STATUS STATUS STATUS

Do you remember those disco balls that rotated on the ceilings of discotheques, late at night, showing different colours and levels of brightness?

Well YOUR personal status at work is like that. How so? Its colours and brightness can look quite different to each person: you, your friends and family, and even society as a whole.

In other words, your status has as much to do with what you think it is as it has to do with how others might think about you.

Consider some different jobs and professions and their status levels:

·      Celebrities and sports stars. They tend to have very high status in the eyes of the public, and to their own eyes.

·      Doctors and teachers also have high status but (sadly), that seems to be on the wane in the broader society.

·      Politicians? That is another story.

So what happens to YOUR status when you retire from work? In simple terms, you leave and it stays behind. Either you will:

·      Not notice its absence. It may be good or bad that you didn’t;

·      Miss it terribly;

·      Be happy that it has gone.

 If your answer is the middle case then two questions arise:

1.   How do you intend to replace that lost status that you once had?

2.   How differently will other people think about you now if you don’t?

Perhaps a retirement coach can help you to think through the issues?

Retirement: You won’t know what it is like until you get there.