Last week, one of our longest-standing members of the team retired. Mike Smith was a veteran of the Sales Team (including a lengthy stint as Sales Manager), a familiar face to many an Astun client, and possessor of a dry sense of humour.
Mike’s last working day coincided with our most recent team meetup. There, he sneaked in a little practice for retirement by nodding off during a presentation. This was a typically brave move for Mike – the presenter in question is also the author of this blog!
It’s goodbye from him
Before finishing, Mike wanted to share a few words with the team and our customers:
“After 15 eventful years, the time has come for me to retire. I would like to thank everyone, both colleagues and customers, who have supported, challenged, and inspired me during this time, many of whom I consider friends. When I joined Astun, I was employee Number Six, and it was a very different place from the one it is today.
I have had some difficult personal times, both health and family, over this time, and I am very grateful for the support and understanding that Astun and Mike Saunt, in particular, have afforded me.
I will have no problem filling my time from now on. I still have my book to finish, and already have numerous “philatelic trips” planned for 2026, including standing for election in Macau and delivering a seminar in China in July. I have also received an invitation to display my collection at the Royal Palace in Monaco in December.
I am very pleased with my retirement presents, in particular the wristwatch. I will be sure to set the alarm for 10am every morning from now on.
I leave with pride in what we accomplished together and with warm wishes for continued success in the years ahead.”
And fond memories from us
During the gift-giving part of our meetup dinner, Mike Saunt was quick to thank Mike for his exceptional service and commitment to our customers. Over the years, there is very little Mike hasn’t been involved in, from managing new sales and renewals to calculating our carbon footprint and writing our G-Cloud submissions. Mike Saunt comments, “ We both know that although we’re totally different characters (lucky Mike) we’ll keep in contact. For me, he’s one of the Good ‘Uns out there and will be sorely missed.”
A colleague who wants to remain anonymous for reasons which will soon become apparent adds his thoughts,
“Mike was great when I joined Astun around 14 years ago. He helped me settle in and introduced me to customers and all things Astun. I think our first road trip was to see Carole in Mendip. More visits followed to install and configure iShare (on-premise!) and provide face-to-face training. We worked well together where sales and support overlapped (working on customer issues, managing subscriptions, and customer performance reports). It has been great working with Mike: he is pragmatic, straight-talking, a good sounding board and, more often than not, we ‘got things sorted’. We have had good laughs at Astun gatherings over the years too, I’m going to ‘miss’ his ‘shining wit’.
Over the years It’s been interesting having football related conversations with Mike, especially when Chelsea were good. I guess it’s a shame their three ‘Golden Eras’ are a distant memory (I believe their greatest ever era passed in 2015, quite some time ago). You can now reliably plot their steady decline using the latest AI modeling methods. It looks like the Championship beckons within the next 5 to 7 seasons as the ‘big club rot’ fully takes grip and they continue their current downward trajectory. Best of luck to Chelsea. We are all going to miss Mike and wish him the best for his retirement!”
Having opted to work part-time since January 2021, Mike’s had plenty of opportunity to start easing into retirement. We hope that the transition goes smoothly and look forward to hearing how he’s getting on in due course.
