New book and podcast series on how to sustain a 50+ year career

A decade after pioneering the idea that more of us will live for a century in her 2016 million-copy bestseller The 100-Year Life with Professor Andrew J Scott, London Business School Professor of Management Practice Lynda Gratton returns to a more personal and pressing question: how do we actually live that longer life well?

Living the 100-Year Life: How to build a career that lasts and a life you love, published this week by Bloomsbury, offers a new way of understanding—and shaping—the years ahead at a time when our lives are stretching but our assumptions about work, careers and identity remain rooted in the past.

Drawing on over two decades of research into the future of work, and her experience teaching global leaders at LBS, Professor Gratton explores how we can build lives that remain meaningful and resilient, sustaining purpose, relationships and wellbeing across many decades.

At the heart of the book is a simple but powerful idea: that a long life is not a straight path, but something we weave. A fabric made up of eight essential threads that strengthen, weaken and shift as our lives unfold. Four threads of productivity—mastery, knowing, cooperation and amplifying. Four threads of nurture—friendship, intimacy calm and adventure. Together, they shape not only how we work, but how we live, connect and find meaning across a century.

An eight-episode podcast series entitled Life Threads accompanies the book. Hosted by Professor Gratton, each episode explores one of the eight 'threads' that shape a fulfilling, productive, and sustained working life across a 50+ year career. Through intimate conversation with practitioners and experts, the series brings the book's framework to life.

Episode 1 looks at Mastery, with guests Grayson Perry and Professor Herminia Ibarra speaking to Professor Gratton about what it takes to keep developing mastery over a long working life. Through Grayson Perry's evolving creative practice and Herminia Ibarra's research on identity and career transitions, this episode explores how mastery is built, reshaped, and renewed over time — and why what we are good at can both define us and constrain us. Listen now via Spotify or Apple, or watch on YouTube.

Subsequent episodes, released weekly over the next seven weeks, will feature:

Episode 2: Cooperation — Alex Beard

Episode 3: Knowing — Selin Kesebir and Julia Gillard

Episode 4: Amplification — Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic and Dorie Clark

Episode 5: Friendship — Robert Waldinger and Shirley Cramer

Episode 6: Intimacy — Stew Friedman and Jennifer Petriglieri

Episode 7: Calm — Robert Rowland Smith and Randall Peterson

Episode 8: Adventure — Jasmine Whitbread and Dan Cable

If you want to see how your threads are currently balanced across your life, you can take a simple diagnostic. In just 15 minutes, you’ll receive your personal assessment.

You can also find insights about how to practice living a 100-year life in a recent Think article.