Besides wealth and fame, NFL great Tom Brady and Starbucks co-founder Howard Schultz have something else in common: They are both becoming ‘boomerang employees” by returning to their old jobs.
Tom Brady may have been feted as the NFL’s greatest of all time when he announced his retirement a little more than a month ago. But that didn’t stop him from deciding he was having more fun on the gridiron than off.
Schultz, meanwhile, slides back into the CEO role where he’s been twice before, hinting at brewing up some big changes while a new, permanent chief executive is sought.
They are among the most prominent would-be retirees who would rather toil in familiar jobs rather than idle away their days.
The idea of going back on the job as a boomerang employee is becoming easier to accept as COVID-19, at least for the moment, is in retreat, making it safer to return to workplaces.
LinkedIn, the job search and networking website, found that 4.5% of newly hired employees among the companies on its site were returning workers in 2021, up from 3.9% in 2019.
“It’s always easier to go back to somewhere where you were comfortable,” said Michelle Reisdorf, a senior regional director for recruiting firm Robert Half. “It’s such an easy transition back into the workplace.”
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Back to what’s familiar
For freshly minted retirees, those who decide to go back to work reflects a rebound from The Great Resignation, the name given to the phenomenon of large numbers employees ditching their jobs during the pandemic. They could quit knowing that with the latest unemployment rate standing at a mere 3.8% last month, employers remain anxious to fill empty positions and there are still plenty of opportunities to go around.
He certainly doesn’t need a job, but Schultz will be hoping his third time back as Starbucks’ CEO is a charm. He was CEO from 1987 to 2000, then returned in 2008 and stayed in the role until 2017. He tested the waters for a possible presidential run in 2020.
Starbucks had 11 stores when he began. Today, it has 28,000.
This time, Schultz is stepping in temporarily upon the retirement of CEO Kevin Johnson and will work for $1 a year. But Schultz indicates that he won’t just be warming the chair. Rather, he’s already sounding like a change agent.
“Although I did not plan to return to Starbucks, I know the company must transform once again to meet a new and exciting future where all of our stakeholders mutually flourish,” the company quoted Schultz, 68, as saying in making the announcement.
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‘My place is still on the field’
Like many boomerang employees, Brady paints his return as a labor of love, returning to the workplace that he cares about the most.
“These past two months I’ve realized my place is still on the field and not in the stands. That time will come. But it’s not now,” he tweeted in making his announcement.
He’s reveled in so much glory over 22 NFL seasons that there’s not much more he could do to burnish his legacy. Brady won the Super Bowl seven times, was the Super Bowl MVP five times in addition to being named MVP for the regular season three times.
Yet forestalling retirement or returning isn’t a particularly new phenomenon in sports. As Mike Jones in USA TODAY Sports recently pointed out, Brady joins a list that includes Michael Jordan, Brett Favre, George Foreman, Michael Phelps, Roger Clemens, Mario Lemieux and Floyd Mayweather, to name a few.
It’s much the same for some other CEOs in the business world. Steve Jobs returned to Apple, taking the company to new heights, and Jack Dorsey boomeranged as CEO of Twitter. (Then departed the post again in November.)
Michael Bloomberg came back as CEO at Bloomberg and Michael Dell at Dell Technologies, as noted in a list compiled by Inc.
Apparently there’s an extra incentive to retake your place when the company bears your name.
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