Contemplating Retirement

Azmi Wan Hamzah

And when you retire, you must not just go, but you must let go. You must walk out and never look back. Remember, your last job is no longer your business. You have neither obligation nor right to offer your two sens worth; and your successor owes neither obligation nor time to listen to your views, which in all probability will be outdated, outmoded and irrelevant very quickly. Selective amnesia is a wonderful thing in that it allows you to be absolutely comfortable with yourself while criticizing the shortcomings and failings of those left behind to carry on after you. However, it is good to be reminded that they, being younger, do not share the creeping dementia that is yours to suffer.



This may or may not be good news, but you were supposed to be listening to Malaysia’s eminent, or should I say, premier, environmentalist and green crusader, who no doubt would be scathing in his assessment of the Malaysian corporate sector’s environmental awareness, never mind its record. Fortunately for you, and unfortunately for me, the said gentleman, a very dear friend of mine, got his diary all muddled up, which broadly reflects the thinking of the particular lobby that he represents. So instead, you have me to offer the light relief over lunch, as you munched on your over-priced prawn cocktails and whatever comes as the main course and desert.

We all have our moments of weakness, and mine is at funerals. And that’s precisely where I was approached by a desperate Tan Sri Nik MohamedYaacob, Executive Director of the Perdana Leadership Foundation, to stand-in at this CEO Forum for the tree-hugger gone MIA.

My initial lame protest was “Tak boleh lah - the gathering sounds much too high-powered and high-brow for me.”

He responded “How can? You have done and seen it all before. There should be plenty that you can say that should be of interest.”

“Like what?” I shot back. “I have been retired too long to have anything relevant to say”.

‘Go talk about your retirement then. Come to think about it, retirement would be a great topic over lunch break. Even these corporate Prancing Horses with their Hugo Boss suits and expensive after-shavesought be reminded that they too will have to retire some day”. I swear, those were his words, not mine.

Ladies and gentlemen,

All journeys start with a google-search. Is it not amazing that we could actually function before without search engines and the internet? Apparently(this is what I found after googling the subject)the human race can be split into two categories – those who look forward to retirement, and those who don’t. Actually, that is not strictly true, because you also have another category comprising the ones that never got started as far as honest work is concerned, and for whomretirement, therefore, is really a moot point. Recalling the many friends and colleagues over almost 40 years of working life, this third category is not insignificant, I dare say.

Each of the first two categories naturally views the other dimly. The Can-Retire Lot thinks those who cannot or do not look forward to retire as being one-dimensional, tunnel-visioned, unimaginative and brain-dead. The I-Dread-the-Thought-of-Retirement Faction thinks the other as being soft, insipid, wasteful and brain-dead. The third category, whose sinister existence has been mentioned, does not see any real change between work and retirement. Naturally they don’t care to have opinionswhile they pretend to be brain-dead.


For most people, retirement happenspredictably and in leisurely fashion - when the mandatory retirement age written into the terms of employment, your personal use-by-date, comes by. On the fateful day,everybody in the office tries to be nice to you including, and most particularly, the ones to whom you have been less than generous with promotions, financial rewards, compliments or impressions. There is afternoon tea with cakes and biscuits. Along comes some company big-wig (it’s always somebody a bit bigger than yourself in the organizational scheme of things, and if you are The Big One, then the non-executive chairman is woken up, dressed, talcum-powdered and wheeled out for your Big Last Day), to say very flattering andpleasant things, all quite untrue of course, and gives you a gold watch or a potted orchid to take home with a broad-sheet-sized farewell card recording everybody’s scribbled best wishes.They accompany you to the door, leaving you with the distinct feeling that they expect you to go straight home and never come back, and to make the journey between workplace and final resting place not a prolonged one, never mind your planned stops at the golf club and/or the surau in between.

A month or so later, you find yourself quite lost. There is no longer the office refuge to go to, and your presence at home is beginning to create some domestic strife. The dear wife, who for the last three decades has been complaining over how little time you spentat home, suddenly thinks your presence is no great thing after all. At this lowest point of self-esteem and the nadir of self-confidence, no one should be blamed for contemplating either suicide or alternative sleeping arrangements.Away from the home of course.(For the sake of political correctness, please treat the gender references as interchangeable).

