Wow. What a week. I’m on the plane flying home from Lisbon and still digesting an intense five days, filled to the gills with new ideas, people and a bubbling sense of energy and connection. As you probably know by now, if you’ve been walking with me for a while, it was the launch of our first Longevity Leadership programme at Portugal’s top business school, Catolica Lisbon. And I gotta say, not very humbly, it was a rip-roaring success!
I’ve often found myself enthralled with ‘newish’ topics that people and companies aren’t always entirely ready for or interested in. Or, like my years on gender balance, that some people don’t want to engage with at all. You’ve got to have the patience (not my strength) and persistence to feel like you’re whistling in the wind for a while.
Staking out a position slightly ahead of the curve has its up- and down-sides. The up is that, as long as you are not too early, you’re in a solid first-mover position when the world moves towards you. But it can also be a bit lonely, and you (and your husband) can often think you’re a bit nuts or mildly obsessed, convinced of something that no one else seems to see or value in the way you do. You can launch things you think are urgent, important and world-shifting to an under-whelming kind of meh reaction.
So the one thing I wasn’t fully prepared for was the full-on enthusiasm of everyone involved in what we’re now calling ‘LL1.’ Participants complained they were limited to a 10/ 10 rating on the feedback forms. Speakers and guests were delighted to be there, happy to spend time together, to learn and grow and share know-how and experiences, and start building a community of change. They sat in on each other’s lectures, joined us for dinners and excursions, and generally looked delighted to find a bunch of other people pushing in the same direction with the same urgency and vision. They also admitted to being a bit lonely at times.
A Meeting of Minds (& Action)
I laugh at how this all got started, an example of life’s serendipity and the importance of trying new things. I was lucky enough to meet Celine Abécassis-Moedas a few years back. She attended one of the Midlife Rethink courses I had started during Covid. We became friends and had lots of conversations about the New Q3, longevity and the world’s evolving demographics. (Also an interesting sub-theme on the joy of making new friends in Q3). She also happened to be Dean of Executive Education at Catolica Lisbon and invited me to do a half-day session at one of her Advanced Management Programmes last year. It went down so well that we started saying we should do a week-long programme. Why not? You guys know how much I love Lisbon. In a new twist on an old saying, ‘if you can’t live there, teach!’
So off we went, scoping out what our dream of a week-long programme offering a deep dive on everything longevity would look like. Our first bet was that it needed to be a very holistic approach. If we wanted to prepare leaders for the demographic transition at play, we needed to introduce them to this age of longevity’s full range of impacts. We wanted them to see that this would transform… everything! Countries, cities, companies, consumers, careers and their own lives.
There are now a number of programmes focusing on personal midlife career transitions (I’ve written about university programmes here, non-academic ones here and here). What didn’t exist was a programme aimed at public and private sector leaders and managers to prepare them to understand and lead the change. This was my big learning from my decades on gender balance. If you want to accelerate change in companies, give leaders a bit of time and space to skill up on a new issue and ‘own’ it. That’s how Longevity Leadership was born, a partnership between my company, 20-first, and Portugal’s top business school.
Morning Menus: The Big Picture
We thought we’d start each day with Big Picture context-setting. Each morning would serve up a different slice of the macro impacts of demographic change. Thanks to my 4-Quarter Lives podcast (who ever knew podcasting would be the world’s best recruiting vehicle for faculty?), I had met and learned from dozens of brilliant experts and could invite some of the best to join us in Lisbon. It ain’t a hard sell. Everyone, it turns out, is in love with Lisbon (it’s not just me!).
So Miguel Gouveia, a Catolica professor, gave us a data-rich, unusually optimistic (for an economist) view of lifespan and healthspan trends around the world. Nic Palmarini, head of the UK National Innovation Centre on Ageing (NICA) shared his research on how cities are adapting and preparing for longevity – and how essential a political layer they are to living well at every age. Michael Clinton, ex-head of Hearst Magazines, and now CEO of ROAR Forward, flew through on his way to Cannes Lions and roared through a presentation on what he calls the ‘re-imagineers,’ the 1/3 of Q3ers who are redefining ageing and retirement. While Lisa Edgar, who runs The Big Window, dove deep into the fascinating and little-explored characteristics and needs of the Q3 consumer. Including the age/ perception gap (see picture) where we think we are older than our age until 30, then think we’re increasingly younger than our age… until 75, when it often catches up with us. To wrap up our overview, we moved from the market side of the equation to the talent side. Martin Frolander, CEO of Junoverse, an age tech business, showed his company’s data on the motivations and needs of the Q3 workforce and how companies will need to adapt to our ageing workforces – or face mega gaps.
