Can you imagine what it must have been like to be on the receiving end of early vaccinations for a deadly disease such as small pox? Back then, techniques for inoculating people were inconsistent to say the least. In many cases, people did what was called “buying the pox” where they would exchange money or small gifts for some scabs or pus that they could use to fight against it.
Some individuals just rubbed the scabs on their own skin, others rubbed the virus on wool and wore it around their wrist or neck, and some even had their children wear smallpox-infected clothes. Later on, it became more common to puncture the skin with a needle, yet the procedure was still done "arm to arm" with the infected person close by.
The whole idea of being immunized in one or more of these ways may appear downright frightening, but the reality is, the process of introducing something negative into the body in order to teach it to fight against it saved thousands, if not millions of lives.
Today, with more and more people reaching retirement age than ever before, advisors need to start infecting clients with small doses of reality about what retirement is actually going to be like. We have to stop selling retirement as a utopian phase of life where everything is great as long as they save enough money and have the right asset allocation.
Clients need to understand and be prepared to fight off things like boredom, isolation, depression, addiction, loss of purpose, divorce, overspending and more. They need to be encouraged and coached to develop a plan to replace their work identity, fill their time, stay relevant and connected, as well as keep mentally and physically sharp or risk wasting years trying to figure it out, repairing damage in their relationships, health and more.
Of course, the trick is finding the right balance of information. As you might expect, the success of early vaccinations was dependent on the skill of the administrator. Often, for various reasons the vaccine either "did not take" and had to be repeated or the patient fell ill with a full-blown case of smallpox. Therefore, the tools and resources that advisors use to inoculate clients must be strong enough for them to take action, but not too strong so that they unnecessarily delay retirement.
Advisors can start this inoculation process by helping clients think more carefully, deeply and creatively about how they will manage their transition. One way to accomplish this is to introduce a new series of questions that help clients see retirement in a new light and ultimately cause them to say, “I never thought about that.”
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Do you know anyone who failed at retirement or who isn’t doing well with it? What was the root cause?
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What are you going to do if retirement turns out to be something different than you expect?
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What if the volunteering you’ve always dreamt of doing isn’t fulfilling?