Turning off the tap

NotSkint · 23 September 2017 at 4:27PM

I retired just over a year ago, shortly before my 48th birthday; and it was the best present I could give to myself.
My company was doing yet another restructuring and was going round in circles, reinventing the wheel that didn't work the last time. I found that knowing that I didn't have to be there didn't reduce the stress. I became increasingly annoyed seeing good teams broken up and good peoples contracts left to expire because there was surplus manpower elsewhere. It didn't matter that their skill sets were completely incompatible. I saw absolutely useless people promoted into managing new teams and knew it was something I wanted no part in.
I wished them luck and disappeared into the sunset.
Over a year later and the restructuring is ongoing and still fundamentally broken.
I am so glad that I had always invested in my future self. He is grateful.

bigadaj · 23 September 2017 at 4:54PM

Triumph13 wrote: »

Would that it were an opportunity for a nice redundancy package. Instead it will just be a huge pile of platitude-filled online forms from which I will derive absolutely zero benefit and loads of hassle. One of the benefits of FU money is that I will be telling my manager I have no intention of 'engaging' with it whatsoever so what's the absolute minimum content I can put in without causing a riot from HR. I do think that there is a fundamental problem with all these performance processes in that the people in a position to design them all have a certain, highly ambitious personality type and it never even occurs to them that there might be people out there who aren't like them and have no desire to be like them. [/Rant]

The forms are processes are produced by people who don't actually do anything, whether in HR, management or elsewhere.

Someone needs to arrange for that 'B' ark to set off into space, the problem is nowadays it would have a fair chunk of the entire workforce in it.

ermine · 23 September 2017 at 6:46PM

bigadaj wrote: »

I know it's difficult to isolate this issue from wider life but it does make me wonder if many people just choose the wrong job to so desperately want to retire at a very early age.

I quite enjoyed my job for the majority of the time I was there and I couldn't really moan about the pay. But it was the performance management bullsh1t that I couldn't hack. I couldn't play the game, knowing there was a forced distribution. Companies go on about the importance of teamwork and then put a system in place where it's a zero-sum game - you win and someone else loses. It was a research facility originally and I'd have thought they'd expect their staff to be bright enough to spot the inherent contradiction in the aims, and if people are going to lie to me I'd rather they put the effort into making it a convincing lie

I also found I got more intolerant of the whole management BS anyway - the younger me could believe that (insert name of latest reorg/management fad) was going to make everything better but after you've seen the third incarnation of some fad come round pumped up by MBAs you know that you've seen this movie before.

Perhaps that the result of the usual process of getting more cantankerous as you get older, but I do think that something pretty nasty has been going on in the workplace over the last thirty years. The places I started at actually trained their intake in the technical vagaries of their specialist technology, whereas now companies expect their young 'uns to work for free as interns and seem to have a very tickbox mentality compared ot a more human approach.

There are also some industries (finance, management consultancy and a lot of IT f'rinstance) which are essentially a young person's game. Look around the office - with a working life between 25 and 65 a quarter of the people should be between 55 and 65. If that's not the case, then it tells you something about how long you are likely to last in that industry, and it would be prudent to inform your retirement plans accordingly.

brewerdave · 23 September 2017 at 7:03PM

bigadaj wrote: »

I know it's difficult to isolate this issue from wider life but it does make me wonder if many people just choose the wrong job to so desperately want to retire at a very early age.

......or got moved away from their chosen career by either redundancy or forced redeployment. I suffered both in the last 10 years of my working life after 26 years of relative bliss !!

Triumph13 · 23 September 2017 at 10:13PM

ermine wrote: »

I also found I got more intolerant of the whole management BS anyway - the younger me could believe that (insert name of latest reorg/management fad) was going to make everything better but after you've seen the third incarnation of some fad come round pumped up by MBAs you know that you've seen this movie before.

Yep that's a classic case of BOHICA * syndrome.

