Many seminar attendees suggest that some type of pre-retirement training be made mandatory for new employees. Image: William Potter/Shutterstock.com
By: John GrobeBack when I was a retirement trainer, part of my role was to review course evaluations provided by students in the pre-retirement classes that I delivered. The most common comment I saw is one that trainers can do nothing about – some version of “I wish I had known all this sooner.”
Individuals often lamented that they wish they had known more about how the federal retirement system worked earlier in their career. Some even go so far as to suggest that some type of pre-retirement training be made mandatory for new employees.
I’m sure that many of these comments are valid; if the person had understood how important the Thrift Savings Plan was to a secure retirement, they would have socked a lot more money away – and done it earlier. However, I suspect that a lot of the comments I saw in seminar evaluations were prompted by the changing perspective of a person who is nearing retirement; a perspective that now values behaviors that did not seem important at an earlier stage of life. In other words, not all the commenters would have acted differently earlier in their career even if they had been aware of how federal retirement worked.
It is true that many federal agencies do not provide retirement and financial education to their employees until late in their careers. The agency from which I retired had a requirement that pre-retirement training be offered to employees who were within five years of retirement eligibility. It’s those folks who are close to retirement who are the ones bemoaning the fact that they didn’t know enough about retirement earlier in their career. But many agencies do not offer early or mid-career retirement classes. Why? The one-word answer is “budgets”. When agency budgets are squeezed, two items that begin with the letters “tr” are the first to go – training and travel. What parts of the training and travel budgets are cut? “Non-mission critical” training and travel are the ones. That often means that there’s not enough money left for mid-career and new employee retirement and financial education.
But if we offered new employee and mid-career retirement education; would those who need it attend? The answer is a definite “maybe”. I know that I didn’t begin thinking about retirement until my mid-30s; and that was because I was given the retirement program to manage along with the labor and employee relations programs that I already had. Had I been left to my own devices, I might not have begun thinking about my own retirement for another decade.
It’s a fact that our perspective changes as we age. What is important to a 25 year old (e.g. a Z-28 Camaro, etc.) is different than what is important to a 50 year old (e.g., enough money on which to comfortably retire, etc.). For many of us, it is only as we near the finish line that we realize we are not as prepared as we could have been.
So, what can one do about this?
First, you can start paying attention. If you have not been paying attention to your financial future – start doing so now. Spend some time understanding your benefits and map out a plan that will have you financially ready for retirement at the time you are mentally and emotionally ready for it.
You can read brochures from the Office of Personnel Management, the Thrift Savings Plan, and the Social Security Administration. Go to their websites and see what is available.
Sign up for mailing lists from the above-mentioned agencies and follow them on social media. You’ll receive notice of updates in your inbox.
Don’t be the one who, at age 55, bemoans their lack of knowledge of how federal retirement works.
John Grobe is a retired federal employee and retired retirement educator with over 30 years of experience in helping federal employees understand their retirement.
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