Retirement Question

What is the minimum notice for retirement? And the maximum. For example, if you notify your manager that you are retiring let's say, in six months, can they still harass you during that time, put you on a PIP, etc.? Or do they pretty much leave you alone?

Serious answers only, but please also feel free to call it like it is with this terrible toxic company and its management.

 

Assuming you are over 55 and have at least 10 years of service you can retire. In terms of giving notice you can give your management 2 weeks notice. However, if you have had a good relationship with your management then give them notice 3 to 6 months prior. If this has not been a good relationship then give them 2 weeks. You can begin collecting your pension within one month of finalizing your selection on the H&B website.

 

Unfortunately, when you announce your retirement to a bad manager, he or she will make your life a miserable living hell until the day you leave. If you can stomach this for 3-6 months, go for it. But be warned: You will be a target. They do not want you to leave gracefully. Some mangers and directors love to terminate people the day before the retirement. Just so they can laugh about it later. The company backs them.

 

This is crap. Stop stirring it up. If you're truly retiring, they'll let you do it on your terms. No manager or company will terminate just before your announced retirement.

Give them 6 months, and tell them you'll help with any transitional needs, but wait until the end of the year-either the work year or your anniversary of hire. You'll get your full year bonus. And if they want to ask you to leave before that, request the full year bonus and the full year service for pension calculations.

JNJ is a for profit company, but they won't be spiteful, assuming you warrant it.

 

Not true from personal experience.

 

+1

 

To be defined as a "retiree" at J&J, the age is 50 with 5 years of service. 55 was the "magical" number for retiree medical. For legacy employees with the J&J pension, full vesting is at 5 years. Retiree medical for those eligible moving forward looks much different with a point system to purchase retiree medical based on years of service, etc.
The value of these points will change over time, pushing retirees into the government health care exchange programs. If you didn't retire last year and take advantage of the programs offered before all of these changes, you will be in for a big surprise as they continue to strip away the benefits in the years ahead. That said, if you are unhappy wiht your job at J&J, don't stay there being miserable waiting for these benefits as they will be stripped away like a rug from under your feet just when you thought you had reached the age to be eligible for them. Then you will have spent years working in a job and company that makes you miserable. You never get that time back so get out now. Life is too short to spend it everyday unhappy.

 

Troll much.

 

The rate things are going here people will not have to worry about lasting until 55, 60 or 62. As for the erosion of benefits: people will stay because there are no jobs. Misery loves company.

 

Said the other troll.

 

So, if you retire the last day of the year, you get your full year bonus? when does it get paid, in the normal timeframe that you would get it if you were still working, or upon retiring?

 

Normal time frame everyone else receives theirs.

 

From a person who is getting to retire give them as much notice possible--however you can retire at anytime--immediately. If under the age of 62 you will not collect retirement pay until 62--but you can extend your health care via COBRA.

 

Wrong.
If you are >55 and have >10 years service then you can declare retirement and receive your pension. You can only go the Health & Benefits web site to indicate your retirement benefit selections within 90 days of your declared last day, not before. If you cut it too close, e.g. only giving 2 weeks notice, then your pension payments would be delayed while the paperwork is done to catch up. I see no reason to declare 6 months in advance; 90 days is reasonable, although 60 is probably all you need.
62 is the age to qualify for early Social Security payments.

 

If you give three to six months will they spend the time antagonizing you or are you pretty much off limits? I work for an operating company with a brutal boss who wants the pleasure of firing me (as he did to another older employee, the guy is a cruel sociopath) and I would like to avoid that.

 

You can give 60 or 75 days advance notice and hope that prior to giving notice that they lay you off. Then you get severance (2 weeks for every service year), unemployment, and at the end of the severance or unemployment period you notify J&J to change your status to "retired" and you start the pension distribution process (and select retirement medical options, etc.). You will be covered by severance medical until then (assuming you are >50 and have >10 years service).

If your concern is being fired, do you know if they are "building a case" on you? Are you on a PIP? Are you getting bad ratings/reviews? If so, then it's safer to declare sooner rather than later. Then you control your future, not a sociopath.

 

Although now that I read this, maybe it's better to be terminated. I'm not on a PIP but expect one soon. I believe those go for three to six months, right? Then, when they terminate you, I hear that you usually get six months severance with a signed promise not to sue. Then you can collect unemployment, right. That goes for two years under my man O. Tell me where I am right or wrong here. Thank you. Not everyone in this company is a sociopath. Gee, if I had a big rack and wore short skirts my DM would not only be leaving me alone, but courting me. Our RBD would give me some regional awards no matter what my sales performance. That's J&J!

 

PIP is usually 3 months. It's basically them telling you to find a new job within 3 months.

If you are fired, you get nothing except the right to get your pension paid. You can file for unemployment. "I'll take your badge now".

If you are laid off then you are guaranteed 4 weeks severance and you retain the right to sue. You can try to file for unemployment. Your mileage may vary on that.

If you sign the form waiving your right to sue then you get 2 weeks severance for every year of service (up to some max). They also give you 30 or 60 days advance notice.

 

I would say play with your manager's mind. Let him set you up while you just put it on cruise control. Play golf or hit the spa while you're on the PIP. It doesn't matter, you're gone anyway. If it makes his tiny wee-wee tingle that he gets to fire you, just laugh as he does, knowing you played him. Sociopaths hate when you don't take them seriously. And make mention of his ultra-tiny wee wee. Tell him that his wife told you while she was at your house one weekend, that you were both in bed laughing about him. Then retire away!

 

You are among the many who have probably given the best years of your working life to J&J, made many sacrifices in your personal life, including missing important family events, putting personal family and close relationships in jeopardy, and at times, putting your own personal health at risk, postponing Doctors appointments, and working with an unrealistic workload and a shortage of resources. Unfortunately, none of this matters and even if you are continuing to do this now and meeting or exceeding objectives, you are older now and have become too costly for J&J. You along with your other white male colleagues at J&J are targets for termination. J&J needs to make room for younger minorities and females in support of the diversity initiative. It's a numbers game so don't beat yourself up over it. Take a separation package and be glad you left an organization that no longer has a moral compass. You have some great memories of working for a company that was once the most ethical company in the world. Sadly, "ethical" is no longer a word that can be used to describe J&J.