Introducing your Midlife MOT

Midlife's a good time to take stock...

The IGC is pleased to introduce Legal & General’s Midlife MOT.

Midlife is a great time to take stock of where you are right now, what the immediate future holds for you, and how you’d like your later life to look.

That’s why Legal & General has created their Midlife MOT with The Open University. It’s a free work, wellbeing and financial health check that will help you plan for the rest of your midlife and your later life.

..but it can be hard to plan ahead

Like many midlifers, you might have found that, with some family members growing old and others growing up, you’ve had to take on more caring responsibilities than ever before. That can make it hard to look even a month ahead, let alone plan for the long-term future.

As Emma Byron, Managing Director of Legal & General Retirement Solutions, says:

"Midlife is a time when it’s essential that people start thinking ahead and planning the shape of their own retirement. But as our research shows, the high levels of support and care required of this age group, can make it nearly impossible to carve out time to put towards their own wealth, work and wellbeing. While focusing on the here and now is understandable, especially during the ongoing stresses and strains of a pandemic, it’s absolutely crucial people consider their own futures."

There are some very specific challenges ahead. If you’re in midlife now, you’ll experience a rising State Pension age and a longer working life than previous generations. Your job might also be at a crossroads, whether you’ve chosen to strike out in a new direction or are taking stock after redundancy.

The latter can be quite common - people aged 50 and over are most at risk of being made redundant. Most find a new role elsewhere, although for 1 in 8 it’s an opportunity to leave the workplace entirely. And, of course, you might find yourself taking time off work to care for a sick relative.

All that makes good work, wealth and wellbeing planning even more important. It’ll help you:

• Stay on top of your own present and future wellbeing
• Reliably and sustainably support the people who need you
• Be ready for and resilient through life’s ups and downs

So what does the Midlife MOT cover?

The Midlife MOT covers your:

• Financial wellbeing
• Working life
• General health and fitness

You’ll assess where you are, think through where you’d like to end up and then plan how you’ll get there. As you go, you’ll cover topics like:

• Boosting your financial fitness with a rainy-day emergency fund
• Paying down your debts and growing your pension savings
• Understanding the five pillars of healthy ageing
• Staying in shape on your own terms
• Making sure you’ve got the right work/life balance
• Managing the day-to-day challenges of modern working life

The course is free and should take you about four hours to complete. You can move through it at your own speed and convenience. To sign up for it, just visit The Open University's OpenLearn. It can inspire anything from rethinking how you balance your spending, to making a midlife career change.