A New Year. Thoughts and Musings.
Here we are – the beginning of a new year and nearly 12 months after the start of COVID. Some of you haven’t heard from me since the late Fall and after a busy end to 2020, I wanted to share some of my musings about where we are and where we’ve come from. I’ve put my thoughts together and reflected on how my attitudes toward work and life have changed and how they’ve stayed the same.
I don’t have to tell you at length that a year ago, everything was remarkably different. Many of us could be relatively carefree about our everyday lives. We could go to the store without concern, we could meet friends at restaurants, or watch sports teams play in fully-packed stadiums. We could visit crowded movie theaters. For many of us, we wouldn’t think twice about booking flights to see clients or family in person. All of this was so normal and we didn’t think twice about it.
Then...BAM. What initially seemed like an overseas, faraway problem became a very real present threat – to civilization, to our organizations and our personal lives, creeping in to change the way we all collectively live.
What hit me the hardest was that it all happened so quickly. I recall vividly, even though it now feels like 10 years ago -- I was in Barbados working with 25 FP&A professionals at an oil & gas company and everyone was talking about what was going on -- speculating whether it was something or nothing. One day, I’d be in the Caribbean and a couple days later, everything would stop. Turning on the news, I saw scenes of chaos and disarray at Chicago O’Hare Airport, "What a mess."
Borders...closed. Schools….shut down. Meetings...canceled. BAM -- a total lack of foresight and a total lack of preparation led us to what came next. And, of course, here we are still in it.
Over the past year, what’s struck me most, is coming to terms with the notion that everything can literally change in a single moment. Solid goals we set out to conquer can be thrown out the window almost immediately. Not only does it impact the present moment – it throttles sequential plans thereafter.
What’s made COVID so extraordinary is we’re ALL collectively dealing with the impact. It’s compelled all of us to change, reminding us that even the best-laid plans are never a sure thing. Life, and even the future of work and humanity, are always unknowns.
Some of you may recall the choice I made years ago to take a mini-retirement I coined my "First Retirement". Part of my motivation was to take time to enjoy life more fully and reposition my work. But another part of my motivation was to avoid putting all my faith and focus into a single linear trajectory. Aware that disruptions could upend life and work, I wanted to reassess my presumptions about what the future might look like. Ever since I took that First Retirement, I’ve come to see life and work not as a definitive plan but as an investment in a diversified portfolio. This doesn’t just offer better positioning during times of uncertainty; it brings more color to experiences.
Many people have had to change the way they go about their every day. They’ve had to change the way they work, play, and plan their lives. Many have been forced out of the workforce temporarily due to childcare requirements or business closures. Almost everyone I know with young kids has had to juggle between virtual schooling, infected caretakers, or both. The number of people changing careers, by choice or otherwise, is high.
In times of heightened stress or crisis, we often don’t have the freedom to over-plan, over-think or over-analyze. We have to rely upon our instincts and be resilient. But this also gives us a rare opportunity to change the way we think and go about our days, asking bigger questions about what the future of work and life.
When I gave my TEDx talk "Why I Retired at 32" years ago, my goal was to challenge people to reconsider their definition of career and retirement. If my talk alone didn’t prompt them to rethink this, I certainly believe COVID has. Collectively, in real-time, we’re reinventing what work means and how it can be conducted.
Here are the possibilities I’ve long encouraged people to consider about the way they work in an increasingly flexible and constantly changing world and workforce:
1. Constantly redefine what work and retirement mean
When I took my first "mini-retirement", I was nervous for all the understandable reasons but most people didn’t look at me like I was crazy. Instead, they shared comments like: "good for you" and "I really wish I had done that". Colleagues in their sixties were telling me I made the right move for a whole array of reasons. Clients would actually say "we'll talk about business but first I want to hear about this retirement you took."
When we tell 18-year-olds to choose a skillset and career pathway they can pursue for the next forty years, we ignore the immense pressure it puts on them. They may feel they need to stay committed to this plan, otherwise they won’t be able to reach their visions of success or the golden years of their retirement. Or perhaps worse, in their minds, they may sense they'll fall behind their peers. This is outdated thinking and impractical given how much and how fast the world is changing.
Many in our society look to retirement as the chapter of life when they can finally enjoy their time more fully and wholeheartedly. That’s also assuming the financial assets exist to execute on this aspiration. What if, instead of waiting until the final chapter of life to retire, we prioritized intermittent work and leisure throughout our lives, allowing ourselves the opportunity to refresh, reinvent, and reposition? Is a pandemic the time to double-down on what you know? Or is it the perfect time to take a leap?
