The FIRM Guide

The Work History Module

One entry per employer or professional activity with legal, financial, or benefit relevance — benefits, vesting, credentials, and survivor obligations that outlive employment.

Where this Module fits

A-05 Module 5 of 8 in the At-Home area — step 2 of 4 on the dependency ladder (System → At-Home → Financial → Estate).

Benefits and credentials that outlive the job — pensions may wait at more than one former employer.

Adds to The Secure Guide: One entry per benefit-relevant employer — vesting, credentials, records, heir notes.

Adds to The Family Guide: Where records live and who to call for survivor benefits.

Every Module adds one section to each guide — that is how the two guides assemble as you work. See what you're building.

Download Text File Nothing is entered on this page — you fill the template in privately.

Text file — the flexible one. Use it as-is, paste it into a spreadsheet, open it in any editor, or paste it into an AI tool to reshape the blank form to fit your family: rename a field, add a row, drop one you don't need.

Print / PDF — the ready-to-use one. Print it and fill it in by hand, or choose Save as PDF and complete it in your own offline PDF app. Either way it stays with you — the finished Secure Guide template goes inside your Vault.

One rule: only ever give an AI tool the blank template. Never paste your real information — passwords, account numbers, anything you'd keep secret — into an AI tool, an online service, or anywhere outside your own Vault. Customizing an empty form is fine; filling it in happens privately, offline. That's the same rule this site follows: nothing sensitive ever leaves your hands.

Secure Guide Starter Template — Work History

One Secure Guide entry per person, per employer or professional activity — every job, practice, board seat, or self-employment arrangement with legal, financial, or benefit relevance gets its own entry. Store this inside your Vault; update at job changes and the annual benefits review. Education entries follow the same shape.

This record is more than a resume — it is how your family claims what you earned. A pension can hide behind two acquisitions and a changed plan administrator; a career across five employers can leave small vested benefits waiting at several of them. Document the trail while you can still walk it from memory. Three purposes, in order: claim the benefits you've earned, make survivor benefits findable for your family, and preserve the professional story — what you did, what you're proud of — for the generations who will ask. And write down the negatives too: “No military service,” “no ongoing obligations” — N/A is an answer that spares your family a search.

Organization and role (e.g., "Logistics company — Operations Manager"; "Self-Employed — Consulting").
Month/year is plenty — and note employer name changes from mergers or acquisitions; the pension trail follows the paper, not the sign on the building.
Pension, 401(k), life insurance, retiree health — with the plan administrator's name and contact, and the HR person who actually helped you. Account credentials go in your password manager.
Fully vested / partial / forfeited, with dates. “60% vested — small monthly payment starting at 65” is exactly the sentence heirs need.
Licenses and certifications — issuing body, renewal cycle, and the closure procedure: an active license left open can keep billing renewal fees or carry liability indefinitely.
Where contracts, benefit statements, settlement documents, and service records live — DD-214 for military, SF-50s for federal service; physical copy plus a scan.
Survivor-benefit eligibility, union contacts, claims procedures, obligations that outlive employment — and the reliefs: “clients should be notified; no ongoing deliverables.”
Annual — salary changes, vesting milestones, and new benefit statements land here.

Education: same shape, one entry per institution or program. Heirs may need credentials verified — for professional licensing, employment claims, or survivor education benefits — long after the school stops answering informal requests.

School, degree or certification, dates attended, honors worth remembering.
Transcript and diploma locations (original + scan), and the verification service or registrar an employer or licensing board would use.
If one exists and still matters — reference its Identities entry rather than re-entering it.
Work History; secure-guide; family-guide; At-Home

Family Guide Starter Template — Work History

This template contains no sensitive information. It can be stored with household documents.

In the matching Secure Guide section: one entry per benefit-relevant employer — vesting, credentials, records, heir notes.

That detail is what makes recovery possible — and it is protected in the Vault, which opens with The Vault Key. The key is never written here, by design. The people listed on this page know how it is kept, and the steward's job is to keep that path current, so this page never leads to a locked door.

Useful on its own, no secrets: who works where now (employer, role, roughly since when), the past employers that still matter (a pension or benefit waiting there), degrees and credentials held. The shape of the family's working life in a few plain sentences.
The Work History section of The Secure Guide (per-employer entries: benefits, vesting, plan administrators); original documents in the fireproof safe.
The moments this page matters: a JOB CHANGE (some benefits cancel at departure — re-shop before leaving); a SERIOUS ILLNESS OR DEATH (the employer's HR or benefits office is a first-week call — group life insurance, pension survivor benefits, final pay, retiree health); a DISABILITY OR SOCIAL SECURITY claim (the work history itself is the evidence). Include the benefits phone numbers here — they are not secrets.
Steward + cadence (e.g., reviewed annually with the benefits statements).
For survivor benefits: the plan administrators listed in The Secure Guide, or the family's benefits consultant. Pensions may exist at more than one former employer — check the catalog before assuming anything lapsed.

Anything this page's reader should know that the sections above didn't ask for — the exceptions, the house quirks, the thing you would say out loud while handing this page over.