For some others, retirement is not a scheduled event but comes rather unexpectedly and most suddenly, perhaps to be announced together with a horrendous set of quarterly results. Why should company boards think that your private pain could actually sweeten embittered public shareholders is a logic quite beyond me, but as CEOs yours is not to question why, but yours is to do and sigh.

And if scheduled retirement is so dangerous as to make you give up or give in to desires previously suppressed, imagine the dangers posed by unscheduled retirement. So my friends, back to the management primer – you must prepare for retirement as you would any management task. And you do that by having A Plan.

The Plan must address the first question – are you ready for a life on the beach or will you miss the adrenaline rush of making deals and breaking subordinates? If indeed you look forward to retirement, it is still important to have your daily routine and your big events planned out in some detail, in fact in great detail. The less time left unfilled in your personal organizer means the lesser risk for retiree’s remorse and damage to self-esteem. Remember you can’t spend 24/7 ogling nubile bodies on the beach or talking to your tomatoes and rose bushes or listening to the iQuran Pro recitations on your iPad.

So the more hobbies and interest areas you identify to be treated as your projects-in-retirement the better. In fact I would say too much is never enough, because it is amazing how quickly one becomes disenchanted and lose interest with these retirement hobbies. Whether in work or retirement, the saying that the reality is quite different from the theory remains ever so true. And you shall quickly realize that ogling requires excellent not failing vision, and shaky hands and fingers symptomatic of early Parkinson’s are not conducive for paint-brush, piano or putting bait to fish-hook.

If indeed you miss the ringing of telephones, the power meetings, the fawning of underlings, the insider’s gossip and the music of the cash till, then The Plan should treat your retirement as but the dawn of a newand better day in your cycle of life. You are ready for re-birth and to embark on a new career, a new life. However, if you can actually hold back your departure till the day they give you your farewell dinner at the Bankers Club, perhaps you should reconsider taking the journey. The real entrepreneur-in-the-making is one who would not wait to break freethe chains of employment, seduced by the lure of the risky life and the tough freedom it represents.


When is it a good time to effect the voluntary retirement? You’ll know by the signs. Like when your mind starts to wonderwho exactly reads all these clever papers you write, or why do you have to attend yet another product launch, or no, not another new township scheme to review, or why are you, an eagle born to soar, be working for a bunch of turkeys? When subversive thoughts of the kind begin to assail you, it is time to go. Forget the gold watch and the executive incentive payments, cleverly designed to work as golden handcuffs anyway. Be cognisant that your spirit has quit your job; only your carcass remains behind. And when you quit, you must go, before your corpse starts to smell. Too many people quit mentally, but stayed on physically. You can do much better by not being unfair to your employers and most of all to yourself. Better to retire voluntarily then for them to send in the undertakers to wheel you out.

And when you retire, you must not just go, but you must let go. You must walk out and never look back. Remember, your last job is no longer your business. You have neither obligation nor right to offer your two sens worth; and your successor owes neither obligation nor time to listen to your views, which in all probability will be outdated, outmoded and irrelevant very quickly. Selective amnesia is a wonderful thing in that it allows you to be absolutely comfortable with yourself while criticizing the shortcomings and failings of those left behind to carry on after you. However, it is good to be reminded that they, being younger, do not share the creeping dementia that is yours to suffer. They will have perfectly good recollection of the boo-boos and disasters of your making in your time. (By the way, everything I have said here do not apply to politicians and ex-politicians.)


I trust this has been a lot more pleasant for you to half-listen to, then for me to speak. I shall plot a way of getting even with Tan Sri Nik, for he should know we Kelantanese have almost infinite patience in the pursuit of getting even. In the meantime, I shall be joining our missing environmentalist friend on a protest march to save the Malaysian bearded gecko. Apparently all the political din and hot air have affected this rare reptile in its habitat. It has done severe damage to its libido, putting the species high on the endangered list.

This is what I do in retirement. The scope for mischief and fun is fabulous.

Peace Be With You.

( Tan Sri Azmi is a prominent captain of industry and this is taken from a speech he gave at the Perdana Leadership Foundation)