TL; DR: I have to decide by the end of the week whether to take a VSP, or pass on it for the outside chance of being promoted to Fellow in April. I work too hard and have no outside life, so I’m worried about suddenly having no purpose. I’m also worried about regretting that I never made Fellow.
My company has surprised me with the opportunity to take a voluntary severance package, and I have until the end of the week to decide if I will accept it. It includes 36 weeks salary, subsidized COBRA (I pay only the employee rate) for 18 months, prorated bonus (if there is one) and prorated RSU’s. The total cash payout is approximately 45 weeks’ pay. My wife (55) is planning to retire in 18 months and will be eligible for family retiree medical benefits the month before my COBRA runs out. With this benefit, we can both get full medical coverage for about $4K per year until Medicare, and then we get Medicare Advantage for $1,400 per year plus the cost of Medicare part B.
I’m a male, 59.5 years old. We own our house outright with no debt and have no children. We have approximately 95X saved (based on past 5 years expenses, adjusted for changes in spending during retirement including increased travel, health insurance and taxes). I call this our comfortable budget. We have approximately 55x saved based on my desired budget (significant travel and other luxury expenses). With no children or other close heirs, we will need to spend this. So, obviously, I don’t need to keep working. The problem is whether I want to keep working.
I work in a job that is not what I wanted to do for a living, but one I turned out to be good at. The job isn’t terrible, but it requires far too many hours. I manage a team of 10 engineers located in 5 different cities (North America, Europe, and India), and work as an individual contributor to cover a couple of people we don’t have the budget to hire. I’ve been tracking the time I spend in front of the monitor for the past couple of years, and I average 57 hours per week (3,000 hours per year) and only take 2 weeks total vacation (most of it around Christmas). That works out to be way too many days starting at 8:00 a.m. and ending at midnight and I’m just tired. I’ve also had several minor health problems this year that I think are stress related. I know the company will keep on running without me, but I have very specialized skills, and they will find it difficult to cover everything I do. There are a lot of people who have become dependent on me (Last month, I took a very rare 2-week vacation and came back to over 800 E-mails!) I’ve been asking for relief to lighten my workload, but my pleas have fallen on deaf ears. I’ve tried to slow down, but I don’t seem to be able to not do everything asked of me.
Last year, I was nominated for and went through the application process to be promoted to Fellow (the highest technical rank at my company). I have received the highest performance evaluation 5 of the past 6 years and had recommendations from 4 VP’s (3 present and one former) and 2 senior directors. I have a budget of approximately $30M/year, and I’ve demonstrated savings of approximately $30M per year over the past 5 years. Unfortunately, I was denied the promotion with no explanation about why, or what I should do to improve my chances of making Fellow in the future. I was, of course, deeply disappointed. I decided that I would continue to work hard, and apply one more time (April), and if I did not make it this year, I would retire. Now, with the VSP, I have to decide whether to take the severance or turn it down with no guarantee whatsoever that I will make Fellow.
I’ve read on Bogleheads that one should retire to something, not from something. The problem is that I’ve worked so hard for so long that I don’t really have a life outside of work. I’ve given up on all my hobbies, and I have no real friends (other than my wife), and we have no children. Earlier in my career, I spent 10 years as an adjunct professor in two different top 10 departments (in addition to my day job), so I’m considering going back to the university part-time (teaching one class a semester) to ease into retirement.
I’m feeling very conflicted. Do I take the money and quit as a way of saying screw you for not promoting me, or do I keep slaving away at my job on the outside chance that I get promoted? If I did get promoted, I would only expect ~5% raise and 5% higher bonus target, so I would be passing on the severance for the chance at a better job title and not much else. I think what I really want from the promotion is recognition that what I do is valuable. If I were advising someone else in this situation, I would say take the money and run. I’m just worried about suddenly having no purpose and regretting that I never made Fellow. Have any of you been in this situation? What did you do, and what would you do if you could do it over again?
