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The Art of The Farewell Email
With so many people losing their jobs, the farewell email, letting colleagues and contacts know where you are moving and how you can be reached, has become common. Writing a really good one, whether it be funny, sad or just plain mad is an art form. Chris Kula, a receptionist at a New York engineering firm, wrote: "For nearly as long as I've worked here, I've hoped that I might one day leave this company. And now that this dream has become a reality, please know that I could not have reached this goal without your unending lack of support." In May, lawyer Shinyung Oh was let go from the San Francisco branch of the Paul Hastings law firm six days after losing a baby. "If this response seems particularly emotional," she wrote to the partners, "perhaps an associate's emotional vulnerability after a recent miscarriage is a factor you should consider the next time you fire or lay someone off. It shows startlingly poor judgment and management skills — and cowardice — on your parts." Let's hear the best and worst goodbye emails you've seen.
I worked in a company once with a guy who was known for sending out long, rambling emails and overwriting everything he got his hands on. I was constantly trying to get him to edit himself better on fact sheets and the like. Well, he gets laid off and his final email (sent to everyone in the office) read simply "Fuck all of you! I'm outta here." I was so proud he had finally learned the power of brevity.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
"So long and thanks for all the fish!"
Which is why we should all endeavor to display a complete lack of 'unprofessionalism.'
The funniest "goodbye" email I saw occurred about 10 years ago. A guy down the hall from me was responding to a personal ad--probably in a "casual encounters" section. He gave, shall we say, a very elaborate physical description of himself. He also went into details about his various fetishes and sexual proclivities, as well as some choice moments from his sexual history. He also described exactly what he hoped to do with the person he was writing to, complete with various sexual acts and positions.
Unfortunately, when he clicked send, the mailer garbled the "to" line in such a way that it went to the company-wide email list. (The company-wide email alias was "world"--the email address he was sending to had "world" in it, and I assume he had accidentally put a space the middle of the email address, causing it to be mis-parsed.)
When the email hit everyone's inbox, there was a moment of silence on the whole floor, followed by phrases like "holy shit" and laughter. The last anyone saw of him was him ducking and half-running down the hallway with his backpack. He apparently thought he'd never be able to live it down, called HR later in the day to resign, and never showed up at the office again.
Russ Pitts tells TechTV that he "couldn't care less if the building spontaneously filled with eagle semen"...
'a';DROP TABLE users; SELECT * FROM DATA WHERE name LIKE '%'... if you're reading this, it didn't work.
When I was given the news, I was able to tell the head of the department:
"Good luck with your layoffs, alright, I hope your firings go really, really well."
Others weren't so glib, but then others hadn't already planned to quit and secured a 40% raise elsewhere. For me, the severence was a bonus.
There was this guy Andy H. who was laid off. He got his pink slip and sent out a looong 2-page email about who he hated and who he hated more... An hour later, his manager (who had not read his goodbye mail) came running out of his room saying, "Hey so sorry for the mistake, the OTHER Andy H. is the one getting the boot, you're still staying with us". Moral of the story - don't blow your mouth, be professional and courteous. Unless you're absolutely sure you're kicked out the door, and then you can say "fsck y'all, I'm outta here!!"
nobody remains virgin, life fscks everyone...
I know a guy who was laid off and actually heard that he was laid off from the press.
...
I'll see your "laid off from the press" and raise you a "new Chairman of the Board at the meeting".
The government agency I work in has a Board composed of 3 appointed members. The year after I started, the then Chairman of the Board was at the first meeting of the year and, from what I heard, the opening discussions went something like this:
We'd like to welcome the new Chairman of the Board,
Not an auspicious, or professional, way to introduce the new Chairman.
We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security. -- Dwight D. Eisenhower
When the manager entered one of our guys came forward and asked him for a kiss.
Upon the managers indignant reply "Why would I kiss you?" our Hero explained he liked to kiss while being screwed.
"The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
I thought that was pretty clever for a farewell done in good humor.
