James McCormack had just turned 60 and had grown tired of the stress and strain of working 12-hour days, so, during the pandemic, he decided to retire. “I didn’t have plans to work again,” said McCormack, who worked for the Cruse bereavement charity for 28 years, latterly as director of finance.
But after enrolling on a ten-week professional cookery course — “it was a retirement present to myself” — he got the bug to work again. So, almost a year ago, he took a job as a commis chef at The Queen’s Head in Kingston upon Thames, southwest London. Now 62, McCormack works 15 to 20 hours a week in the pub, owned by the stock market-listed pubs group Fuller, Smith & Turner.
“The cash
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