I have a Time Machine.

When I first started using it, I was a bit nervous. I worried that my clients would think this was a bit too weird. I was probably a bit tentative because of that and so it maybe didn’t work as well as it could have. But it still worked.

Now I haul out that Time Machine pretty early in the first meeting I have with a new client. They don’t seem to find it weird at all. And it gets to the heart of things pretty quickly.

We’ve taken the Time Machine to retirement parties to listen to the lovely speeches colleagues give. We’ve taken it to conferences to hear how other researchers’ work has been affected by the work a client has done after being awarded the grant I am helping them apply for. We’ve taken it to the job a new scholar will have in 15 years to see what kind of department it is, what kinds of colleagues they have and what they are teaching and researching.

By skipping over the messy and uncertain process of how you end up there, the Time Machine enables you to access details about your vision that you might otherwise dismiss as impractical, impossible, or just too frightening to contemplate.

Once you know where you are trying to go, we can focus on making that process less messy.

Whether you are finishing your PhD and figuring out what to do next, planning the last 15 years before retirement, or somewhere in between, I’d be happy to take you for a trip in my Time Machine. Then I’d bring you back and plan out the first steps on your journey.

This post was edited Sept 14, 2015.