We're a close group at work, and all get along pretty well and like working there, but people do move on from time to time. About a year ago, a friend sent a company-wide email with the topic "Out of Office", which is usually used if someone's emailing in sick or going on vacation. Took about an hour before someone actually read the email and saw that he would be out... permanently.
Now everyone reads all the vacation emails carefully, just in case.
The email has become tradition, with every subsequent departure using the same message, verbatim, changing only one thing... the first email said that he hoped the people at his new job would be half as cool; the next said one fourth, then one eighth, etc.
-- I prefer the term "karma escort."
Not just geeks... Years ago I went into a tiny office to set up Internet Connection Sharing for their two machines. When I started one of the machines, it threw up about a dozen "missing system file" errors before finally booting. When I asked about it, they very nonchalantly replied, "Yeah, it does that. The secretary deleted a bunch of files after she was fired last month."
Though, to be fair, I think that sort of thing should be saved until retirement.
http://i155.photobucket.com/albums/s300/sjclark1967/FarSideLoneRanger.jpg
That which does not kill us makes us... st
To be fair.. ...even when the person/company on the receiving end deserves a kick in the arse.
Professionalism is acting with grace and civility...
SO when the boss tells you to unclog the toilet in the bathroom you reply:
"No problem sir. Would you prefer I use a plunger or the toilet brush as I am updating my resume and want a good list of what technologies I use in my work?"
And the grease on the top of the stair well was just coincidence too. Or was it the clothes hanger taped to the front of her chair.
On April 1st a few years ago, my boss and I put together a mass email saying that another member of my team was leaving the company. My boss sent it out to lend it credibility.
My teammate is Italian both in looks and in name. We stated in the email that he was leaving the company to go work for his "family business",etc.etc. and that no one should make inquiries about it since the family was tight-knit and considered their business very personal, etc.etc. could be dangerous,etc.etc.
Thankfully he had a good laugh about it, but he did admit that he had some relatives in Jersey that wouldn't have found it funny.
We didn't make him the butt of any jokes after that.
$7.95/mo, 200 GB disk, 2TBxfer, MySQL, PHP, RoR.
The Three Envelopes.
IT manager starts a new position.
All goes well for a few weeks, then something big breaks. Lots of pressure. Rooting around in his desk, he finds 3 envelopes. The first is labeled "Open at the First Crisis". On a whim, he opens it and the note inside reads "Blame it on your Predecessor". He decides to take this advice and to his surprise, it works like a charm, management is satisfied, he is given time to fix things.
A few months go by and a something much bigger breaks, seriously disrupting operations. He is in trouble. At his desk, he decides to open the envelope labeled: "Open at the Second Crisis". He'd been saving it for something big, and this is it. The note inside says: "Form a Committee to Study the Issue". He does just that and, to his surprise, it works great. The committee wastes time and accomplishes nothing, but blame is diffused.
A few years go by. The third and final envelope is labeled: "Open at the Third Crisis". He thinks about opening it many times, but he waits, saving it for a real disaster. One day, it comes. Catastrophic failure. He takes a deep breath, tears the envelope open and inside, finds a note that reads: "Prepare Three Envelopes".
(I liked this story so much that I left a set of envelopes behind at one job.)
Ok so my pay goes down so you can keep these 4 worthless guys. I'm going to only do half the work I did before.
Correction... make that five worthless guys.
It doesn't hurt to be nice.
A few years ago I worked for a college at NCSU that hired me to redo their website. Interestingly enough another group at the college did the same and we were told to work together. This guy claimed to have years of experience in designing sites and print media... but couldn't even tell you the basic HTML tags for a webpage.
Long story short, I was fired for not working well with him but hired almost 2 weeks later for more pay at a better job, better office, and all around better situation.
He on the hand, failed to bring their site online, convinced them to implement a CRM that he could manage, deleted the ENTER site (15,000+ pages) not once, not twice but three times.
Applied styles around my SQL code and claimed that I didn't know what I was doing... but the best part...
*Drum roll please*
The person they hired to replace me (wtf did they hire someone to replace me if he was so great)... quit three weeks ago with NO notice with the reason...