I didn’t want to bet on that traditional paradigm so I went with the latter. About ten years into my consulting career, I'd made a conscious choice to take time off. Since then, I’ve deliberately prioritized smaller, more meaningful breaks allowing me to reposition and re-engage with my work more fully and productively. This fuller focus doesn't just benefit me -- it benefits those with whom I have personal and work relationships.
2. Reinvent for the next chapter of work
What gets studied at eighteen usually isn’t as relevant at thirty. What gets learned on the job at thirty might not be a job responsibility at forty. These are very real possibilities in today’s world since the pace at which we learn is changing so rapidly. Instead of being fearful about our own limitations, we can anticipate changes and reinvent ourselves by bridging our skills to ones that are newer and more in-demand. When I took time off from the workforce during that First Retirement, I redirected my career intentionally to explore several entrepreneurial ideas, build new skills, and plan for what was next in my life.
Today, I work in a field and deliver solutions I wasn’t capable of delivering in my 20s. Yet, it was the skills in my 20s and 30s that allowed me to bridge to the work I do today. Had I not taken time off to refresh, reskill, and redirect, it would have been more difficult to build a my practice and speaking platform in fields I’m best suited for. According to an extensive report by Upwork, it’s expected that by 2027, more than half of our workforce will be made of freelancers who are redefining what work means to them. Ask yourself, what could this look like for you or your workforce? Can you more effectively choose the work you’re best positioned to do with the partners who need you most?
3. Refresh and stay relevant throughout your work-life
We’re working longer hours and the retirement age is creeping higher. In France and other developed nations, the upward push of the retirement age is becoming official policy and I speculate the U.S. isn’t be far behind. Changing careers is far more common than sticking with one forever. Overwork and burnout are real problems and cost our healthcare system billions of dollars to address. According to research conducted over the past decade by Gallup, fifty three percent of workers continue to feel disengaged. This isn’t good for anyone, their companies, or the economy as a whole. I wonder: what can we do to prevent the sickness rather than just provide the medicine?
The positive news is that companies are increasingly prioritizing learning, development, and wellness. Some are even allowing people to take planned sabbaticals, paid and unpaid time off without putting their jobs at risk. Two clients of mine have invested heavily in rotational programs, encouraging high-potentials to get diverse experience across many different parts of the company so they stay interested, engaged, and valuable.
Recalibrating the way we think about the work and life relationship can allow for entering a new chapter of work, feeling refreshed and excited about what we do and those we serve.
What I Expect Going Forward
Entering into a new year always provides a fresh moment for introspection. Many of us, if given the ability to turn back the clocks, would never wish for COVID to become a reality. In its absence, however, I wonder if the resilience and ingenuity of people would be as strong as it currently is. COVID has provided us with a chance to not just reconsider the way we work and live -- it’s given us the opportunity to accelerate long-overdue changes.
We can better answer the questions:
Do we actually have to work from an office?
Can we live where we want without consideration for where our jobs are located?
What role can technology play in our work?
Can we work four days a week by spreading hours differently?
Can we take time to focus more deeply or take time away to explore different opportunities?
We are often at our best when we’re willing to separate ourselves from normal and challenge the traditional, whether by choice or through outside pressure.
Despite the lessons we’ve learned over this past year, and the advent of promising new vaccines, I personally don’t think the pressure from COVID will be going away anytime soon. I really don't. I believe we’ll learn to live with it, managing ourselves and our new expectations. It’s through revisiting our expectations that we elevate ourselves and our ambition.
Sometimes, even as recently as last week, I’m asked if I’m still retired. I laugh and explain, "well it depends on how you define ‘retired’". For me, the First Retirement didn’t mean the ULTIMATE forever retirement. Instead, it meant taking some time away from traditional work to do what I wanted, with an intention of positioning more effectively for what came next.
For you and others, taking a ‘first retirement’ might mean something completely different. Maybe it's taking time off to do something else? Or maybe it's just being more intentional about what you want to be doing. Regardless of your take-aways from my musings, my hope is that you are encouraged to look at work and life a bit differently going forward than you did this past year.
I believe it is greater self-awareness, among all of us collectively, that leads to greater rejuvenation and purposefulness in all that we do.