for you to be happy in a new role, the culture of the company has to map to your own. If you're a morning person you will want to arrive at work early. If you find yourself working in a culture where nobody leaves until the boss has gone home in the evening, you may not thrive!

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The Mid Life Opportunity (www.MidLifeOp.com) is a community for Mid Lifers. Advice and Guidance will soon be available from The Mid Life Coaching Panel. It’s free to join so what are you waiting for? Complete the form on the right hand side of this post…Tx

Changing Jobs in Mid Life

I recently had a slightly surreal experience which set me thinking about the way that we each view our world.

We arranged to take a long weekend break in Europe that involved getting a taxi to the station, arriving at 4am – an early start! The taxi duly dropped us off just before 4 and we were blearily taking our cases out of the car when a 20something lad wandered up and asked the taxi driver if he could take him home.

So here we were, talking to the same taxi driver about the same taxi but from a completely different perspective – we were starting our day and looking forward to going to France and our 20something friend was ending a long night out and looking forward to his bed.  We were in the same place but viewing the situation from a completely different perspective.

The same is true of politics – I can see it’s the government’s fault, you blame the world crisis. We’re both looking at the same situation.

And music – we listen to the same song – you love it, I hate it.

What about the mid life relationship crisis? Let’s say that your friend becomes involved with a young bride or a toy boy. Whether the new love interest is from Russia, Thailand or from the same country as your friend, do they really think that it’s all going to have a happy ending? You don’t, they do …

So what do we learn from this? That we all view the world with different eyes? This probably indicates that Mid Lifers typically see things differently to younger people. Mid Lifers have more experience to draw on, more real life examples of what works and what doesn’t – the generation gap, if you like. In the world of work, does this prejudice younger people (the hiring managers) against Mid Lifers?

If you’re looking to change jobs, or need to find a new job because you’ve been made redundant, ask yourself where you are most likely to be successful and happy. You will probably have a lot of transferable skills but that doesn’t mean that they can be transferred everywhere. Think about where you are most likely to be happy – that is probably going to be where you can also add most value. If you’ve worked in the customer service department of a big company and you like gardening, working in a large garden centre might strike the right notes for you. If you’re in your 40s, worked in local government for the last 15 years and play in a band at weekends, you’re very unlikely to be happy working in the media. Do you see the difference?

Working in a garden centre ticks the ‘gardening’ box, the ‘customer service’ box and the ‘midlife’ box.

Working in the media ticks the ‘music’ box but most definitely doesn’t tick the ‘mid life’ box – the media is populated with young, thrusting ‘metrosexuals’ who are unlikely to share most of your midlife views of the world.

So understand that we all view the world from different standpoints and that this may affect your chances of landing that new job and ultimately, your likelihood of being happy and productive in your new role. Think about the working environments in which your views and those of your potential new boss and colleagues are likely to coincide rather than conflict – this is where you will find happiness and fulfilment in your work.

Sounds obvious? Maybe, but how many Mid Lifers think they know better!

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The Mid Life Opportunity (www.MidLifeOp.com) is a community for Mid Lifers. Advice and Guidance will soon be available from The Mid Life Coaching Panel. It’s free to join so what are you waiting for? Join here FREE!

Please take 1 minute to complete the 2010 Mid Life Survey: Click here

Are you a Mid Life Lark or a Mid Life Owl?

The vast majority of people are either “Morning types” (Larks) or “Evening types” (Owls). This is governed by our own natural body clock and it is not something that we are at liberty to tinker with. You are at your most productive either at the beginning of the day or the end of the day. Some jobs obviously suit particular types. Delivering the post or the morning milk is clearly a job for a Morning Type. Working in a nightclub is not! If you're thinking of changing your job or you are actively job hunting, being aware of whether you are a Lark or an Owl is important. You haven't changed your type during your working life to date and you're unlikely to change in the future.

You need to organise your working day around your type. If you are a Morning type, then plan your main tasks for the beginning of the day. It will be fatal to leave important (but possibly unappealing tasks) until after lunch. The afternoon will arrive, you will look at the task and decide that “as I am a Morning type, I’ll leave this until tomorrow morning.” Taken to its logical conclusion, tomorrow never comes and you can find yourself putting the task off until it is really too late.

If you are an Evening type you should plan those important tasks for later in the day. You should also arrange your meetings at this time when you are at your most productive and most alert. Start the day with the routine tasks that don’t require a lot of brainpower. But beware of falling in to the trap of concentrating on the easy (and possibly more enjoyable) tasks throughout the whole day. This may sound simple but just take a moment to think about some of your recent working days. Have you been as productive as you should have been? If not, have you tried to address tasks at the wrong time of the day with predictable outcomes?

When you are thinking about your Mid Life career move, try to uncover the culture of the company that you are considering working for. In order for you to be happy in a new role, the culture of the company has to map to your own. If you're a morning person you will want to arrive at work early. If you find yourself working in a culture where nobody leaves until the boss has gone home in the evening, you may not thrive!

The Mid Life Opportunity (www.MidLifeOp.com) is a community for Mid Lifers. Advice and Guidance will soon be available from The Mid Life Coaching Panel. It’s free to join so what are you waiting for?

If you would like some help now with aspects of your life, contact Better Life Coaching: www.betterlifecoaching.co.uk