For more information on how to use these templates, see The Recoverable Family book.

Worked example — Frank's family

The same weeks that taught Frank about his father's email taught him about pensions: days spent tracing whether his father had one at an employer left thirty years earlier — the company acquired twice, the plan administrator changed — until a hired benefits consultant finally found the small monthly payment his mother was owed. Frank's own history: three employers over twenty years, a side consultancy, and a license with his name on it.

All details are fictional and illustrative. The assembled example guides live at the example Secure Guide and the example Family Guide.

Secure Guide — Frank's entry

Five entries in the At-Home folder of Frank's encrypted Secure Guide volume — three employers, the consultancy, and the education record:

Entry 1 — Current employer (logistics company)

Meridian Logistics — Operations Manager
2018 – present
401(k) with generous match · pension · life insurance at 2× salary · retiree health at 10 years of service. Benefits department 555-0158; HR contact Dana Whitfield ran his enrollment
Pension fully vested (5-year mark passed). Retiree health at 10 years — year 8 now, flagged for the 2028 review
—(the PE license predates this job; see Entry 2)
Offer letter, benefit elections, and annual statements — fire safe + scans in the Vault
Life insurance and pension survivor options elected at enrollment — the benefit summary in the fire safe is the claim's starting point
2026-01 — salary update recorded, vesting confirmed
Work History; secure-guide; family-guide; At-Home

Entry 2 — Distribution company (prior)

Harlan Distribution — Operations Engineer
2008 – 2018 (acquired by Stateline Supply Co. in 2021 — recorded so the paper trail survives the sign change)
Defined-benefit pension — administrator: Pinnacle Benefits Group, 555-0161
60% vested at departure — small monthly payment starting at 65. Benefit statement was missing: NEW STATEMENT REQUESTED 2026-02, now in the fire safe
PE license #38271 (state board) — personal, not employer-tied. Renewal every 2 years with CE credits; CE records in the Vault; formally CLOSE with the state board at death or the renewal fees never stop. Maintained through the professional association — see Subscriptions
Employment dates letter + the new pension statement — fire safe
This is the pension nobody would think to look for. It exists, it is real, and the administrator contact is one line up
2026-02
Work History; secure-guide; family-guide; At-Home

Entry 3 — Manufacturing firm (first job)

Beckett Manufacturing — Operations Analyst
2002 – 2008
Small 401(k), minimal match — ROLLED OVER at departure; now part of the current retirement account (see Financial Accounts). Nothing left waiting here
N/A — account closed by rollover
—
Workers' comp claim (minor injury, settled and closed) — dates, employer, and outcome documented in case it ever matters for medical or disability records
Nothing to claim — recorded so no one spends a week confirming that
2026-01
Work History; secure-guide; family-guide; At-Home

Entry 4 — Self-Employed: consulting

Self-Employed — operations consulting for small manufacturers
2018 – ongoing; 2–3 small projects a year
None — 1099 income (~$10–15k/yr), reported on Schedule C. No LLC, no formal structure (see the Entities Module for when side work becomes a business)
N/A
Works under the PE license — Entry 2
Client contracts in the At-Home folder; current client Brindle Tool & Die — contract filed 2026-03
If Frank is incapacitated or gone: notify the clients listed here that projects will not be completed. No ongoing obligations or deliverables — written down so nobody has to wonder
2026-03 — new client added
Work History; secure-guide; family-guide; At-Home

Education

Westvale State University — B.S., Industrial Engineering, 1998–2002 (Franklin A. Mercer)
Diploma original in the archival box (office closet); transcript + diploma scans in the Vault. Official verification: the Westvale State registrar
Dormant — noted in Identities as “abandoned — inaccessible,” nothing rides on it

One year in: Sarah has walked the survivor-benefits trail herself — where the summaries live, which administrators to call, what she'd be entitled to. The record Frank's mother never had is the one his own family now keeps current at every January review.

Family Guide — Frank's entry

This entry sits in the household reference binder. No salaries, no account numbers — where the history lives and who to call.

Dad: Meridian Logistics (operations manager, since 2018); before that Stateline Supply (was Harlan Distribution, 2008–2018 — a pension is still there) and Beckett Manufacturing (2002–2008). His engineering degree is from Westvale State; he keeps a PE license. Mom: her own design business since 2018; Brightline Design before that (an old 401(k) is still there). Side work: Dad's consulting practice, ongoing since 2018.
The Work History section of The Secure Guide (per-employer entries with the benefits and plan administrators); original documents in the fireproof safe.
Job change: some Meridian benefits CANCEL at departure — the group life especially; re-shop before leaving. Serious illness or a death: call Meridian benefits (555-0158) in the first week — group life, pension, final pay. The old pension: Pinnacle Benefits Group, 555-0161. Disability or Social Security claims: the work history in The Secure Guide is the evidence, already assembled.
Frank — reviewed every January alongside the benefit statements.
For survivor benefits: the plan administrators listed in The Secure Guide. Pensions exist at MORE THAN ONE former employer — check the catalog before assuming anything lapsed. Frank's PE license must be formally closed with the state board.

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