When you retire, how will you measure the success of your professional career?

I will measure success by being able to afford to retire. The artifacts of my career do not matter, as I'm sure those who follow will improve upon them.

Forget it, I'm not going to retire, I'm just going to drop dead in my tracks. As long as I can have as much fun as I'm having now, and know that a few people out there are getting more out of their careers because of the work I've done, I'm happy. Here's the big three for me:

First, that the methodology and some of the concepts I developed continue to have an impact even after I'm "away from the phone" as Dave Brock says;

Second, that the company I founded continues to prosper after I've left active duty; and

Third, that more people continue enter the sales profession and get lots of pleasure and satisfaction out of their sales careers for a long time to come, because of the work I've done.

Oh, and my grandchildren continue to think I'm the funniest grandmother who ever walked down the street.

For me, at least, that question is not as relevant as it was 20 years ago. For many, the division between work and personal is gray or non-existent. So it becomes a question of how will you measure the success of your life. Now THAT is a good question.

(Personal) By how many friends (real) I have and how happy I have been able to make the people around me....because that is what makes me happy.

(Professional) Happiness! with a very small slice of pride...I know, I know but I want to feel proud of what I (WE) was able to accomplish with a lot of help from the team that believed in a collective goal. And the impact we had on peoples lives. How many people did we make healthier, happier, safer....that is the reason I started this business.

I'm with Paul and Alan. To sum it up, the question I will ask myself is "Did I make a difference?" That applies to both my personal and professional lives. And that is a question I will continue to ask myself as I now near my third retirement. A big part of that test will be how others answer that question when asked about me.

For me, money paid the bills, but it wasn't the driving force (other than I didn't want to starve to death). I found that if I did the work right, the money followed. That has been important to me in maintaining a balance in my life.

I'm with the others - retirement is a last-century paradigm. Traditional retirement is the fisst step on a very slippery slope.

And, the measure of whatever success is doesn't come at the end; it is - or should be - baked into everything one does every day.

How you are seen at the end of a career is far less important than how you are perceived in the here-and-now - by family friends, associates, and clients.

Guys, do you think that our different generations see retirement differently? I know that the gray-hairs among us see retirement very differently from the generations that preceded us. What about the Gen-Xers and Millenials out there?

Ellen, I'll answer that for you. I'm not planning on retiring either. My dad 'retired' to leave his diplomatic career and went into helping NGOs (in Burma/Myanmar). I'm planning to do the same, using my skills to help the community -- why retire when there's so much to do around the world?