"I can't take Tom anymore".
I found this out when that college sent out major SOS requests to any developers who could help them fix their site. Tom had deleted it again...
God I love my life.
Sadly it's too late for your mother to heed your advice.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
When I was laid off in January(no worries new position starts soon), the company immediately made me log out of my machine. They didn't even want me to save the code I had worked on all day, they simple walked me to the machine and said log off. They then informed me my account password was already changed and I wouldn't be getting back in. After this, they said take 5 minutes to pack up and say goodbye to a few people and get out.
On my way out they informed me that they really regretted losing me because I was a good employee, but they had to make cuts. I said I understood.
I never got to send that farewell e-mail, but the joke is really on them. The lay-offs came out of the blue, and I had been working on major updates to the database all day. No one knew this as I was the sole developer. I was going to change the code to reflect the DB changes the next day, but I never got to. If they don't find my backups the code base will never work....
We had a salesman do this after the sales manager told him he was about to get canned before I had been given notice to disable his accounts. He knew the sales manager's password to our CRM application, logged on as him, and attempted to delete every account in the system. Then he switched to the shared file storage and started deleting every file he could get his hands on. That's when my boss called me and we shut down his workstation remotely. Then he started attacking us with a metal yardstick. The receptionist called 911 and the police showed up. He said he wasn't going back to jail and tried to attack the officers, at which point they tazered the hell out of him. Funniest thing I ever saw. We pressed charges for destroying data and assault/battery, and he plead guilty. I forgot what he was sentenced to, but last I heard he was out of jail but still unemployed four years later. Word got around pretty quickly and nobody would have anything to do with him. This is a relatively small town, so I don't understand why anyone would be so stupid as to do something like that.
We ended up needing one all-nighter to recover. Most of it was spend figuring out what exactly he had actually deleted, as lack of permissions had prevented most of it. In any event, I didn't mind, the sight of him doing the tazer dance in front of everyone was totally worth it. I won't advocate tazering people indiscriminately but he totally absolutely deserved it. You had to be there, it defies description how funny it was. He went from attacking people with a yardstick to quivering wreck on the floor in about as fast as you could say "quivering wreck on the floor".
I've left my job with one company by leaving all of my stuff in the server closet, a piece of paper with the passwords, and a note saying "Good Bye!" They bounced several pay checks, and delayed disbursing paychecks for several months beforehand.
The second time, I dumped my laptop and gear at the data center, and sent an email to the HR drone saying "I can't take this anymore. I'm gone effective now."
This one, we had 3 Canadian contractors who made my life hell, by making it impossible for me to do my work. not giving me access, and fucking with my passwords. They kept their shitty jobs, I got a new one.
After years and years of dedicated service a sysadmin is getting fired. He has one day to train his replacement. He says to the guy taking over his job "This is the only training I think you need. In the file cabinet there are 2 envelopes. The first time you get in trouble bad, open the envelope marked 1. If the crap hits the fan again, open the envelope marked 2. That should be all you need to know."
So months go by and the new guy does his job diligently, but as we all know sometimes things just go wrong. He gets in hot water and fears for his job. Luckily he remembers the envelopes in the cabinet. He grabs the envelope and it just has one slip of paper in it from the old Sysadmin. It reads: "Blame it all on me."
he does, and management buys it. He keeps his job.
Unfortunately later in his career things get bad agian and it looks like he's going to get fired. He remembers envelope number 2 is still in the cabinet. Excited, he get the envelope and tears it open. Another note is in the envelope from the old sysadmin.
It starts : " You will need 2 envelopes and some paper..."
Hmm, is that like a 90 degree angle? Or some other kind of angle...
(You aren't very bright, are you?)
"MIT betrayed all of its basic principles."
Dear *your company name here*;
I regret to inform you that your services as employer are no longer required. You position has been terminated effective *your last day at work*.
This decision was not arrived at lightly, and is in no way is a reflection on the performance of your duties as an employer.
