An economic downturn often shortens the "to do" list. Projects at work and at home get postponed. We don't go out for fun as much to economize. We cut back on business travel. We do "stacations" instead of heading for a resort 2000 miles away.



There's treasure in this slower pace. It leaves room for the "important conversations." When activity slows, the interpersonal stuff that's had to wait for things to calm down can take center stage for an hour or two more easily. That's true at work, true at home, and true with loved ones you can only reach by phone or internet.

Take advantage of it. If you're planning retirement, there are things that need to be discussed rather than assumed. Same deal if you are living retirement. What you are assuming about how other people fit into your life warrants some investigation in any case. Some of those conversations are waiting to happen at work as well.

If you're coupled, one of the biggies is a discussion of how what you want as "retirement" will mesh with what your sweetie wants. If you want to travel the world and your spouse wants to stay home and raise rare African orchids, you're gonna need to talk to come up with a plan that keeps you both happy. Differences in interests are surmountable, but require honest conversation. Nothing like a downturn to give you some quiet time to have one.

Honest conversations with adult children also require some slow time--at least to do them well. Are you planning on being a significant part of their lives once you retire? How do they feel about that? Are they expecting you'll be available as the on-call babysitter? You need to lay out the boundaries for that or you're going to feel like indentured help in no time.

If you're working and wondering whether you want to retire at all, this is also a good time to talk to your boss or mentor about other options, either with the company or as a resource to the company after you leave. If you do what you do well and like doing it, there may be a way to create a more flexibly shaped job as a transition to--or in lieu of--retirement. But you aren't going to have any idea of how you're valued unless you get some feedback. The place to start is with ...you guessed it....an honest conversation--about what you're doing and the value of that to the company.

The "who" for this conversation varies. Maybe it's someone in Human Resources. Maybe it's the guy who loved having you on his project four years ago. Maybe it's your peers. One way or the other, you need to know the value of what you know and can do from a source other than your own perception. We deceive ourselves too easily, sometimes by thinking we are superstars when we aren't, but often in the direction of giving ourselves less credit than we deserve. If you have a little time for conversation, go to people you work with and trust and find out what they think of what you do.

And don't stop there. Find someone to talk to about the future of your area of expertise, too. Is it a growing area of need? Or waning for whatever reason? How current do you keep yourself? Even if you do stay current, are the things you do well going to become obsolete in another decade? Being realistic about this stuff will help you define a satisfying set of retirement options.

Once you have a sense of your value as an employee and a realistic assessment of how long that work is going to need to be done, you can explore ideas for reshaping your work. There is so much that can be done with a cell phone and a laptop these days. But getting the flexibility you want will probably take several steps. The likelihood of running your job from wherever you want whenever you want will be better if you explore ideas slowly up the chain of command for a while before making any concrete suggestions. That's easier to do when business is slow.

These are just a few examples of the kinds of conversations we need to have to live well. A downturn provides quiet time when you might be able to get some of them accomplished. The best part is that once you have this information to work with, new possibilities and directions open up. Focusing on and pursuing those will make you forget there's a downturn happening it all.

Copyright (c) 2009 Mary Lloyd