Armed Polite Society
Main Forums => The Roundtable => Topic started by: MillCreek on March 05, 2020, 07:48:33 AM
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After I found my last job a couple years ago at age 58, I had pretty much resigned myself to working there until retirement. I like where I am and what I do, even though it is way under my skillset, but the four-hour and 90 mile round trip commute to Seattle several days a week was wearing on me. I had chatted with a few employers since, but discovered that age discrimination is a real thing, and few people want to hire an older white male in a female-dominated healthcare profession. 'Overqualified' and 'we can't afford you' is what I heard most often, and I was never sure if this was the case, because I do have 35 years + experience in my field, degrees up the wazoo, and my minimum salary is commensurate with qualifications, or it was a proxy for age discrimination. I am pretty sure a lot of these potential employers looked at my age, calculated how long I would likely be working, and decided it would not be worth the effort.
A couple of months ago, my wife and I were at a restaurant, and I waved at one of my risk management colleagues from the local hospital who was there with her husband. She came running over, grabbed me, and told me she had just heard of a new position that was going to be posted, I would be perfect for it, and I should apply immediately. This is with a very large multi-state healthcare organization, and I had in fact worked for this organization several years ago as a corporate risk manager at the corporate offices. More to the point, this position would be with the medical group division, and the office would be 25 miles from my home.
So the position was posted, and I applied for it, even though I was overqualified, and was not a nurse, as per the job description. After three panel interviews, I was pleasantly surprised when the recruiter called last night and offered me the position. I start at the end of March. It is a substantial increase in pay and benefits over my current job and the commute will be 35 minutes or so each way, and I can ride my motorcycle to work in the good weather. I will also continue working directly with patients and providers, which I prefer over working strictly in the insurance and legal arenas.
So here I am, at age 60, setting off on a new venture. I had planned to pull the plug and retire at age 62 in my current job, but if I like the new position, I may just keep working until 65 or 67. If I don't like it, I will just retire period.
The other thing that was interesting to me was the power of networking. My one colleague thought of me when she heard about the position, my references spoke well of me, and I had scads of colleagues in the local area contacting the chief medical officer and CEO of the medical group division singing my praises. They interviewed several candidates but I was the overwhelming favorite of the interview teams. I was humbled and impressed by how networking worked in my favor.
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Nice! Congrats on the white patriarchy privilege, you villain, you.
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Congratulations, but you should feel bad about this!
You have taken a job from a more deserving marginally educated person of color with a questionable gender identity.
Going to miss all of those "dear patient" letters you post...
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Congratulations MillCreek.
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Congrats Millckreek! Sounds like a great job, and the cut in commute time is worth a lot!
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Changing jobs/companies every few years is such a weird concept to me. I'm pretty much stuck with my company until I'm forced out due to retirement or furlough. I've been here 19 years and can work another 14 before mandatory retirement.
It's pretty cool that you can change jobs like that and keep or increase you salary. Congratulations on the new job. Sounds like you earned it.
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Changing jobs/companies every few years is such a weird concept to me. I'm pretty much stuck with my company until I'm forced out due to retirement or furlough. I've been here 19 years and can work another 14 before mandatory retirement.
It's pretty cool that you can change jobs like that and keep or increase you salary. Congratulations on the new job. Sounds like you earned it.
After I left the law firm, I was in my first professional job for almost 19 years. I have had so many HR and recruiting people tell me that I hurt my career by staying so long in one place. They say that if you are not moving up, you should be moving to a new job and/or a new city every 3-5 years, since that is the only way to get salary increases any more. Perhaps this is the way of the future in today's economy. I can see doing this if you are in a profession with lots of openings, or are young, single and mobile. Once you start accumulating houses, spouses with their own career, and children, or are in a profession with few openings, it is not quite so easy to pull up stakes and move on. In my profession, there are maybe 1-3 jobs in Western Washington at any one time, and none at the executive level.
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In the airline pilot world changing jobs means starting at the bottom of pay and seniority. Once we get a decent job at a decent company, we get kind of stuck here. I can't complain, though, I get paid well to do little.
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Congrats! Better pay and better commute is a tough combo to achieve.
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Wow. Nice!
Brad
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Changing jobs/companies every few years is such a weird concept to me. I'm pretty much stuck with my company until I'm forced out due to retirement or furlough. I've been here 19 years and can work another 14 before mandatory retirement.
