Retirement Coming Up

[Ginger]

Michael, congratulations on your upcoming retirement.  My husband retires in October so we are happy campers.  I take it day by day at this point.  One wrong move by management or more dump jobs on my desk, I am out of here!  
Enjoy your new found freedom come next week.  On to a new adventure in your life!

 

[Patrick]

One wrong move by management or more dump jobs on my desk, I am out of here!  

I feel the same way.  How many of you ERs just ignored the dump jobs the last few months of your working lives, knowing that management couldn't do anything to you since you were leaving anyway?

 

[playaman]

July 1, 2007, is "Retirement Day" for both me (and my wife, I think). Also, almost my 60th birthday, which isn't all that early, but my wife and I have decided to wait until then in order to get our youngest child out of college.

I semi-retired myself a year and a half ago, but I find that I'm just as busy as previously (in part because this part-time job should be full-time). My wife and I could just call it quits now, but two years isn't all that long. Now that people know I'm "available," I'm amazed at how many projects keep popping up -- most wanting pro bono help but some actually willing to pay for my "extra" time.

 

[Nords]

I feel the same way.  How many of you ERs just ignored the dump jobs the last few months of your working lives, knowing that management couldn't do anything to you since you were leaving anyway?   

That rarely happened-- most of them were ignoring me because they couldn't do anything to me...

 

[Dreamer]

I have always planned on age 55. I am CSRS under Fed Civil Service System. However, we have had big changes in management and their style of management. They seem like nice people, but they are way into micro managing everything and when you are not used to that (read: we had a manager who knew that we knew what to do and did it, so he had a very laid back approach) it is very hard. Also, we had 4 people retire last year and another 3 are retiring this year and our office only has 13 people. Dealing with so much change and so much work, morale is getting very low. I am seriously considering taking the early out next August (they said they are anticipating giving early outs at our agency again next year-I just passed on the one this year, because I want a higher pension). I need to get serious about tracking our money and making sure that I can do this. If I go next year I will be 53 and my daughter will be starting her senior year in high school. I told DH to seriously think it over and if he has any doubts at all to let me know soon, because once I retire it is over! I have 32 yrs in with the gov.

Dreamer

 

[Danny]

Monday, though I'm taking leave so I don't have to come in. That makes Friday at 2:30PM PDT my effective "never going back to work" retirement date.



cheers,
Michael

Have a ER Independence day!

 

[tryan]

This October at 43 for me .

 

[Michael Moore]

I haven't slacked off (any more than usual) as I didn't want to leave my coworkers stuck with extra work (over and above what they'll have to do because I won't be around).

I've had what is probably viewed as a "bad" attitude for years, though I see it as just being realistic. But what does reality have to do with work?

The other three of my remaining old timer compatriots (still doing programmatic stuff where I made the switch to systems fulltime a few years back) will all be gone by 03 Jan 2006, meaning that there won't be anyone their side of the branch who worked here during the 70s/80s.

Institutional memory? Who needs it? It just gets in the way. At least that appears to be the attitude of management, as they haven't shown any concern about 70 years of top-notch work history in this specific job (my coworkers) walking out the door.

Two of them already had their plans made and announced for retirement. The other one came out of a training session for a new review yesterday and announced she was calling HR to get a retirement package. The handwriting on the wall had suddenly became very clear for her.

Thanks for the last day good wishes. I'm looking forward to more people getting them.

cheers,
Michael

 

[SteveR]

Michael,

Just a couple more hours. I remember my last day the first time I ER'd. ( I know, don't go there). The instanity and inhumanity of modern megacorp is beyond what most people not in that arena can possibly imagine. I left just after lunch on my last day (had to attend my final party you know) and then Elvis left the building.

I know many others I used to work with that bailed out before they lost the rest of their common sense, their humanity and their minds. Life in megacorp is unbelievable. I have seen a shift from common sense and using your brain and creativity to get things done to a herd mentality where HR and a disconnected management class call the shots without a clue as to the real target.

Brain Drain or historic intelligence is being lost in a big way. Management has no idea what they are losing because they did not live through the times where that shared knowledge was learned and why that may be important in the future. They would rather learn it all again and waste the time and money in doing so instead of being proactive and finding a way to capture at least some of this knowledge.

Anyway, enjoy your new life.

 

[AltaRed]

End of April 2006 for me - on 57th birthday. Already getting very impatient. Trying to stay the course through end of 2005 as a normal employee and then shift into cruise mode come Jan 1.