Afternoons for Me: Health, Wealth & Self
The afternoons focused in on personal transformation, reprising key elements of my Midlife Rethink programme. Busy professionals rarely get a chance to pause and explore their pasts, assess where they are today, and get some space and arty-fun to help dream up their next chapters. And also, the shock of understanding the consequences of longer lives and careers on your own plans and pacing helps leaders ‘get’ the impact on their colleagues and consumers. The macro is often unlocked by the personal.
We added in a doctor on health and a finance expert on wealth. How do you assess your body’s readiness for a 100-year life (she recommended doing a DNA Core test from Nordic Laboratories to check your genetic make-up, and then work with functional medicine) and your finance’s ability to support all those extra decades? Oh yes, and the doctor also designed all our menus and snacks, which were as gorgeous as they were longevity-friendly.
To round out our theme, we included a daily ‘role model,’ guests who shared their life journeys and lessons, and their changes and re-inventions over time. These included former ExCo member of SHELL Andy Brown, who failed his first retirement and moved to Portugal to run energy business GALP, then failed his second retirement and is now becoming President of The Energy Institute. Margarida Couto was a founding partner of VDA, Portugal’s leading law firm, for three decades before moving on to CSR-oriented GRACE and a Women on Boards initiative. The French banker Jean-Jacques Salomon who ‘retired’ to Portugal and is busy fund-raising for Lisbon’s Jewish Museum, which looks magnificent, designed by architect Daniel Libeskind. And Ruth Shaber, an American doctor-come-healthcare executive who has relocated and bought an entire building in downtown Lisbon where she will base a centre for women. Inspiration galore!
Every day ended with a 15-minute meditation session to try and calm our whirring brains, and a quiet, small-group learning circle where participants could digest the avalanche of information, ideas and reflections they’d travelled through in our dense days.
But then, of course, we were in Lisbon. A longevity city if ever I saw one, complete with healthy hills, glorious river views and ocean breezes, and beauty everywhere you care to look. See this week’s Economist on why Southern Europe is the longevity ‘blue zone’ of the world (hint: “Diet and exercise, but also urban design and social life”). So evenings included a sailboat ride down the Tages, a meal in a glorious old private palace-turned-hotel, and a private Fado concert featuring a drop-dead gorgeous 23-year old singer and a 100-year old guitar player in one of Lisbon’s loveliest hotels.
Have I sold this thing yet? The feedback from everyone was so overwhelmingly positive that we’ve committed to running it annually. Same week, same place, next year. Did I mention I love Lisbon? There are many different ways, I’m discovering, to live in a city.
Getting Longevity on the Strategic Agenda
One of my other goals was to get longevity on the business school agenda. Not just at Catolica, but everywhere. Demographic shifts are a huge, global transformation that we all need to prepare for, up there with climate change and AI. Business schools are obvious places to massify the message to business leaders. It’s still not on many leaders’ radar. So here’s hoping the success of this first-of-its-kind programme offers a template for other schools to get longevity-ready themselves, with a broad, holistic approach to the topic.
As we disbanded with hugs and a few tears on Friday, there was a small sense of history in the making. And having been there to see some of its early steps.
I’ll leave the last word to one of the participants, Mafalda Honório, who is head of Silver Economy Marketing at insurance company Fidelidade, on LinkedIn:
I'm still processing everything we experienced in CATÓLICA-LISBON | Executive Education this week - all the information, the incredible sharing. We weren't just students; we were the pioneers of something new that will transform the world! That was the most memorable part of this week. We were a dynamic group of eager learners, both speakers and students, united in the same mission - to awaken and enable individuals, companies, and societies to prepare for the tremendous opportunities Longevity presents.
Great week!
Had the opportunity to learn and reflect about many things related with life in a fantastic ambience with super fantastis people. No words can express the recent born feelings, ideas and new dreams which are for me an important source of motivation.
A huge thanks Avivah and Céline!
The best is yet to come!
All the best for everybody involved in the GREAT Longevity Leadership Program!
Thanks Avivah for this opportunity! For helping me redesign, again, with you now a decade from now (this is my 3rd Midlife Rethink program in 3 years😃- a privilege) and, to learn from the best about this longevity journey! Best week of my 3rd Q, as of now, full with health, knowledge, community and propuse, main pillars for longevity!👏👏💯