It's pretty cool that you can change jobs like that and keep or increase you salary. Congratulations on the new job. Sounds like you earned it.
Been at my current job 10 years this Sunday. Before this longest I stayed at any job was 3.5 years. I'm actually pretty surprised I've stuck it out this long. Nearly left 4 years in. Been actively looking for the last 2-3 years, but with Boeing not hiring much it's been tough. Could leave in a month if the wife was willing to move to a new region of the country. Without that willingness I'm pretty limited in opportunities. Though I did find a posting at Microsoft I'm qualified for that I'll apply for today. It would pay a lot more but I'd go from a 50 minute round trip commute to about 5 hours round trip.
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Congratulations!
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"Changing jobs/companies every few years is such a weird concept to me. I'm pretty much stuck with my company until I'm forced out due to retirement or furlough. I've been here 19 years and can work another 14 before mandatory retirement."
Tell me about it. I was with SAIC for just over 20 years and was perfectly content to spend another 20 there, but then my contract ended and I couldn't find anything else inside the company, so I had to jump.
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My nephew is a 30 year old self-described 'code monkey' currently working at Microsoft in Redmond. In the last five years, I think he has worked at seven or eight different places and the longest stay was nine months. Most of the time, the job ended, and he had to move on. He now an actual FTE employed by Microsoft, and he has hopes that this will be a longer-term position.
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I know people who have made a career out of that crap, and there's no way that I could. I'd go nuts.
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Congrats!
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Congrats to you.
And thanks for the background information, too - it brightened my day and I got a good chuckle out of reading about a 60 year old RISK MANAGER who rides a motorcycle! :rofl:
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Congratulations, buy some rain gear, ride to work every day! It's not like you get ice on the roads over there often.
Now some poor female (chosen preferential pronoun) nurse of color will have to continue being exposed to all of the diseases brought into a hospital because you used your white male arrogance and applied for a job where you did not meet the requirements yet somehow allowed the hiring body to choose you. A failure at all points of the process.
Sometimes it pays off to swim out of your lane a bit.
Just the commute difference would be enough for me I think. I go crazy in traffic anymore.
bob
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Congrats, good luck with the new job.
As others have said the commute alone would make it worthwhile. 2 years ago I got transferred to a different location and shift. Lost my shift differentials to the tune of a 20% pay cut and added 90 miles a day to my commute, until the transfer I had a 4 mile round trip. At the time I had 2-1/2 years to go till pension eligibility. Now I'm only 4 months till I'm pension eligible but I'll only be 58. Hopefully I can hang on till 59-1/2 and I'll probably bail out then. I hate the commute and location enough that it affects my health and sanity.
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In the airline pilot world changing jobs means starting at the bottom of pay and seniority. Once we get a decent job at a decent company, we get kind of stuck here. I can't complain, though, I get paid well to do little.
Now if they'd just quit hassling you about having a few drinks on the job...
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Now if they'd just quit hassling you about having a few drinks on the job...
For realz.
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Congratulations, Millcreek.
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Interesting about the "Benefits Manager" side of your profession.
Yes, networking works and commuting sucks.
Congrats !
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Congratulations! What are you going to do with all of your free time now that you won't have that horrible commute?
The power of networking is amazing. I got my job 17 years ago only because a former colleague mentioned my name to a headhunter.
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My nephew is a 30 year old self-described 'code monkey' currently working at Microsoft in Redmond. In the last five years, I think he has worked at seven or eight different places and the longest stay was nine months. Most of the time, the job ended, and he had to move on. He now an actual FTE employed by Microsoft, and he has hopes that this will be a longer-term position.
Submitted the application. If they're like Amazon they'll reject me probably just after lunch. Hopefully they take more seriously. I tick all the boxes they want except previous experience with consumer items. But, if they're smart, they'll realize that's a very issue.
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"I got a good chuckle out of reading about a 60 year old RISK MANAGER who rides a motorcycle!"
WELLLLLLLL...
I normally wouldn't call one of these a "motorcycle...," but if it makes him feel like a young buck again... :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:
(https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/61Qlpt-yIFL._AC_SX425_.jpg)
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Congrats!
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Congrats, Millcreek. It sounds like this will be a much better deal all around.
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Congratulations!