Signed,
*your signature*
Date: *today's date*
Print the above out on pink paper, and sign it. Lay off your entire company :-)
Ian Ameline
I left a company about one and a half years ago to move to greener pastures (well to be precise, same global company, different country, but I did still technically quit the old job). I wrote a fairly standard and "nice" goodbye email to everyone and they threw me a nice farewell party.
However, what I found humorous was the emails I RECEIVED as I left. Some were nice ("been a pleasure working with you, blah blah"), a minority were nasty ("finally getting rid of you - fuck off and don't come back"), and some were just incredibly surprising (cute girl: "I'm so disappointed I never got to sleep with you!"... damn, had I only known earlier!).
The best thing though was a large banner that my co-workers printed. As I was the "resident uber-geek", they wanted to try and do something they thought I might appreciate. They used some kind of online tool to convert ASCII to binary, and printed a large poster that was SUPPOSED to say "01000111 01101111 01101111 01100100 01100010 01111001 01100101 00100000 01100001 01101110 01100100 00100000 01100111 01101111 01101111 01100100 00100000 01101100 01110101 01100011 01101011". Unfortunately, it got truncated somehow and ended up as "01000111 01101111 01101111 01100100 01100010 01111001 01100101 00100000 01100001 01101110 01100100 00100000 01100111 01101111". Now, they all sort of expected me to decode it in my head instantly, so were a little disappointed when I didn't... but, being the "geek", I did so (slowly, but surely) and about 20 seconds later started laughing... they couldn't figure out why, and so I did have to eventually explain it to them. I do still wonder if someone deliberately truncated it at that point (there were other geeks there after all), but I think it's more than likely just a humorous coincidence.
My book about LSD and Self-Discovery
Also on facebook as: DroppingAcidDaleBewan
I would rather not burn bridges - you never know if you may want to work at a company where a previous co-worker is employed at.
I agree somewhat. It all depends on the situation though. Some places need a response. You don't need to be nasty (for the very reasons you mention), but sometimes you do need to do something. If only to keep your sanity.
Last place I left was so bad I left without putting in a two week notice. Only time I've ever done that. Showed up late, walked around and personally told everyone I cared about goodbye. Handed my boss typed up instructions on my project and how to use it so the next guy won't be screwed. Gave him my passwords and all that.
Then loaded up my PC, turned on active desktop, set my desktop to Badger Badger Mushroom, and walked out.
BTW the place was a madhouse. This was entirely appropriate behavior. The HR lady who did my exit interview? She was terribly unhappy about my unprofessional exit and lectured me about the appropriate way to quit a job. But. Two months later she went out drinking margaritas at lunchtime with the CFO. And ...never came back. Neither of 'em.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
Looks like you've run into each other again!
when i quit mcdonalds....my farewell letter read..
"Dear Ronald,
Suck my McDick.
Rabble rabble rabble."
Oh absolutely! I greatly enjoyed detailing everything I've seen and heard while I was there. Threats, extortion, theft, espionage - all of it.
People would steal product off the lines and use it to bribe/payoff people outside the company for other services. The head of engineering would show up and park his car by the owner's car. Then sneak in back and take a company car back home. Show back up at 4:30 and check to see if everyone was at their desk. And if the owner would go looking for him, he had a patsy in our department that would call him at home and tell him to haul ass back to the office. Sales would rifle through our desks after hours to see what we were working on so they could take credit. We tested that once by making up a bogus project to see how far up the ladder it'd go. The engineering manager had people in his department work on his house for him, after reminding them that he was the final voice of approval for approving all vacation leave.
I could go on and on. And I did to HR - just before I left.
Oh yeah, one more thing I did on my PC. I had a poorly hidden folder named "private stuff". It had thousands of pictures of shovels in it. Thousands. Arranged by type and color and length.
With no explanation.
Just shovels.
That'll leave 'em guessing if they find it. Is it porn? Is it a hobby? Who collects shovels? Is it like Jack Nicholson in The Shining? A modern day internet equivalent of "all work and no play makes jack a dull boy"?
They'll be talking about me for years.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.