[Retitled for clarity - moderator Kendall]
My company has surprised me with the opportunity to take a voluntary severance package, and I have until the end of the week to decide if I will accept it. It includes 36 weeks salary, subsidized COBRA (I pay only the employee rate) for 18 months, prorated bonus (if there is one) and prorated RSU’s. The total cash payout is approximately 45 weeks’ pay. My wife (55) is planning to retire in 18 months and will be eligible for family retiree medical benefits the month before my COBRA runs out. With this benefit, we can both get full medical coverage for about $4K per year until Medicare, and then we get Medicare Advantage for $1,400 per year plus the cost of Medicare part B.
I’m a male, 59.5 years old. We own our house outright with no debt and have no children. We have approximately 95X saved (based on past 5 years expenses, adjusted for changes in spending during retirement including increased travel, health insurance and taxes). I call this our comfortable budget. We have approximately 55x saved based on my desired budget (significant travel and other luxury expenses). With no children or other close heirs, we will need to spend this. So, obviously, I don’t need to keep working. The problem is whether I want to keep working.
I work in a job that is not what I wanted to do for a living, but one I turned out to be good at. The job isn’t terrible, but it requires far too many hours. I manage a team of 10 engineers located in 5 different cities (North America, Europe, and India), and work as an individual contributor to cover a couple of people we don’t have the budget to hire. I’ve been tracking the time I spend in front of the monitor for the past couple of years, and I average 57 hours per week (3,000 hours per year) and only take 2 weeks total vacation (most of it around Christmas). That works out to be way too many days starting at 8:00 a.m. and ending at midnight and I’m just tired. I’ve also had several minor health problems this year that I think are stress related. I know the company will keep on running without me, but I have very specialized skills, and they will find it difficult to cover everything I do. There are a lot of people who have become dependent on me (Last month, I took a very rare 2-week vacation and came back to over 800 E-mails!) I’ve been asking for relief to lighten my workload, but my pleas have fallen on deaf ears. I’ve tried to slow down, but I don’t seem to be able to not do everything asked of me.
Last year, I was nominated for and went through the application process to be promoted to Fellow (the highest technical rank at my company). I have received the highest performance evaluation 5 of the past 6 years and had recommendations from 4 VP’s (3 present and one former) and 2 senior directors. I have a budget of approximately $30M/year, and I’ve demonstrated savings of approximately $30M per year over the past 5 years. Unfortunately, I was denied the promotion with no explanation about why, or what I should do to improve my chances of making Fellow in the future. I was, of course, deeply disappointed. I decided that I would continue to work hard, and apply one more time (April), and if I did not make it this year, I would retire. Now, with the VSP, I have to decide whether to take the severance or turn it down with no guarantee whatsoever that I will make Fellow.
I’ve read on Bogleheads that one should retire to something, not from something. The problem is that I’ve worked so hard for so long that I don’t really have a life outside of work. I’ve given up on all my hobbies, and I have no real friends (other than my wife), and we have no children. Earlier in my career, I spent 10 years as an adjunct professor in two different top 10 departments (in addition to my day job), so I’m considering going back to the university part-time (teaching one class a semester) to ease into retirement.
I’m feeling very conflicted. Do I take the money and quit as a way of saying screw you for not promoting me, or do I keep slaving away at my job on the outside chance that I get promoted? If I did get promoted, I would only expect ~5% raise and 5% higher bonus target, so I would be passing on the severance for the chance at a better job title and not much else. I think what I really want from the promotion is recognition that what I do is valuable. If I were advising someone else in this situation, I would say take the money and run. I’m just worried about suddenly having no purpose and regretting that I never made Fellow. Have any of you been in this situation? What did you do, and what would you do if you could do it over again?
[Retitled for clarity - moderator Kendall]
Statistics: Posted by DrMark — Tue Dec 03, 2024 12:42 am — Replies 24 — Views 1217