I've had quite a few agronomic managers ask me when I retire from the state of Iowa at 62 (16 more years) to look them up and they will offer me a job on the spot. Probably a seasonal agronomist or seasonal risk manager.
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"I got a good chuckle out of reading about a 60 year old RISK MANAGER who rides a motorcycle!"
WELLLLLLLL...
I normally wouldn't call one of these a "motorcycle...," but if it makes him feel like a young buck again... :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:
(https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/61Qlpt-yIFL._AC_SX425_.jpg)
OMG! It's an ATV!
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Mine is a "Trike" and is classified as a motorcycle in my state and has flaming skulls on it, ThankYouVeryMuch!
(the little wheel on the front is an "anti-tipping" wheel)
(https://armedpolitesociety.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fherohog.com%2Fimages%2Fmisc%2FSpeedysTrike.jpg&hash=fdb82cb130360685c5307e81a56a80a462d8e252)
CONGRATS on the new job! Pays to be in the right place at the right time and to know the right people!
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"the little wheel on the front is an "anti-tipping" wheel"
Training wheels. Gotcha. :rofl:
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Congrats on the new job. Getting more $$$ and less hassle to get to the job is pretty nice.
I've been in my job for the last 14 years. It's actually a really satisfying job, too. I get out of bed when I feel like it between 7AM and 8:30AM. My commute is about 15-20 feet. I linger over my coffee for a couple hours. Around 11:30 or so, I take my lunch break. Then around 1:30 I take a nap for an hour or so. No one complains to me at all about whether I'm accomplishing my task. I do have some maintenance responsibilities at the office from time to time. If it snows, I can shovel or snow blow...whichever happens to intrigue me at the moment. After a walk of about a half mile for exercise I distribute the mail that I have picked up at the mailroom. When the weather is nicer, I get to ride a small tractor around the outside of my "office" once, maybe sometimes twice a week. I am allowed cold beverages on the small tractor.
The pay is pretty good: Around $5300.00 a month after taxes. I get medical insurance and have a fully funded IRA. I don't think I'm going to retire from my labors. I love my job so much I'll just stay till I croak.
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Update on the old job: so they have not found someone to replace my skillset (which I warned them about). They have turfed my responsibilities over to the general counsel while they continue to search. Unfortunately, the general counsel does not know squat about healthcare risk management/patient safety, so she sends me about two emails a week asking my opinion. Now these are questions that I can generally answer off the top of my head in less than five minutes, as opposed to her doing hours of research and probably coming up with an answer that is not grounded in the realities of healthcare.
So I am wondering at what point do I continue to help out, vs. start charging them my consulting rate of $300/hour against a $ 1500 retainer. This is a non-profit healthcare facility that runs on a shoestring at the best of times, and currently almost 50% of their employees are on furlough. If this was the U of W, or Kaiser or someone like that, I would be charging them without blinking an eye. Maybe I should just chalk this up to relationship-building, in case the general counsel or others on the leadership team are in a position to help me some day, or I am piling up good points in Heaven.
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If it's just a couple times a week and doesn't appreciably impact your current duties, let it be. Chalk it up to goodwill and keeping positive relationships alive.
Brad
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I might let them know I'm happy to keep helping at the current frequency and degree of difficulty. But that if they ramp up on either side of that spectrum you'd ask for a formal consulting arrangement.
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So I am wondering at what point do I continue to help out, vs. start charging them my consulting rate of $300/hour against a $ 1500 retainer. This is a non-profit healthcare facility that runs on a shoestring at the best of times, and currently almost 50% of their employees are on furlough. If this was the U of W, or Kaiser or someone like that, I would be charging them without blinking an eye. Maybe I should just chalk this up to relationship-building, in case the general counsel or others on the leadership team are in a position to help me some day, or I am piling up good points in Heaven.
Do you incur any potential liability for doling out free advice?
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Do you incur any potential liability for doling out free advice?
No.
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I'm sixty now as well, I also have a newish job... lowest guy on the totem pole and its difficult/dirty/hard work with very little thinking or experience needed.
plus, I made more money in the eighties.
but, its a 15 minute drive.
I like everyone there, it has bennies and 401k , I hope to last a few yrs - i am quickly getting older tho
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If you are not incurring any potential liability, then I agree with what Brad said. It's a case of not burning bridges behind you. You may need those connections one day.
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Belated congratulations MillCreek!