“I realised recently that I could have set this all up, on the side, while I was still employed.

Thing is you don’t think like that when you’re an employee – you just don’t think striking out in a new field is possible for you. But it is.

Ken Titmuss

No money. Told you’re too old to get a job in your industry. Out of work for the first time in your life. No experience running a business. No idea what to do next.

Most people would have given up, but not Ken Titmuss. I met Ken the other day and his story was so moving I videoed it (below) so you can hear it too.

Ken Titmuss now runs London Trails, his innovative business offering guided walks of London using old maps.

Yet only a few years ago Ken was lining up at the job centre, signing on for unemployment benefits.

He’d left a role in his long-time career in community work thinking he’d easily get another job, only to find that, in his mid-50s, employers were overlooking him for younger candidates.

He simply couldn’t get a job anymore – as you can imagine, that came as a shock.

This is the story of how Ken decided to no longer let the government, or any employer, determine his future. It’s the story of how, by deciding not to give up, he took action and in the process stumbled on a new Free Range business that he loves.

AND it’s the story of how sometimes, age can be an advantage (Ken sometimes wears a Tweed jacket to emphasise the venerable historian angle!).

Ken started a business, in a completely new field, after a lifetime of employment. He had no piles of cash and no business background but he learnt how to get the word out, got up to speed with technology (we met over Twitter!). He is now building a business that is finally giving him the freedom he never had in employed life.

Watch Ken talk about his journey from unemployed, to finding out what he wanted to do, to making it happen in a recession. And how he now gets paid to walk around his favourite city with old maps.

If you’ve ever gone into business for yourself watch 7mins in when Ken describes the feeling of getting his first payment – I actually got teary hearing him talk about it. We’ve all been there!

PS: Ken took me through his old maps and his walks and I’m hooked!

I thought I knew London but I never saw it in quite that way before. Even regular guided walks don’t have the same impact.

If you’re a Londoner Ken’s walks are worth checking out as you’ll see your surroundings through new eyes  -> his website is http://londontrails.wordpress.com/ and you can follow him on Twitter @oldmapmap


Get free of the cubicle and create a freedom-filled, fulfilling work-life with my free weekly love letter to career changers: It’s a mix of adoration and butt kicking,packed with exclusive tips (stuff that’s not posted here) to start creating your I-want-it-now Free Range work-life in 2010.

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You’re a people person. You don’t want to be holed up at home everyday, with only a mewling cat for company. You don’t want to trade in office social life for watching Judge Judy at lunchtime.

You’d quite like to throw in the commute, go free-range and get the chance to CREATE a perfect career (rather than fruitlessly waiting for it to be handed to you in the form of a job)… but being self employed just sounds too lonely.

You may know other self-employed people who have that lonely solo-lifestyle, but it doesn’t have to be that way. In fact…

Working for myself has been the most social time of my life. Here’s why:


1. Once you’ve gone free-range (self employed), you choose who you spend time with.

Unlike employed life, your ‘people’ are not just those who work in your office building. They are incredible people you meet in more places than you can currently imagine.

You’re not saddled with people who you wouldn’t otherwise spend 40+ hours a week with – think about it, you already choose your friends, in free-range life you get to choose who you see, and you get to choose that every day.

2. When you enter the world of free-ranging you have a huge new community – online and face to face.

More and more self employed people are coming together, and they are easier to find than ever before. It’s just up to you to get things going

When I started working for myself all my friends were in regular employment. I knew no one who was free to be where they chose during the day (except a few journalist friends with odd schedules). Now, most people I spend time with are office-free. We meet for coffee, we chat, and we meet more people.

I’ve made more amazing contacts and friends that I’d ever have met stuck in an office 9-5

3. You choose your colleagues (how to make competitors into collaborators)

It’s not all about just having coffee while others are stuck in regular jobs – you can also make up informal ‘teams’ to come together for different projects you work on. Meaning you have colleagues without the hassle of hiring people, or the hassle of forming official ‘partnerships’ or companies.

For example, I have an informal team with two other out-of-the-box-careers coaches. We work on each other’s projects, support each others’ work, and come together to run workshops and courses.

That ‘team’ wasn’t planned in advance, it was played out. Our new little team was born after informally meeting up every week, because we enjoyed each others’ company and views – within months we went from being each others’ BIGGEST COMPETITORS to colleagues who spur each other on in the up-times, troubleshoot any down days, and love to play with new projects together. Best of all, we chose each other, so we know we get on and can draw on each others’ strengths.

