What do you want to be when you grow up?

Frank Meeuwsen, from What’s the next action?, recently tagged me, and, as part of one of the latest meme, asked me to answer the following question: What do you want to be when you grow up? His own answer is here.

This is, first of all, the perfect opportunity to express my deepest thanks to Frank for setting up the Getting Things Done FeedBurner Network. It goes without saying, but is better being said! I shall thank him in person next week, as I shall be flying over to Utrecht to take part in the GTD in the Netherlands Evening, which Frank and Taco Oosterkamp are co-organising on 12 April.

So, here goes …

As a child

The thing I remember most, is that I wanted to be either an Indian Chief or a Navy captain!

As a teenager

As a teenager, I always had a good idea that I wanted to be teaching when I grew up, either History or PE (i.e. Physical education). If I liked the social side of High School, I was not found of classes. Somewhat paradoxically, I loved spending hours on end in the Municipal library. I was also a keen runner and loved training in the woods; I runned the Paris Marathon when I was 17.

Now

I am a university lecturer at a British North Western university and I love my job: I am a very happy historian.

Later

I am still not sure what I want to do when I grow up. There is no question: I want to remain both an academic and a practicing historian. I have however become increasingly interested in the area of personal productivity. This is something I see myself taking further in the coming years. For the time being, I am preparing a one day workshop on time-management for academics, which I hope to teach next semester at the university where I work.

All being well, I could well see myself adding a personal productivity consulting side to my current activities. I primarily see this as a boutique consulting operation; albeit, a very limited operation, as life as an academic can be very busy: perhaps something like 6 to 12 days a year maximum. I have just found a really cool name for this The productivity labs! … and yes, I am now the proud owner of www.productivitylabs.com! Nothing there yet, but watch that space. The idea would be to deliver personal productivity seminars, both to academic and non-academic audiences. This is something I would also like to do in French, my mother-tongue, as this could be a great opportunity to spend more time in France: I sometimes really miss the old country and the lovely village where I lived before coming to Britain.

Would the opportunity present itself, I would also be interested in doing some one-to-one productivity coaching. So, if by any chance you are interested and are based in the Manchester-Liverpool area, please do get in touch.