Would It Be Dumb To Tell My Manager My Plans?

[CardsFan]

I think 3 months (maximum) is more than enough unless you had a prior agreement like "street" did. And you need to be prepared to be shown the door the day you give notice. It probably won't happen, but you need to be ready.

In my case, I gave 2-1/2 months notice for my intended last day, but was asked to to stay on (part time if I wanted) until the end of the year (6 months total). So I worked part time for 6 months (with a planned 6 week vacation in the middle) and we parted company on good terms.

 

[SoReadyToRetire]

Wow--I guess it's nearly unanimous! I will rethink my plan to tell him at tomorrow's 1-on-1 that I'm leaving next August.

Although as some of you pointed out, I truly would NOT break my heart if they showed me the door today, or next week. It would take away the stress of having to decide when to go. I'd survive.

As for the severance package, yes, I was kind of hoping that they might offer me one--but good point--why would they, knowing I was planning to leave next year anyway?

It's a crazy time at our company, with lots of satellite offices being closed, but we've been assured ours will not be until at least the end of our lease, which is 3 years away. If I wait that long, I think I'll go insane. So August 2020 it is--with maybe a month of notice.

Thank you.

 

[JoeWras]

As for the severance package, yes, I was kind of hoping that they might offer me one--but good point--why would they, knowing I was planning to leave next year anyway?

Well now, wait a minute there!

It depends on the structure of the corp, especially a Megacorp.

Your first line manager doesn't want you to go. He or she may not want ANYONE to go, since the number of people in the department is important. The exception is if there is a real non-performer.

However, if layoffs or reductions are coming from "on high", the first line may have to produce a list of names, or a name. In this one case, it might be nice to be on such a list, and hence your manager knowing way ahead could help. He or she would want YOU to go in order to save someone else. In this way, he/she doesn't lose two people close together.

I saw this happen a few times at my old MC where it was worked out this way. But it is darn tricky to do. My manager promised to submit my name should a reduction occur, but it never did. Turns out a year later they still haven't reduced, so I'm glad I left. Seemed like they were reducing every 6 months before I retired. Would have been nice to get on one of those lists.

 

[MRG]

Good luck OP. I gave two weeks and I wish I didn't feel like I had to give that much.

The next year will probably drag on, sit back and enjoy the circus.

 

[georgemoe]

Somewhat similar situation with me. My current boss and I have been together supporting the same group at megacorp for over 20 years. While a great boss he shares very little personally that isn't business related. We are both close to retirement age and during our last get together I asked if we wanted to start going through some scenarios. He wanted no part of it. He told me it was my business and was not interested in my plans. He will now know when I'm about 30 to 60 days out.

 

[Rocky mtn high]

I told my managers and ended up they let me go when convenient to them not to me. Don’t do it early, it will be a mistake.

 

[kgtest]

So is it stupid to let my manager at work know *now* that I plan to retire in August 2020 (at the latest)?

I'm the only one on my team who does what I do, and it will be a hardship for them when I leave. My manager has been nothing but fair and honest with me, and extremely supportive, for all the years I've been with him.

I want to let him know that he'll need to plan to train someone else to do what I do so he won't be stuck when I leave.

I can't think of any way this can really hurt me. I'm not interested in promotions, I'm doing just what I need to do to get by at the job, and there are rumors our office will be closing at the end of our lease anyway (we were acquired, and a new company headquarters was built several states away).

Can anyone think of a reason I'll regret telling him now?

I think unless you have obligations that only occur annually/semi-annually no need to give more than 2 weeks notice. I am thinking like a cardiologist that see's a heart patient once a year might want to tell the Operations Doc that he can't schedule into that year as he will retire.

Nobody is ever "STUCK" when you leave, and if they are a sound business will be just fine when you are gone.

If someone would be physically hurt or potentially harmed if you did not disclose sooner, then I might change my mind. If people aren't dieing, 2 weeks is sufficient.

 

[Bamaman]

If my company was bought out and there was a chance my location was going to not exist in the future, I'd keep my mouth shut.

Maybe a buyout is coming that might come with a big severance pay package.

 

[tb001]

JoeWras brings up a good point. If financially there’s no difference to you if you go now vs then (if so, why not go now??), then letting them know now *could* put you at the top of the severance/layoff list. No guarantees though.

For me personally, that’s the only time I would think about giving my boss a heads up that far in advance.

 

[Jerry1]

JoeWras brings up a good point. If financially there’s no difference to you if you go now vs then (if so, why not go now??), then letting them know now *could* put you at the top of the severance/layoff list. No guarantees though.

For me personally, that’s the only time I would think about giving my boss a heads up that far in advance.

Maybe you could phrase it a little differently. Instead of telling your manager you want to retire, let him know that if he has to let people go, he should talk to you. As in it wouldn’t break your heart if you were let go.