Where can you find your new colleagues? Places to start are:


  • Twitter (FULL of people working for themselves who’d love to chat or meet up),
  • Your local Jelly (an informal working group where people meet up to work for a day at someone’s house or a café), or
  • A co-working space: for example I am a member of the Hub in King’s Cross, London, where members can pop in with our laptops, and work (and chat) alongside others anytime.
  • You can also email another solo free-ranger whose business you admire, someone you just think ‘I bet they’d be interesting to chat with’.
    • Be as friendly and sincere as you really are, and you’ll find the person behind the brand is not an anonymous competitor, but someone in a similar situation to you who (if they have any sense!) would most likely love to chat to another free-ranger who understands their world.

Soon, the old idea of spending your day only with people who happen to work in your office building will seem really restrictive. In your new life, the possibilities are endless for having people around you, supporting you, making your days even brighter than before.

BIGGEST TIP:

Don’t get hung up on finding your new colleagues before you start – start first, then when you have something going, you have something to talk about, and you can more easily find like-minded people.

The difference from employment is that your new social work life doesn’t come to you until you build it – but once you’ve built it, you’ll have more people around than ever before… and the satisfaction of knowing you chose them and they chose you.

Get free of the cubicle and create a freedom-filled, fulfilling work-life with my free weekly love letter to career changers: It’s a mix of adoration and butt kicking,packed with exclusive tips (stuff that’s not posted here) to start creating your I-want-it-now Free Range work-life in 2010.

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Did you know that EVERYONE is a banker?

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“Everyone I know are bankers”, my friend said to me the other day. “I really want to change career, but all I can see are opportunities within finance – in my world, working in finance is what everyone does.” (EVERYONE is a banker) If you don’t work in banking, my friend’s perspective might seem funny [...]

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It’s August! ** interval music **

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Welcome to Free Range Humans. If you’re wondering why there hasn’t been a new post for a week, I’ve been blissed out on holiday (that’s me floating happily above). However I’ve also been busy cooking up a SUPER exciting new Free Range Humans project which you’ll hear about in the next week: get on my [...]

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The 3 Reasons You DON’T Need To Be An All-Rounder (lessons from the Flip Cam)

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Are you staying stuck in a job because you think you don’t have everything it takes to escape the cubicle and create a dream ‘free range’ career? Maybe you think you are creative with plenty of ideas, but don’t have the focus… or maybe you feel you are organised and focussed, but don’t have enough [...]

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Want to take that ‘big dream trip’ without waiting for a sabbatical?

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Ever wanted to take that ‘big dream trip’ without waiting for that elusive sabbatical, or travel to the beach without waiting for next year’s holiday? This year, I’m out to prove you can travel the world and have a real income at the same time. Fun and adventure, without waiting for your yearly vacation. Many of you [...]

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Hot topics: the Top 5 most popular articles on Free Range Humans

July 21, 2010

The Free Range community has been growing ‘on speed’ lately! New readers, new weekly love-letter recipients, new Twitter followers… I get excited about each new follower (that means I’m excited a lot of the time). So, being nosy, I checked in for a peek on what you’ve been reading. What ARE the most popular posts on [...]

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Successful on the outside but falling to pieces inside? (here’s why that might be a good thing)

July 20, 2010

“When you’re in pieces / you pick up the bits / and nothing fits / and the wind blows you away. ” (‘Flakes’, Mystery Jets) Do you look like you’re ‘together’, but inside feel like you’re all over the place? Have you ever felt like you’re ‘ unravelling’…. Coming apart at the seams, simply from being [...]

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Top 5 Happiest Jobs (will they make YOU happy?)

July 18, 2010

If you’re surrounded by people who think dreading Mondays is the norm, it’s little wonder you’re searching the internet for that magical ‘happy career’ that will sort out your problems. Luckily, there are scores of happiness at work studies that tell you which are the happiest jobs. One these is the City & Guilds’ Happiness [...]

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Meet The One Who Forgot The Niceness Pills

July 13, 2010

I get a lot of enquiries from people who want to change career. Most of the emails I get are from lovely people who feel desperate and frustrated at going around in circles with no idea of what to do next. They say “I know I must sound strange/sad/desperate.”. Trust me. You don’t. You sound [...]

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