Photo Credit: leadchangegroup.com
When asked about what do they miss most about their working lives, retirees often cited social interaction, structured days, short- and long-term goals and, of course, all the perks, healthcare and monetary benefits.
On the eve of my eighth retirement anniversary, I have also been doing some reflections on my own. When compared to work, freedom is much better – I have little or no stress and, overall, post-retirement life is very happy for me. There’s no alarm clock to wake up to in the morning – in fact, for most mornings, I wake up to some daylight instead of leaving home in darkness and returning from work after sunset. As a partner of Canada’s largest public relations consulting firm, I was used to accounting for every minute of my work hours by completing time sheets on a daily or weekly basis. We consultants prided ourselves in logging in the highest number of hours with, preferably, most of them billed to multiple clients on a monthly basis. The higher our billable income generated for our company, the better we would personally be rewarded. Since retirement, I’ve had the luxury to enjoy free time to myself every single day. Not only do I not need to think about how my time is being used, I deliberately asked myself to slow down and try not to do too much within a tight time frame. No more multi-tasking; no more rushing from one meeting to another; no more commuting in rush-hour traffic; and no more fast food.
I’ve been focusing on how to make myself happy and healthy every day – more time to jog on the treadmill and keep appointments with healthcare professionals; visiting the hair salon for my beauty and grooming routines at my leisure; eating at least one slow-cooked meal a day often in fine-dining restaurants; spending quality time with friends and discarding all networking events; seeing a movie or a play and attending concerts on a weekday or weeknight far from the madding crowd; reading the daily digital versions of The Globe and Mail and The New York Times thoroughly on my Kindle; and, most enjoyable of all, reading a digital book on a snowy day when everybody else was stuck in traffic, scrambling to get home.
My post-retirement travels have brought me to interesting cities around the world including London, Paris, Milan, Prague, Vienna, Madrid, Barcelona, Istanbul (for the first time), Cyprus, Santorini and Athens in Europe; Haifa, Jerusalem, Bethlehem and Nazareth in Israel (for the first time); Brisbane in Australia; Hong Kong in Asia; and Vancouver, San Francisco, Montreal, New York, Boston and Naples in North America.
In spite of my post-retirement bliss, I’d be dishonest if I don’t admit that there are certain things I miss from my working life. The top of that list is camaraderie. According to a study by the Center for A Secure Retirement in the U.S., 65 percent of retirees said they missed interacting with co-workers the most. I belong to this group of retirees because I do miss the office camaraderie, particularly the creative brainstorming sessions with my former colleagues, both young and mature, to generate the best ideas and solutions for our clients. Work used to be a huge part of my life and the human interaction was probably the best part of it.
I also miss the thrills of winning competitive new business pitches. As a partner, it was my job to keep generating new business leads and bidding for sizable projects for our firm. For the consultancy business, this inevitably entails some sort of “beauty contest” by responding to a Request for Proposal to compete for the business, usually against two to three other firms. Although the preparation work for the competitive pitch could be gruesome, nothing is comparable to the thrills of winning an account. I remember leading a pitch team to travel to Amazon’s head office in Seattle where we presented our proposal to the e-commerce giant’s Executive Team against the incumbent agency. Nothing gave me greater satisfaction than hearing that we had won the business before we even boarded our return flight home.
Then there was the pitch for the launch of Cathay Pacific Airways’s Toronto-Hong Kong direct service. At the time, I’ve just switched from one agency to another, and the contact I’ve made with the airline called me at my new company and expressed interest in following me to my new firm, on condition that I presented a new team with a proposed launch program. Once again, our presentation won the day and the launch of their Toronto-Hong Kong direct service has always been one of the greatest highlights of my career.
The third biggest pitch that marked a significant milestone for my career was our winning the Brand Toronto Launch Program which was aimed at rejuvenating Toronto’s tourism industry after the SARS outbreak in the city. Because the program’s objective was to generate media and consumer interest in key U.S. cities, we competed against two other firms comparable to our size with international offices. Our pitch was creative, strategic and all-encompassing which eventually accounted for our selection by the client represented by Tourism Toronto, the municipal government, a working committee comprising the city’s prominent business executives, and a U.S. advertising agency. I remember the thrill of reporting this victory to our firm’s Executive Committee who all spontaneously gave me a round of applause and a champagne celebration at the end of the Partners meeting.
The last thing I miss were the business travels across Canada and around the world. Apart from spending a lot of time writing at my desk which was an essential part of my business, I was lucky enough to travel nationally and internationally on behalf of my clients while learning so much from interactions with the local people in various markets. For my long-standing and loyal luxury client Montblanc, I’ve led media junkets to Paris; organized cultural events from coast-to-coast in Halifax, Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver; and attended client meetings at their head office in Hamburg. For another long-standing client Royal Canadian Mint, we’ve created the Art of the Coin Exhibit and taken the travel exhibit to major museums across the country to educate Canadians on the history, uniqueness and value of numismatic coins.
In spite of my reminiscences, I would not trade any of what I miss about work for my complete freedom now. I’ve fully enjoyed kicking back and slowing down for the past eight years and there are absolutely no regrets about hanging up my boots. In addition to maintaining my physical fitness, I’ve been keeping my mind active by learning Spanish since my retirement and practising it on a daily a basis with my smartphone app. Boomerwatch.ca is in its 12th year now and although I may not be blogging as often, the research and the writing also help me with my mental agility and continuing education on all matters that are important to baby boomers. To all my friends who are about to retire in the near future, I’d like to welcome them to the club and wish them all the best in their pursuit of the ultimate freedom.
