A STORY WORTH TELLING
“How’s retirement?”
I’m asked that often.
My ready reply is, “It’ll do ‘til a better gig comes along.”
I recently had a conversation on this subject with a retired friend.
“Always said I’d never retire,” I told him. “I tried gardening, but all I grew was older and crankier. I tried an RV, but realized camping for me is a hotel with a view of trees.”
“I was glad to leave the office behind,” my friend said. “Too much change with this AI stuff.”
I paused to consider his comments about artificial intelligence.
The very definition of a “day at the office” has been rewritten since I started working at age 13 in five-and-dime stores, sweeping floors and assembling bikes on Saturdays for 25 cents an hour.
A few years and a college degree later, I moved up to insurance claims adjusting at $250 a week. That bought me a starter home and a new car with money left over.
Life was good.
The American workplace back then really was different, though.
Even during that first office job in the 1970s, it had been changing since the ‘50s but still reflected postwar traditions and formality: hierarchies, clear distinctions between management and employees; direct communication, usually in person; and utilizing titles and surnames when addressing colleagues or superiors.
Office dress codes ruled — coat, tie and dress shoes for men.
Ladies wore skirts, dresses and heels.
Today, that rigid, status-driven society has morphed into organizational structures that emphasize teamwork and the recognition that good ideas come from all minds. And the concept of “casual Friday” in the 1990s introduced “dress down” offices in many workplaces.
The words of one supervisor who mentored me early in my career still stick in my mind, however.
“If you want to be regarded as a professional, you have to dress like a professional,” he said.
Acceptable professional behaviors also changed. Practices now considered unprofessional and unhealthy were everyday occurrences then, like smoking.
My boss at my first job smoked and so did the secretary (now called the “administrative assistant”).
But it was a time when almost half of all Americans were smokers. Even after moving into the communications f ield, my first 10 years in newspaper jobs saw at least half the employees lighting up at their desks.
Even my doctor and dentist smoked.
A Surgeon General’s report on smoking was largely ignored for 30 years, until the 1990s when smoking bans began securing support.
Thirty years ago, job security meant long-term company loyalty and company pensions. Today’s landscape is a “gig economy,” made up of a workforce where people have multiple careers and where employers offer employee-managed 401(k) plans and company investment opportunities.
Then there’s technology, shifting from typewriters and Dictaphones in my first office job to computers, then to voice-to-text capabilities, each transition leading to less paper — except for one colleague who, despite adapting to email, still printed and filed every message.
In conclusion, my retired friend and I think the biggest change in modern offices might well be the elimination of offices altogether. The office today is part of the “always-on” culture: Employees working from home, always reachable by email and text, often laboring during non-standard hours.
“And now it’s AI taking jobs,” my friend said, shaking his head.
“Oh, that doesn’t worry me,” I retorted.
“I may be going to work for AI.”
“What the ...?” he quizzed.
“Yep,” I said. “I’m looking at a new parttime retirement gig.
It uses all of my old skills proofreading, clarifying and factchecking AI-generated documents for companies wanting to make them look … well, less AI-ish.”
Then I smiled.
“Makes me wonder though. These days, who really is working for whom?”
Contact Aldridge at leonaldridge@gmail. com. Other columns are archived at leonaldridge.
com.
