Phased Retirement

This is the first of a two-part series published by SHRM - The Society for Human Resource Management "Phased retirement is an employer-based program that allows older workers to reduce their working hours and transition into retirement. These programs may include a partial drawdown of funds from defined contribution or defined benefit retirement plans and continuing employer-sponsored health coverage." '"Older workers may be tired of dealing with their current level of responsibility and are looking for less-stressful roles or roles that are project-based, where their schedules can be more flexible," said Sean Nehlsen, Cleveland-based regional managing director at OneDigital, an HR services provider.' Phased retirements also can allow time for older workers to share their knowledge with other employees, Nehlsen said. "When employees announce that they're ready to retire, it's too late to do any transfer of knowledge," he noted, which...

This 'phased retirement' blog is a service of the nonprofit Center for Ageless Entrepreneurs (CAE). We use 'phased retirement' to mean that older workers and their employers can set up a plan for the employee to gradually shift from full time to part time status while giving the employee a chance to launch their own small enterprise - potentially an enterprise connected to their recent employer. The U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) uses this definition: "Phased Retirement is a human resources tool that allows full-time employees to work part-time schedules while beginning to draw retirement benefits. This new tool will allow managers to better provide unique mentoring opportunities for employees while increasing access to the decades of institutional knowledge and experience that retirees can provide." Link to this OPM definition and federal research is below We will use this blog to post research and commen...