Less than a week after Cisco Systems announced it would lay off 170 workers in Research Triangle Park, the site's top executive has left the company.

Cisco RTP Site Executive Joe Novak's departure on Aug. 15 was not a layoff but a personal decision to retire, the company said. Novak, who was also Cisco's vice president of services, had been with the company since it established a Triangle office in 1993.

The new site executive is Ed Paradise, Cisco's vice president of engineering. If Paradise's name sounds familiar, that's because he was also RTP site executive from 2003 to 2009.

Cisco could lose several hundred employees from its RTP site, which employed 4,900 earlier this summer. The RTP site is Cisco's largest in the U.S. after its San Jose headquarters.

Earlier this year Cisco implemented a voluntary buyout program and will lay off contractors this year as part of a worldwide move to cut 6,500 workers and trim $1 billion from annual operating expenses.

"The decision was mine, and a very difficult one because it involves leaving an extraordinary group of friends and colleagues, and a remarkable company with a very bright future ahead," Novak said in a Cisco release. "After leaving Cisco, I’ll be spending time with my family and taking some time off before I begin my next chapter in life."

Uncle Sam wants you. Just in case you are owed a pension.

The U.S. government is trying to locate 37,640 people who are owed pension benefits. Are you or a relative or friend on the list? You can check here. 

The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation is the federal agency that backs the payment of basic pension benefits for more than 44 million American workers.

When a company's pension plan is transferred to the agency,  sometimes the company can't locate everyone in the plan.

There are 715 missing beneficiaries from North Carolina companies - from Alamac Knit Fabrics to Collins & Aikman to Cone Mills to White of Mebane. 

Note that applies only to "defined benefit" plans - the traditional pension which promises to pay a specific monthly amount to workers when they retire. This doesn't include 401-K or profit-sharing plans. 

The Chapel Hill Police Department may have a new chief by the end of the month.
Assistant Police Chief Chris Blue, who was the second-highest ranked applicant for the job in 2007, is going through an assessment process for the job.
Current chief Brian Curran plans to retire next month. Curran has been chief since 2007. He hadn't applied for the job but was chosen after former Fayetteville Police Chief Tom McCarthy failed a physical with high blood pressure.
“A rigorous set of experiences and expectations has been established to assess Assistant Chief Blue’s skills in real time with real issues,” Town Manager Roger Stancil said.
Stancil informed the Town Council in June 2010 that he believed the best way to continue this momentum of progress in the department was to first consider internal candidates for the chief’s position. Internal candidates eligible to apply for the position were three captains and the two assistant chiefs. Blue was the only one to apply.
The town is assessing Blue based on criteria developed through community input sessions.

IBM CEO Sam Palmisano said today that it isn't "cast in stone" that he'll step down at age 60.

Palmisano, who turns 60 next year, was asked at the Wall Street Journal's Viewpoints Executive Breakfast Series in New York whether he plans to step down.

"There's no formal policy," Palmisano said, according to Bloomberg News.  He later added, "I'm not going anywhere."

Despite layoffs in recent years, IBM has an estimated 10,000 employees in Research Triangle Park. The company announced in July it would add 600 jobs at its RTP campus by opening a center to provide services to mortgage lenders.

Three of IBM's past four CEOs have stepped down at 60. Palmisano has led IBM since 2002.

Former Canes defenseman Aaron Ward, a veteran of more than 13 NHL seasons and a three-time Stanley Cup winner, announced his retirement from the NHL today through the NHL Players Association.
 
Ward underwent a third surgery on his knee after last season, and it was recently determined that he would not be ready for the start of the 2010-11 campaign. Ward played for the Canes until being sent to the Anaheim Ducks on the trade deadline.
 
“I’m very proud to have played for as long as I did in the NHL, with and against the best players in the game,” Ward said in the NHLPA release.

Duke University has posted some information related to its just-announced plan to offer retirement incentives in the hopes of persuading up to 700 employees to retire.

Here's the link.

Hard upon Business Week's recognition of Durham's downtown as a "great buying opportunity," Black Enterprise magazine has ranked the Bull City No. 1 on its first-ever list of "20 Best Places to Retire."