The An Post enterprise story.
Getting more value from experience.
The question isn't simply when people will retire. It's how An Post makes the most of their experience between now and whatever comes next.
Why this matters now
An Post is changing at the same rate as its workforce.
An Post has spent decades building the skills, knowledge and experience in its workforce. As people live and work for longer, there is an opportunity to think differently about how that experience is used, supported and passed on.
Parcels and e-commerce are growing, traditional mail is declining, and the roles and skills in the business continue to change.
For a workforce of this size, later-career decisions matter. An Post needs to know where experience sits, who wants to stay, where work styles may need to change, and the vastness of the knowledge that could be lost when people leave.
10,271 FTEs
reported by An Post in 2025
€1.05bn
revenue reported in 2025
8,000+ FTEs
in collection, sorting, distribution and local delivery
The opportunity
Better for people. Better for planning. Better for the business.
- ✳Keep experienced people contributing where it works for them and for An Post.
- ✳Help employees stay well and be able to do their jobs.
- ✳Change roles or working patterns where a better fit makes sense.
- ✳Pass knowledge and experience on before it leaves the business.
- ✳Plan earlier for retirement, succession and other changes.
This is the starting point for Futurythm: understand what is happening before deciding what needs to change.
The cost of drift. Don't drift, design.
Most organisations do not decide to lose valuable people and experience. It happens gradually. People stay in roles that may no longer suit them. Conversations about what comes next happen far too late. Knowledge leaves before it has been passed on. Workforce plans are made without a clear view of what experienced employees actually want to do.
Across a large workforce, those small gaps can add up.
What could that mean for An Post?
Futurythm has built an initial scenario to test the possible scale of the issue, using An Post's workforce size and established European research on work ability.
€29.7m
potential annual productivity and capacity exposure
450 FTEs
illustrative equivalent operational capacity
€5.9m–€11.8m
potential annual value if 20–40% of the modelled gap were addressed
These are not measured An Post losses. They are provisional figures based on external research and assumptions. They show why the issue is worth testing with An Post's own data.
The Work Ability Index
The Work Ability Index (WAI) is an established occupational-health measure of how well a person's physical and mental resources match the demands of their job. It gives us useful evidence on sustainable ability to work. It does not tell us whether someone is ready to retire, and it does not prove the financial figures above. For Futurythm, it is one input, not the whole story.
Reframe the question
Instead of asking “When will people leave?” we can start asking “What could they contribute next?”
The aim is not to keep everyone working for longer. Some people will want to retire. Others may want to stay, reduce their hours, move role, learn something new or use their experience differently. That changes the conversation from retirement planning to workforce planning — and gives An Post more time to make choices about roles, skills, succession and knowledge transfer.
From assumptions to An Post insight.
Find the mismatch. Decide what is worth changing.
Reflect
Before deciding on a solution, there are some basic questions An Post needs to answer:
- ✳Do we know what our experienced employees want from the next five to ten years?
- ✳Who would stay if their role, hours or working pattern changed?
- ✳Where are we at risk of losing important skills or knowledge?
- ✳Which roles are becoming harder to sustain across a longer working life?
- ✳Do our assumptions about older employees match what employees themselves are telling us?
- ✳Where is there a real business cost, and where is there an opportunity?
Respond
Futurythm brings together three sources of information to answer those questions.
People
Personal Pulse / 10 Personal Ps
What experienced employees want, how they feel about the years ahead and what would help them move confidently into what comes next.
Organisation
Professional Pulse / 10 Professional Ps
How ready An Post is for longer working lives, including role design, age inclusion, succession, knowledge transfer and transition planning.
Workforce data
What is actually happening
Age profile, absence, turnover, internal moves, skills, retirement patterns, overtime, cover costs and other relevant measures.
Together, these show where what people want, what An Post believes and what the workforce data shows are not the same. That is where the useful insight sits. Futurythm calls this Workforce Longevity Intelligence. It gives An Post a clearer basis for deciding where to act and where not to.
Then act where it matters
Find the problem or the opportunity before investing in the solution.
The response could be a change in working pattern, a different role, better health or work-ability support, skills development, knowledge transfer or earlier retirement planning. It will not be the same for every person or every part of the workforce.
The point is to find out where An Post has a problem or an opportunity before investing in the solution, and then measure what changes.