The Company That Smiled at Harold for 31 Years — Then Handed Him a Box

What happened to Harold?

Harold was 61 and had worked for the same manufacturing company in Ohio for 31 years. He turned down other offers, relocated twice when the company asked and trained younger employees who later outranked him, without complaint. He was four years from retirement, with a number in his head, a date on the calendar and a fishing cabin in northern Michigan that he and his wife had talked about for a decade. One Tuesday morning in October he was called into a conference room where HR and a lawyer slid a paper across the table. His position had been eliminated in a restructuring, and he had two weeks. Robert is clear that Harold is a composite of people he has worked with, people who came to him shaken by companies they had given everything to.

Why does losing the last working years hurt so much?

Those final years do more than pay a salary. Your savings compound the most in them, your Social Security record takes some of its highest-earning years, and your employer’s 401(k) match does its heaviest work. Lose four of them and the damage compounds. Robert cites Bureau of Labor Statistics data showing that workers over 50 who lose a job take longer to find the next one than younger workers, and often earn less when they do. Harold took two years to land on his feet.

Is your employer your retirement partner?

Robert’s answer: your employer is a business, and it decides on its own interests. The company Harold gave 31 years to was asking how to cut headcount before the quarter closed, and his four remaining years did not enter the equation. Until you accept that, Robert argues, your retirement carries a risk that no market swing or inflation spike can match. Markets have recovered from declines. The loss of your final working years often cannot be made up.

What does an employer-proof retirement plan look like?

A plan that does not depend on your employer honoring an unwritten deal. It has an income floor that belongs to you, a layer of guaranteed or near-guaranteed income that pays whatever your company decides in October, and it works whether you retire on your terms at 65 or on the company’s terms at 61. Robert says the pre-retirees who have done this work read restructuring announcements with a calm their colleagues do not have. If you are under 65, the plan also needs an answer for health insurance before Medicare, and the post on responding to a severance notice covers the first decisions after the conference room.

What should you do before it happens?

Build the plan as if that meeting could happen tomorrow. Harold is okay now, and he would have been spared two hard years if someone had shown him this four years earlier. Robert’s 30-minute retirement clarity call is a look at how your plan would hold if your job ended on someone else’s schedule.