A reader writes:
My last remaining immediate family member recently passed away, leaving me enough of an inheritance to possibly allow me to stop working now (before retirement age) while maintaining my current standard of living. I had been saving under the assumption that I would not receive any help, and I thought retirement was still 10 years away.
My job is understaffed and the commute is long and extremely stressful. My health (mental and physical) have been in decline for a few years, due to stress from work and concern for the family member. For the past year or so, I’ve been saying that if I won the lottery, I’d retire in a heartbeat. But now that I have the means to do so, I hesitate to suddenly abandon the career I’ve worked so hard on and leave my colleagues in the lurch when we are already understaffed.
On the other hand, I can’t imagine returning to 11-hour workdays and my terrible commute while grieving and trying to settle the estate. I’m having trouble focusing and making dumb mistakes in simple things like writing the check to the funeral home, so I worry about my ability to function at work. They say you shouldn’t make major decisions immediately following a loss, but I need to make some sort of change soon — I’m scheduled to return to work Monday after time off for the funeral and I’m not going to be able to keep up.
I’m considering asking my boss if there are any options to reduce my workload to allow me to switch to part-time while I figure out next steps. But given how shorthanded we are, I don’t expect that to be realistic. I might be able to use FMLA to get a reduced schedule or time off for my heath problems. That would give me more time to make a decision, but would be worse for my colleagues because they are not likely to get additional resources to cover a temporary staffing shortage like that. Just never going back at all is very appealing, other than the guilt.
I know my organization’s terrible staffing practices are outside my control and that the resource issue is not my problem to solve, but I can’t help worrying that my coworkers (who are talented and truly nice people) will be the ones picking up the slack if I do less.
I’m looking for advice on how to approach the conversation with my boss, who is a kind and decent person (but who also needs to keep the organization running). I’d like to offer to do what I can to help out, with the recognition that I can’t manage my old full workload, and ask what my options are. Is that abdicating responsibility? Do I need to figure out exactly what I want and ask for that, or is it okay to go to my boss with general ideas and ask for her help in figuring out next steps?
You don’t need to know exactly what you want to ask for before you talk to your boss, but you’re more likely to come away with the best outcome for yourself if you do. Otherwise, if you leave it open-ended, there’s a good chance your boss will propose something that falls short of what you actually want. If she knows what your real goal is, it will be easier for her to help you, or at least to give you a realistic assessment of what they can do.
If you’d really be happy with a whole range of options (like going half-time or going three-quarters time or having the next three months off or getting your biggest annual project off your plate), then sure, you could go to her with some general ideas. But my bet is that you wouldn’t be equally happy with all of those, and so figuring out what you really want and presenting that will increase the chances of getting it, or at least something close to it.
You should also think about working less would look like in your current job. It’s not uncommon for someone to move from full-time to part-time within the same job and realize that they’re still expected to produce the same amount, just in fewer hours. So you’d want to (a) nail down exactly what part-time work and part-time results would look like, and (b) be really realistic about how that would likely play out on your team. Sometimes — not always, but sometimes — it’s easier to move to a new part-time job somewhere else rather than trying to cut down an already full-time one.
As you think this over, try to take your organization’s staffing out of your consideration. You’re not doing your team any favors if you return to your previous schedule and then start dropping balls or making mistakes, or burn out to the point that you leave without notice in a health crisis one day. Your coworkers are also able to advocate for themselves, whether that means setting limits on their own time or deciding to leave for a job that doesn’t overwork them. You don’t need to work more than you want to save them from having to do that, and few reasonable people would expect it of you.
Also, if it’s really true that guilt is the only thing preventing you from not going back at all … you don’t need to feel guilty. People leave jobs! It’s a normal thing that happens. Your organization will figure things out. I can see why you might not want to make a big decision right now in case you’re not thinking clearly, and that would be a reason to delay that choice (and so would needing to make sure you really can afford to retire) — but guilt is not. Quitting is not leaving people in the lurch. Quitting is a normal part of employment, and your coworkers will adjust.
Last, if you’re not 100% sure that your finances show you can retire now, talk with a financial planner, who can help you decide with confidence. And if you’re close to that point but not quite there, that’s definitely a situation where it would make sense to just work less; there’s no reason to work 11-hour days or anything close to it if you’re not doing it for love or money.
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