Slashdot Mirror
Ask Slashdot: Is It Ever OK To Quit Without Giving Notice?
HughPickens.com writes: Employees and employers alike have the right under at-will employment laws in almost all states to end their relationship without notice, for any reason, but the two-week rule is a widely accepted standard of workplace conduct. However, Sue Shellenbarger writes at the WSJ that a growing number of workers are leaving without giving two weeks' notice. Some bosses blame young employees who feel frustrated by limited prospects or have little sense of attachment to their workplace. But employment experts say some older workers are quitting without notice as well. They feel overworked or unappreciated after years of laboring under pay cuts and expanded workloads imposed during the recession. One employee at Dupray, a customer-service rep, scheduled a meeting and announced she was quitting, then rose and headed for the exit. She seemed surprised when the director of human resources stopped her and explained that employees are expected to give two weeks' notice. "She said, 'I've been watching 'Suits,' and this is how it happens,'" referring to the TV drama set in a law firm.
According to Shellenbarger, quitting without notice is sometimes justified. Employees with access to proprietary information, such as those working in sales or new-product development, face a conflict of interest if they accept a job with a competitor. Employees in such cases typically depart right away -- ideally, by mutual agreement. It can also be best to exit quickly if an employer is abusive, or if you suspect your employer is doing something illegal. More often, quitting without notice "is done in the heat of emotion, by someone who is completely frustrated, angry, offended or upset," says David Lewis, president of OperationsInc., a Norwalk, Conn., human-resources consulting firm. That approach can burn bridges and generate bad references. Phyllis Hartman says employees have a responsibility to try to communicate about what's wrong. "Start figuring out if there is anything you can do to fix it. The worst that can happen is that nobody listens or they tell you no." What do you Slashdotters think about providing employers notice of departure? Has there ever been a circumstance that warranted quitting your job without any prior notice?
According to Shellenbarger, quitting without notice is sometimes justified. Employees with access to proprietary information, such as those working in sales or new-product development, face a conflict of interest if they accept a job with a competitor. Employees in such cases typically depart right away -- ideally, by mutual agreement. It can also be best to exit quickly if an employer is abusive, or if you suspect your employer is doing something illegal. More often, quitting without notice "is done in the heat of emotion, by someone who is completely frustrated, angry, offended or upset," says David Lewis, president of OperationsInc., a Norwalk, Conn., human-resources consulting firm. That approach can burn bridges and generate bad references. Phyllis Hartman says employees have a responsibility to try to communicate about what's wrong. "Start figuring out if there is anything you can do to fix it. The worst that can happen is that nobody listens or they tell you no." What do you Slashdotters think about providing employers notice of departure? Has there ever been a circumstance that warranted quitting your job without any prior notice?
A company cannot fight for right-to-work laws, then be upset when employees exercise their right to not work.
More data, damnit!
Show them as much loyalty as they will show you - i.e. zero.
That's the Cosmic Shame.
Employers LOVE at-will, when it's in their favor. But a lowly employee exercising that same right? Ohh nooo, you're just young and inexperienced.
If I'm an employee and I fuck up or do something that is grounds for termination... no employer in an at-will state is going to say "Okay, we're firing you, but we're going to let you keep working here for two more weeks while you look for a new job". No, you'll be out on your ass.
Well, if a company treats me in a way that I view as unacceptable, guess what.. I'm not giving you two more weeks of my life. The whole "employees are expected to give two weeks" bullshit is a such a double standard in many cases.
I will give you notice if you treat me in a way that deserves for notice to be given.
If this story leaves you a feeling of dejavu, don't worry, it's just Hugh Pickens cross-posting on /. and SN again to attract more traffic to his site
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
As a contractor, I have more than once had a manager come to me on friday afternoon and tell me, "Don't bother coming in Monday... or ever!" As such, when I was offered $25/hour more than I was currently working to start another contract, but I had to start right away, I didn't bother giving notice, and was informed "yeah, just leave your page and parking permit with the security guard on your way out." As far as I can tell, nobody cares about notice anymore.
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
I have like ten weeks vacay banked. I can give ten weeks notice and walk right out the door.
I will, of course, generously offer to consult hourly at 90% of the rate my boss charges clients for my time for the first three months.
You save only 59 seconds over 8 miles by going 75 instead of 65. Do you really have to pass that guy? Do the Math!
without any warning. The answer is IT ALWAYS OK TO QUIT without notice. Fuck'em and Feed'em fish heads.
Typically when a company lays off an employee (or a few employees) as part of a layoff, how much notice do they give?
Usually it's immediate and involves a security escort to HR.
