How Three HR Professionals Planned for Retirement

Most HR professionals are known for helping employees excel in the workplace, as well as for their ability to prepare for the future. Workforce planning and long-term compensation strategies are just two of the many future-focused responsibilities that HR pros must be knowledgeable about.

But not all HR experts expend the same amount of effort when planning their own future beyond the workplace. Retirement planning, which involves deciding when to depart an employer and what to do after—including the financial aspects of life after work—often doesn’t get enough attention.

To help their peers, three retired HR professionals agreed to share their retirement-planning strategies and lessons learned. In each case, the HR expert is enjoying a fulfilling retirement they created for themselves. Here’s how.

Consider Consulting

Many HR professionals enjoy what they do and don’t want to fully give it up, even when they retire from a 9-to-5 HR position. As a result, many migrate into consulting roles, giving them greater scheduling flexibility and the chance to stay connected to past colleagues, industry events and networking opportunities.

More than two decades ago, Phyllis G. Hartman, SHRM-SCP, started planning her retirement, which included the creation of a consulting practice. “I quit working for a company as the director of HR and started my consulting business, knowing that as I worked toward retirement, I could continue to do HR and have control of my time and the assignments I accepted,” said Hartman, now president of PGHR Consulting in suburban Pittsburgh. “I currently plan to keep my business going on a part-time basis as long as I am successful and having fun.”

Paul Falcone served in many high-level HR roles during his career, including as chief human resource officer of Nickelodeon, vice president of production HR at NBCUniversal and vice president of human resources at Time Warner Cable. When time came to step away from the corporate world, Falcone was ready, since he’d spent years building a range of secondary income sources as a public speaker and author of multiple books.

“I’m consulting now and enjoying that lifestyle tremendously, focusing on leadership training, executive coaching and keynote speaking, which are what I love best,” said Falcone, who is also a SHRM columnist. “The continuous income stream allows me to postpone withdrawals from my retirement account or draw from Social Security,” he added.

David S. Twitchell, SHRM-SCP, worked in a range of HR roles over his 42-year career, including as director of human resources at a medical center in Vermont and as vice president of human resources at Catholic Charities of New Hampshire. He retired from his formal role more than a year ago, but felt like he wasn’t done yet. Now, like Falcone and Hartman, Twitchell is a part-time consultant with his own company, Upper Valley HRPro LLC.

“As my retirement date approached, I realized I had much to give back to the profession and really found that although I was leaving a profession I loved, it was time to give up the full-time commitment,” he explained. “[I wanted to focus on] how I might be able to contribute on a more part-time basis, particularly to companies with limited or no HR presence. I could [help them with] navigating the HR landscape.”

Knowing that there are many companies needing assistance that only a seasoned HR professional can provide, he said, “makes it clear that I might have been able to retire sooner, work from home and still meet my monthly expenses.”

Manage Money Carefully

As an HR professional, Falcone knew the statistics that most U.S. workers will not have enough money saved to fully fund their retirement when they are ready to leave the workforce. He said he conducted research to learn about the importance of delaying Social Security distribution until age 70 and using catch-up provisions and other investments to financially support him and his wife.

“I always kept my retirement goals up-to-date,” he said.

Hartman and her husband worked together starting at a young age to plan for their future retirement by spending conservatively and saving part of their income every paycheck. She also researched how she’d run a consulting practice years before she launched hers.

“In researching how to establish a consulting business, I learned about how to determine what HR competencies I needed and how to set up and run a small operation,” she explained. “That experience has helped me help my clients, who are mostly small businesses.”

Tap Into Workplace Resources

As HR professionals help employees plan for retirement, they also should make a practice of squirreling away important tips they learn for themselves. When Falcone worked full time, the information he gathered from his company’s investment committee meetings informed his own investment strategy for retirement.

“By midcareer, I consolidated all my retirement accounts with Vanguard so that I had everything in one place,” he said. “When I turned 55, I paid for a Vanguard financial planner to partner with me and my wife. I love index funds for total diversification, and Vanguard only charges one-third of 1 percent versus the full 1 percent model that most actively traded investment advisors charge.”

Enlist a Financial Planner

Both Falcone and Twitchell used financial planners to help them figure out the cash flow aspect of retirement. Through financial planning, Falcone learned about taxes in retirement.

“Work with a financial planner when it’s time to crack open your retirement nest egg because of the tax ramifications: Traditional versus Roth IRAs and 401(k)s, for example, should be sold in a particular order to delay unnecessary tax consequence,” he said.

Twitchell relied on his financial planner at an especially critical time. “I fell behind [with my retirement planning], but realized I needed a financial planner to help me,” he said. “I partnered with a member of Northwestern Mutual, who has helped and guided me and managed a simple IRA so that I could continue to put money into a portfolio going forward.”

Educate the Next Generation

Twitchell said he made a mistake in not planning sooner, and is now encouraging others to start planning early and learn from his errors.

“I have spent time talking to my children as they have started their professions to put as much into their retirement for the future,” he said. “If they plan it wisely, they could have in excess of $500,000 to their credit to defer to.”

Like Twitchell, Hartman is also imparting her wisdom on the younger generation, just as she did before her workplace retirement.

“For the past two years, I’ve been doing a program for a client company on how to prepare for retirement,” she said. “I cover how to determine what you want to do and how to prepare before you retire.”

When consulting with clients, she gives them this key piece of advice: “I recommend that they start thinking and planning early and that they consider retirement as just another career stage. I also would encourage them to think about what they are good at and what they like to do when planning their retirement career.”

Kylie Ora Lobell is a freelance writer based in Los Angeles.