Friday, November 2, 2012

Nine

Nine more weeks to retirement.  My Medicare card arrived in the mail. I have sorted through all the solicitations for supplemental insurance and picked four or five I will talk to.  Need to do that soon.

Things have changed at work.  Our junior writer gave her notice and is leaving for another job.  This means we will be hiring both a junior and a senior writer.  I'll be required to participate in the interviewing and selection.  And then I will have to train both.  In my previous two jobs, I was a manager and had to do hiring (and once or twice, firing).  It was an activity I found so stressful and unpleasant, I welcomed this position at ARUP where I was no-one's supervisor and was not responsible for anything involving personnel matters.  Until we hired another writer a year ago, that is.  The last nine weeks of my employment will be stressful because of this but I am trying to be pragmatic about it.  It will be an added load, plus I will be doing all the work myself in the meantime.  It will be tough passing along all my knowledge in the few available weeks.  I have offered to come back and do additional training after my retirement, if needed.  And even, in a pinch, work on a project (although I warned them I can't work so much I jeopardize my social security payments).

So I find myself today just trying to gather all the positive thoughts and energy I can to face what I will need to do.  It's about attitude, I know.  With or without me, the company will go on.  They'll figure it out.

And isn't nine a really lovely number?  We're in the single digits!

2 comments:

troutbirder said...

It's a great number. And I remember my father the banker and high school graduate being offered tons of money to stay on and train Harvard Business School graduates who didn't have a clue on how to bank.... until he finally said "enough is enough"...:)

Bekkieann said...

Boy, I know how that can happen. When I took my present job, my former employer kept calling on me for six months until I finally had to cut the ties. We had an applicant yesterday who looks very promising for the senior position--the harder position to fill. We can't hire until the ad runs for 5 days, and we have to interview at least two or three people, I think. But if we hire soon, I'll have nearly two months to train someone. I hope not to have to hang around much at all after my retirement date.