 

[Koolau]

My Megacorp was extremely rigid about their policies. They would never have asked anyone to stay longer. They would never have allowed part-time employment. They would not have allowed anyone to "volunteer" for a "package." Their opinion about employees was that no one was irreplaceable.

They would never rehire anyone who had retired. There was a huge brouhaha when a retired engineer was noticed on site who then w*rked for a contract company.

My point is that answering the original question may have a lot to do with corporate culture, but YMMV.

 

[T-Minus]

I had similar feelings when I was considering giving notice, and decided to wait until a month to go before my target date. Management asked me to stay a bit longer, hire and train my replacement, and transition projects/initiatives to them smoothly with customers - and said they would “make it worth my while.” They had always treated me fairly and with respect, so I agreed. I wound up working for an additional four months, they did exactly what they said they would, and my replacement was a great match for my customers. Everybody was happy - especially me!

And, who knows, maybe your company might decide to downsize and buy out the older, higher-paid workers to cut costs between now and your 2020 target date. You might walk away with a nice package...

 

[SumDay]

I gave 6 months notice, and in retrospect 4 weeks would have been find. I wanted them to hire someone so I could get them trained, and they did, 3 months after I retired.

 

[pjigar]

Don't tell him/her until customary 2 or 4 week notice unless you are prepared to walk out before your time is up.

I had a great manager is last job, knew him for over 15 years, he walked me out the next day after I gave him a notice. I later found out that it wasn't up to him but it was corporate policy. I did get paid until the last date on my notice so it was financially fair. I got couple of weeks of paid vacation! But you get the point now why you should not tell anyone at work about your plans.

 

[Big_Hitter]

Can anyone think of a reason I'll regret telling him now?

what reason would they have to pay you a bonus after you let them know you are no longer a going concern?

 

[dak2018]

Re: The idea that your site may be closing. It could happen much sooner than you expect - a lease is no protection against closing a site as the cost of the people inside the building is a lot more than the cost of the building itself. (I am thinking here of typical office buildings, not manufacturing facilities with large amounts of capital equipment.)

I was in just such a situation and people were generally complacent about the timeline for closing the site - "Hey we have two more years left on the lease, why start looking for a job.". The site was closed a few months later - worked out well for the people on the cusp of retirement as we were all provided severance packages.

I would give a few weeks notice, but otherwise just ride out your period of employment doing your normal good work.

 

[bushpilot]

I gave 6 months notice, for reasons of my own and knowing my employer's needs. It worked fine for me.

 

[RetireBy90]

And you need to be prepared to be shown the door the day you give notice. It probably won't happen, but you need to be ready.

Good point, when I gave 1 year notice, first he didn't really believe it I don't think but I was ready to go the
next day if it came out like that.

As for the severance package, yes, I was kind of hoping that they might offer me one--but good point--why would they, knowing I was planning to leave next year anyway?

My VP had already asked me if I wanted to talk about it if a layoff came down to his team. Not a commitment at that time, but did I want him to talk to me and consider it were this to happen. Alas, would have meant 6 months of pay but didn't happen

 

[Born2BRetd]

I originally gave four months' notice to give my employer time to find a qualified person for me to train. A month into my notice, I realized they weren't making any effort to find someone and were going to wait until the last moment. I went on a nice vacation and when I came back I decided I had had enough and gave them one week's notice. They found someone fast and I spent my last days cramming years of experience into my poor trainee's head.

 

[HI Bill]

No matter where you work, the answer is going to have to include that you NOT tell them unless you are willing and able to be told to pack up and leave today. Other downsides include being made invisible over time, feeling like you have no value, being treated as dead-man-walking, having work taken from you but you still have to show up and fill your days.

Look for a strong upside, rather than absence of a downside.

+1. I made the mistake of giving 7+ months notice, and my program office wanted to have a transition plan, tell the client, and take away the projects that I manage. Without projects to manage, I'd have nothing to bill my time to, and would have to resign early. You will eventually be treated as persona non grata, as has also happened to me. My opinion or advice no longer counts, and I might as well not be here, except for the check. And spending time on this forum!

2 week's notice is my advice. 4 if you feel like taking a risk.

 

[ocean view]

I want to let him know that he'll need to plan to train someone else to do what I do so he won't be stuck when I leave.

OP -If you want to help your manager, start to document what you do and how you do it over the course of the next year. They will really appreciate it. It will also help control the number of post-retirement calls and emails you’ll get.

I told no one, not even family until I gave my 2-week notice, but I did create a document of ALL of my responsibilities, no matter how small. All those little tasks that you just handle as a matter of course that your manager has no clue about - Write them down.