* Bend Over, Here It Comes Again

chiefie · 23 September 2017 at 10:36PM

Been planning now for the past 3 and a half years and with 18 months to go I have left my current role to step down and do 4 days a week somewhere closer to home. I'm hoping to go to 3 days in a year and then take a break at 55 until I get bored, which intrigues me as to how long that will take - perhaps never ? I will miss social interaction and a mental challenge so I will have to do something.

enthusiasticsaver · 23 September 2017 at 11:11PM

my husband and I originally planned to retire at age 60. We put plans in place quite early on in our working lives by overpaying pension contributions and making sure our mortgage was paid off well before then. We worked out we needed around £2500 net each month and substantial cash/investments for things like holidays/cars/home improvements etc. We got to that point at age 58 so decided to go then. As long as we had enough to live the life we wanted we were ready to retire and the thought of working a few extra years for extra money was of no interest. My Dad died at 63 with no retirement so we were determined we wanted to go early and hopefully when we were still healthy which luckily we are.

Planning is the key and making retirement provision as important as changing the car or an annual holiday

enthusiasticsaver · 23 September 2017 at 11:16PM

I have a theory that there are certain triggers throughout life. When your young adult kids reach maturity and are a pain in the neck re cleaning up after themselves and generally inconsiderate it is time to gently suggest they move out and get their own place. When your boss/company management start making stupid decisions or keep changing processes which were tried and failed 20 years ago then it is time to retire. Hopefully the finances are in place to support this.

Dansmam · 23 September 2017 at 11:27PM

ermine wrote: »

I quite enjoyed my job for the majority of the time I was there and I couldn't really moan about the pay. But it was the performance management bullsh1t that I couldn't hack. I couldn't play the game, knowing there was a forced distribution. Companies go on about the importance of teamwork and then put a system in place where it's a zero-sum game - you win and someone else loses. It was a research facility originally and I'd have thought they'd expect their staff to be bright enough to spot the inherent contradiction in the aims, and if people are going to lie to me I'd rather they put the effort into making it a convincing lie

I also found I got more intolerant of the whole management BS anyway - the younger me could believe that (insert name of latest reorg/management fad) was going to make everything better but after you've seen the third incarnation of some fad come round pumped up by MBAs you know that you've seen this movie before.

Perhaps that the result of the usual process of getting more cantankerous as you get older, but I do think that something pretty nasty has been going on in the workplace over the last thirty years. The places I started at actually trained their intake in the technical vagaries of their specialist technology, whereas now companies expect their young 'uns to work for free as interns and seem to have a very tickbox mentality compared ot a more human approach.

There are also some industries (finance, management consultancy and a lot of IT f'rinstance) which are essentially a young person's game. Look around the office - with a working life between 25 and 65 a quarter of the people should be between 55 and 65. If that's not the case, then it tells you something about how long you are likely to last in that industry, and it would be prudent to inform your retirement plans accordingly.

Still at the coalface but could live on pension now if I absolutely needed to go out at 55+ with dignity, and I've been thinking a lot about financial life lived till now.
All the above resonates but I'm not so sure it's as straightforward as a young/old thing. I jumped on a treadmill I didn't know was there and went to work (80s/90s) and thought of credit as a joy not a set of chains - it fed a family, let us have a bit of fun, but I bought a lot of c**p I was told I wanted but could easily have lived without, the kind of stuff I kid myself will go on eBay when I get a bit of time.
I'll be jumping off the treadmill shortly but in the meantime a lot of money was made out of me and my willing just "want to please" work ethic. It's the powers that run the treadmill who're ripping us all off. That'll be a rich establishment bunch then. And it'll be a complex set of rules no one claims to have mastered but that gosh just benefit that same elite. Same old same old - was the landowners, the mill owners, the factory owners, then the shareholders and there's a bit of a con trick going on to make us all think we're part of that elite now but we're not, we're really not. As my children keep telling me. They have no intention of working for anyone or anything that doesn't treat them as equals or reward them for their full effort. Thought I was quite bright but I've not been, I've really been quite dim. Bit cross with myself about that.
As Wine was drunk in the creation of this post I'll review in the morning and retract anything I no longer agree with myself on 😳

michaels · 24 September 2017 at 12:25AM

I have 8 years to go which seems like a life sentence plus at that point kids will only be half way through uni and I have no idea what this might cost me or whether by then it might be very good news not to have an income in terms of what it costs them.

Currently I am working 70% hours which adds another year to when I could afford to retire but means I work 2.5 years less in the next 8 so a net gain of 1.5 years less work.

Would others chosse to work for more years but fewer days a week or less years but full time hours?

Turning off the tap

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