Some notes on a course I recently took as a volunteer with the Canadian Executive Services Overseas or CESO. Overall, a good course that was not too preachy and had useful information when working in different cultures. Highlights are as follows.
I am brushing up on a few concepts and processes that I have used in the past and may very well need to use in the future. One concept concerned a business philosophy of Results Based Management (RBM) and a tool RBM uses for project design, the Logical Framework (LogFrame).
Customer Experience is one of those buzzy terms that is typically associated with technology. Wikipedia has this definition: “customer experience (CX) is the product of an interaction between an organization and a customer over the duration of their relationship.“
At a certain age, retirement becomes a possibility. Canadian author Lyndsay Green’s book: “Ready to Retire?: What You and Your Spouse Need to Know About the Reality of Retirement” is written for men thinking about pulling the plug on work.
This is Ms. Green’s fourth book [1] about aging and perhaps it is good that it was written by a woman. Male-bashing is a fast-growing sport in our society and a man who can afford to retire even more so. In other words, Ms. Green could have written a virtue signalling book by demonizing men who have worked and saved for their golden years. Instead, she has looked at such diverse areas of men’s lives as their health (mental and physical), relationships, finances and what does it mean to be a retired male in the early part of the 21st century.
Snow in Vienna, December 2018.
This is not a book about Freedom 55 or reverse mortgages. Instead, it is about what happens when work stops and the next phase commences. It starts on a depressing note with the dreaded 4 D’s that plague retired men: Drinking, Depression, Divorce and Death.
Money (or lack of it), is often NOT the cause of the 4 D’s. Most of the men in Green’s book and statistics she provided indicate that while income drops, expenditures also drop or are offset by savings [2].
The D’s arise out of a sense of loss: job, social-networks, self-worth and purpose. Two of the cultural touch points used in the book are Arthur Miller’s play: Death of a Salesman and the Jack Nicholson movie About Schmidt. While the play is a metaphor for retirement gone wrong, the movie is a metaphor about coming to grips with aging.
Part of getting a grip on retirement is the transition after work stops. Some men who have retired return to the workforce, others work part time or volunteer in a near full-time capacity. In addition to improving their financial position, this type of work helps them to fill in the losses of retirement (not to mention, get away from their wives or, just as likely, give their partners some much need solitude). Part-time work may include re-negotiating the current role in an organization or completely re-inventing one’s self. No matter what the form, paid or not, working post retirement is critical for a long and healthy life: [3].
Gene Cohen, the late professor of psychiatry, spent decades studying people over sixty and helping them get more out of their later years. In his book The Mature Mind: The Positive Power of the Aging Brain, Cohen reports that the people who were the most satisfied with their retirement were those who had found meaningful volunteer experiences
A source of the 4 D’s is loneliness. For many men, their social network revolves around work. Men often expect to spend more time with their spouses as the center of the social relationships while the same women plan to spend more time with children, grandchildren, relatives and friends.
The home itself can become a battle ground as men attempt to change the physical space and rhythm of the house upon retirement. Nevertheless, most couples work out the flow. When this does not occur, divorce does occur with the wife typically precipitating the split.
Ms. Green does a great job of weaving into the narrative the stories and perspectives of the wives and partners of the men she interviewed. She did this in a confidential manner so that not even a husband might know which of the individuals referenced was his wife.
Nevertheless, the men who took part in the interviews nearly all have supportive wives and themselves are supportive of the women in their lives. Most of the men have taken over the domestic chores so their wives can return to work, go to school, volunteer or to just share the workload.
In summary, a man’s retirement can be the start of a decline or can be the start of the best/last chapter in his life. How this will turn out depends upon his mind set, his plans and his support network after the pay cheques stop. Nothing particularly new in this advise but still very worth the reminder.
[1] For example, You Could Live a Long Time: Are You Ready?
[2] Fred Vettese and Bill Morneau; The Real Retirement; Why You Could Be Better Off Than You Think, and How to Make That Happen,
[3] Gene Cohen; The Mature Mind: The Positive Power of the Aging Brain.
Daniel Klein; In Travels with Epicurus.
Roger Housden; How Rembrandt Reveals Your Beautiful, Imperfect Self,
UK report The Seven Myths of Population Aging: How Companies and Governments Can Turn the “Silver Economy”.
This is the second year that I have been able to review the accomplishments of fellow Alberta Chartered Professional Accountants (CPA) through the society’s achievement awards. Last year, I documented my CPA evaluation criteria, and other than some minor tweaks, am largely using the same scoring method.
The following are my notes so I can use the technique again (in about a decade or so) or for your benefit. As an aside, I have used this technique 3-4 times with success. The first time was in 1995 when I bought a Geo Metro via fax (times change!). See the further reading section for other methods and techniques.
A comprehensive list of risk categories to support a definition previously provided. Categories can be downloaded via MS Excel.
Continue readingA survey of definitions for ‘risk category’ results in one that is organization focused: A risk category allows for the grouping of one or more risks in a manner that is meaningful to the organization and its key external-stakeholders such as investors, citizens, auditors. etc.
Continue readingRecently, I had a discussion with a co-worker (we will call her Carol) who had a family friend who passed away. Carol mentioned that this person was a world traveler and was a keen amateur photographer.
Carol wondered what happened to his image library. Having never married, he did not have children who might have shared an interest or been subjects in the photos. Perhaps an admiring nephew or niece took them or perhaps they are in a land fill somewhere by now.
If lost, what a waste. This person spent a lifetime capturing images some of which were possibly of historical significance. Rather than tossing the boxes of slides or hitting delete on the gigabytes of images, could they live on after the photographer’s eyes have shut for the last time?
I think yes, and here is my proposal: a non-profit stock image organization that receives images and makes them available on the internet for subsequent use. hTe working for this organization is the “Living Images Photo Library of the World“.
Bikes in Portland Oregon… and an example of bequest to a stock image library.
When this friend passed away, his boxes of slides would have been digitalized, categorized, labeled and made available for others to enjoy or use. There are lots of details and issues involved here including:
What do you think? Would you give away your images as your last day appears to be coming closer? If you were Carol’s nephew, would you work through 100,000 images of a life time digitalizing them as part of settling your uncle’s estate? If you were in the image, would you want your six-year old self eating birthday cake being available for the world to see?
In other words, is this an idea of merit and worth pursuing?
A good thank you shows appreciation for someone. Store bought thank you cards are one method, but they lack a personal touch. This is why I have now adopted a post-card thank you.
