The Curriculum: Workplace Financial Education | Retireology

The Curriculum

Read the whole thing before you decide.

Most vendors ask you to take the content on faith. We'd rather you read it. The full participant workbook and the complete slide deck are below, open in your browser, start to finish. No form, no download, no sales call first.

Sessions, one hour each, or one four-hour block

Sections across the four parts

165

Slides, taught live, never read aloud

Tear-out cheat sheets employees keep

Start, Grow, Preserve

One framework. Four sessions. Everything hangs off it.

The academy is built on three stages, taught in order. Part I establishes the foundation and the three risks every retirement faces. Part II grows the balance. Parts III and IV preserve it and distribute it. Nothing is sold at any point.

Part One · Foundations

How to prepare for a 30-year retirement

What changed, why it matters, and what your plan has to deal with. Seven sections covering the three forces, the three risks, and the two things that decide whether a plan survives the unexpected.

1.1

The Retirement Landscape TodayPensions gone, longer lives, healthcare costs vertical. Why this retirement is not your parents' retirement.

1.2

The Three Risks Most Retirees FaceLongevity, sequence, inflation. Why no single portfolio beats all three, and what balancing them actually means.

1.3

The Start, Grow, Preserve FrameworkThree stages in order, and the compounding math that shows why the first dollar can matter more than every later dollar.

1.4

Where Are You Right Now?A nine-question self-assessment. Private, honest, and the baseline every later session refers back to.

1.5

Credit and LiquidityWhy a credit score still matters in retirement, and how many months of cash a working household, a pre-retiree, and a retiree each need.

1.6

Help Preserve Your PaycheckDisability coverage decoded. Own-occupation versus any-occupation, elimination periods, and why group coverage is thinner than most workers assume.

1.7

Foundations of Estate PlanningThe twelve-hour argument, the four tenets, and the five documents parents lose the right to act on the day a child turns eighteen.

Take-homeWrite down your three numbers. Have the 30-year conversation with your spouse. Pull your free credit report. Ask HR for the disability plan document, not the summary.

Part Two · Growing What You Save

Inside your 401(k) and beyond

Nine sections on the two levers that actually move a retirement balance, how to choose an allocation in plain English, and the most tax-advantaged account most participants ignore.

2.1

The Compounding EngineThree savers, three start dates, wildly different outcomes on the same monthly contribution.

2.2

The 1% LeverWhat one additional percentage point of savings rate compounds into across a career, and how auto-escalation does it for you.

2.3

Asset Allocation in Plain EnglishStocks, bonds, cash. What each does for you and what you give up. The 110-minus-age starting point.

2.4

Inside Your 401(k)Target-date funds and their two catches. Index versus active. Four building blocks. How to read a fund fact sheet in sixty seconds. Company stock concentration.

2.5

The Workplace Plan Family401(k), 403(b), 457(b), TSP, SIMPLE, SEP. Who offers each, current employee limits, and the features that differ.

2.6

Roth vs. TraditionalWhen each tends to win, how RMD treatment differs, what heirs receive, and why meaningful balances in both is the goal.

2.7

Dollar-Cost AveragingThe discipline most savers are already practicing through payroll without realizing it.

2.8

The HSAThe triple tax advantage, current contribution and HDHP limits, and how an HSA becomes a retirement account in disguise.

2.9

Life InsuranceTerm and permanent. Five permanent variants and their trade-offs. Which family fits which situation, and how to read an illustration.

Take-homeRun your own 1% lever. Audit your workplace plan and find five key numbers. Answer the hard question about your future tax bracket. Locate your life policy and read the guaranteed column.

Part Three · Preserving What You've Built

Social Security, Medicare, and the risks that wreck retirements

Six sections on the decisions that are hardest to reverse. This is the material employees most often say they have never had explained to them.

3.1

Social Security: Three Decisions, Not OneWhen you claim, how you coordinate as a household, and how it lands in your tax picture. Delay credits, spousal and survivor benefits.

3.2

Healthcare and MedicareAll four parts with current premiums. Medigap versus Advantage and why the choice is hard to reverse. IRMAA as a cliff. Enrollment timing. The bridge problem before 65.

3.3

Long-Term CareWhat triggers a claim, what care actually costs by type and geography, traditional versus hybrid policies, state partnership programs, and the truth about Medicaid spend-down.

3.4

Sequence-of-Returns RiskWhy two retirees with the same average return can end up in completely different places, and the three defenses against it.

3.5

Sample Allocations by AgeIllustrative starting points by decade, so attendees can compare their actual mix and understand why it differs.

3.6

Income Products: A Brief MapSix product categories named and explained, with the notable risk of each. Nothing recommended, nothing sold.

Take-homePull your Social Security statement. Map your healthcare bridge if you plan to retire before 65. Open the long-term care conversation with your family.

Part Four · Distribution & Legacy

Spending what you built. Leaving what's left.

Six sections on the mechanics almost nobody is taught: how much you can safely spend, which accounts to draw from first, and the documents every adult should have on file.

4.1

Withdrawal StrategiesThe 4% Rule, dynamic guardrails, and the bucket approach compared honestly. The right framework is the one you will actually follow.

4.2

Tax-Efficient Drawdown SequencingThree buckets and three tax treatments. Why conventional wisdom can backfire, what the tax valley is, and how a Roth conversion ladder works. The cliffs to watch.

4.3

RMDs and QCDsWhen they begin by birth year, how the amount is calculated, three operational rules most participants don't know, and the qualified charitable distribution.

4.4

Inherited IRAsThe ten-year drain, how the rules differ by who you are and what you inherited, and why front-loading beats waiting for year ten.

4.5

Insurance in RetirementA cross-reference back through the academy. Retirement doesn't change the products, it changes which ones you still need.

4.6

Estate Planning EssentialsWhat probate actually looks like. Will versus trust. The seven documents every adult should have. Why beneficiary forms override your will.

Take-homeMap your three buckets. Locate every estate document you have. Run a beneficiary audit tonight.

Read It Yourself

The workbook and the deck, open in your browser

Both open right here. Page through the whole thing. We publish them because the fastest way to answer "is this any good" is to let you read it.

Participant Workbook

Every attendee gets a printed copy

The workbook carries the detail the slides don't: worked examples, the self-assessment, the take-home exercises, and the four tear-out cheat sheets. It's the thing employees still have on their desk a year later.

Slide Deck · All Four Parts

What your people see on screen

All four parts, start to finish. The slides carry the frameworks, the comparisons, and the numbers. They are taught from, never read aloud, which is why sessions run to time and hold a room.

What Employees Leave With

Nobody leaves with a brochure

Four cheat sheets

One per part, designed to be torn out and taped inside a planner. The entire academy compresses to four pages.

Their three numbers

Total retirement balance, current savings rate, and Social Security at Full Retirement Age. Written down in session one and referenced in every session after.

A take-home list

Three or four concrete actions per session, with full instructions in the workbook. Most take under ten minutes each.

A Note on Standards

Compliance-reviewed before anything reaches your people

Every slide, worked example, and statistic is sourced and reviewed for compliance before delivery. Figures cited reflect current statutory amounts and are updated annually. Frameworks are illustrative and product-neutral throughout: no security, strategy, product, or firm is recommended anywhere in the curriculum.

The workshop is education. It is not individualized financial, legal, tax, or investment advice, and it is not a solicitation. Attendees are told this in plain language on the third slide of Part I.

Next Step

Now that you've read it, see if it fits your group.

Fifteen minutes, no presentation. If we are not right for your people, we will tell you on the call.

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