As a result of keeping my mouth shut, I got a higher than average annual bonus and pay raise based on my performance. I gave notice the day after the bonus was deposited. And the raise increased the value of my significant accrued vacation that they had to pay out. I have no doubt that if I had shown my cards earlier, I would have gotten a smaller bonus and no raise.

 

[RetireBy90]

OP -If you want to help your manager, start to document what you do and how you do it over the course of the next year. They will really appreciate it. It will also help control the number of post-retirement calls and emails you’ll get.

I told no one, not even family until I gave my 2-week notice, but I did create a document of ALL of my responsibilities, no matter how small. All those little tasks that you just handle as a matter of course that your manager has no clue about - Write them down.

As a result of keeping my mouth shut, I got a higher than average annual bonus and pay raise based on my performance. I gave notice the day after the bonus was deposited. And the raise increased the value of my significant accrued vacation that they had to pay out. I have no doubt that if I had shown my cards earlier, I would have gotten a smaller bonus and no raise.

I was really surprised when I left. Mega Corp has formal guidelines for bonus and is based on meeting profit goals and your performance review. It is paid out each March, so my plan was to leave after check hit the bank. Since I left 31 Aug that was 2/3 of the year and I got 2/3 of 2017 bonus about a month after I left, along with a little extra as manager has small funds he can add to computed amount.

Then there was the vacation I cashed in, pushed me into higher tax bracket than expected. Bunch of punks

 

[bolt]

When you work for anyone other than yourself you're always replaceable, do not enchant yourself otherwise you can be fired on the spot. If you have a contract working for anyone you can be let go on the spot and figure it out in court. JMHO /shrug/ Good luck!

 

[Rambler]

I gave 4 YEARS notice. Please don’t bury me...not bragging here, but I knew I would be very hard if not impossible to replace. Part of the issue was that my next in line was older than me, by 10 or 11 years and was planning his own retirement. When I retired, my goal was to replace BOTH me and my next in line, with only one person. As it turned out, we found a replacement for my next in line and gave the older gentleman an easy way out...nice package, consulting for a couple years...just show up a couple times a week, slap a few backs, and read the paper. The new guy was younger than me. After a couple of years, he was suspected of having his hands in the cookie jar (female employees, not money) but nothing was proven, and I’m thinking that could have been because of the women’s fear, or just because they liked being charmed by him. It was in a different country and a different culture. Anyway, his performance, while very good at the beginning, was also beginning to suffer. All this was coming together in my final few months. So when my time came, HQ decided to send a replacement for me, who didn’t speak the language, understand the culture, nor understand the sacrifices made to get to the successes we were having. My underperforming #2 who we had intended to take both roles was gone in short order after that, and my replacement was gone within 3 years...himself also proving to be a bit of a womanizer. I should mention that I was the head of the Asian subsidiary of a large global company, and spoke/speak the language of the main country for that business, understand their culture to the extent possible by a westerner, yet understand the western corporate culture as well. My #2 couldn’t wrap his arms around the global corporate culture. The western guy who replaced me when I retired couldn’t wrap his arms around the Asian cultures. Result=> failure all around. Sales faltered. Profits and more importantly profit margins faltered. About that time, I stopped looking at the results and sold my remaining stock (good thing...it went down quite a bit 6 months later).

Point is this, if you are mission critical and there is no one else who knows how to do what you do, I’d say you owe it to them (especially if you’ve been there a long time) to give them a longer notice. You may want to start the conversation carefully and gently...like “I’m getting older, now xx years old...when do you think I should start thinking about retirement?” Then take it slow and easy from there. Another consideration is if they plan to close your office, when might that happen, and how gold would your parachute be? Depending on the answer to that, I might just keep quiet and see what happens.

 

[ERD50]

...
Point is this, if you are mission critical and there is no one else who knows how to do what you do, I’d say you owe it to them (especially if you’ve been there a long time) to give them a longer notice. ...

And allow me to provide an alternate view.

If you are truly "mission critical and there is no one else who knows how to do what you do", then the corp should have a plan, in case you get hit by the proverbial bus. Your contract should state that they need X weeks/months notice if you decide to leave, with the penalties defined.

If your contract says 2 weeks notice, or 4 weeks or whatever, that's all they bargained for, and all you owe them. Period. If they want you to do more than their contract with you defines, fine, you are free to ask for any $xxx/hour rate you want under any conditions and they are fee to decline it.

It's that simple. Their lack of planning does not fall on your shoulders, unless you allow it.

I'll add - at any point in your employment, the corp is free to present you with a new contract. For example, they realize you are harder to replace than when they first hired you, so they say "Here is this year's raise/bonus, contingent on you signing a new agreement that doubles your required leave notice".

They either value you, or they don't. Not your problem.

-ERD50