I tried every decent and legal way I could think of to resolve the issue w/the business before I rented the chicken suit
I left a job and gave them two days notice because I saw the writing on the wall. They were hemorrhaging money and couldn't keep talent and I knew the job wouldn't last. I got another job in another city and they asked me to report the following week. This was on Wednesday. So I walked back inside, told them I Friday I was done. They scowled, scoffed, criticized and demonized me to the rest of the company. I even had to pay back a signing bonus I received due to a contract I signed. Didn't care. 10 days after I left the company, they folded - gave everyone pink slips and no severance. Loyalty doesn't mean anything, anywhere, anytime. Look out for yourself. Protect yourself. I gave a company I worked for previously a month's notice and they still complained I screwed them over ... so you can't win. Do what is best for you.
Does your workspace always give a two week notice for laid off employees? If not, why should employees bother when the situation is reversed?
On the same note, do you expect employees to invest major effort into protecting your confidential information? Better secure employees SSNs and other confidential information well and offer financial compensation if the system is hacked.
If you're not being mistreated, then don't be a jerk. *Especially* if your leaving without notice will screw over your co-workers, who plan to stay. If you have a good working relationship with your boss and co-workers, then jumping ship to greener pastures is not only acceptable, but even celebrated.
I know for a fact, that if someone in *my* group were to quit, it would totally fuck over for my vacation plans, and I would lose a LOT of money.
Your network is absolutely vital in today's job market. Screw over your employer, or worse, your fellow employees? They'll remember that. And they'll post about it on Facebook and LinkedIn.
But if this is because you're a daily ration of crap? And you're in a right-to-work state? AND you have no reason to expect you'll ever work with your fellow employees again, or your leaving won't hurt them?
Drop that bomb with pride.
[End Of Line]
Quitting without giving notice is rude. That's all, just rude.
If your employer has been reasonable and supported you with things you want (perhaps flexibility in hours, or training), then two weeks notice is only the polite thing to do.
If they've been extorting god-awful amounts of overtime from you, perhaps with the ever-present threat of being let go for no reason at all, then a little rudeness isn't out of place.
A thousand pounds of wood moving at 300 feet per minute. Don't get in the way.
There's no loyalty the other way, employers fought long and hard to make sure it works that way; why do you owe them anything?
Mostly random stuff.
A 2 day notice is always appropriate.
"I quit 2day"
Certainly. Pretty much any question framed that way yields a 'Yes' answer. I've walked out on abusive bosses. Most notable was as a single dad and the SOB said I should bring my two year old daughter in evenings and on Saturday because he'd made promises that couldn't be kept. That company destroyed two marriages I know of.
BUT, have backup money or you're an idiot (especially in my circumstance). If no money, make sure you're walking right into another job.
Same here. Every job I quit, I just stopped going. I saw that as the equivalent of them saying Friday at 445pm that you're done.
More to the point, a company can (and will) fire you w/o notice if they feel like it. Why should you not be able to 'fire' them in the same fashion?
Companies are sociopath entities that are only as good to you as they least friendly person to you in any position of power. They don't care anything about you or your well being. People within the company might, but the company does not, it exists to make money. You might owe people loyalty, but never a company.
HA! I just wasted some of your bandwidth with a frivolous sig!
It entirely depends on the kind of job it is and whether you need it on your resume. ... so you can use it on your resume to explain your employment history.
You can walk and use it on your resume.
In almost all cases, your previous employer is legally not allowed to say anything to prospective employers besides confirming whether or not you worked there.
It used to be that you'd want a good reference (they're legally allowed to provide or be a reference), but many employers have made it against their own rules to provide references, probably for fear of violating the aforementioned laws.
There can still be benefits to staying, but not all that much.
Seriously, if they don't boot you the moment you give notice, the two week "lame duck" phase can be the best part of your time working there. Spend a day finishing your leftover projects and writing some halfassed documentation, bullshit by the watercooler 7 hours a day for 8 more, and turn in your work on day 10. The next guy can deal with any do-overs needed.
And if you hate your job due to your immediate boss but don't have another one lined up, never quit! Turn it into a job you like until they fire you. Do the projects you like and completely ignore the ones you don't like. Boss complains about 1 hour lunches? Take a 2 hour lunch instead. If you work for a large enough company there's enough red tape and "protocol" to keep you employed for at least a month while you do whatever the fuck you want. Bonus, if you play by the rules they won't even be able to fire you "with cause".
The man who told me this secret managed to "work" a full extra year while giving 0 fucks at a job he would have hated, had he cared.
I have personally worked at firms that felt it was OK to lay people off without two-weeks' notice (and without severance pay). So, yeah, I think it's ok. Have I ever done it? No. Would I ever have done it? It would take some pretty extreme circumstances, since I'm a firm believer in not burning bridges (unnecessarily). However, at this point, I'm 63 and self-employed, so it's not likely to come up again in my own life. :-)
Bruce F. Webster (brucefwebster.com)
Given the acceptance of terminating and laying off employees without notice; why exactly would you expect them to be more courteous to you?
I can laid off without notice. Others are laid off without notice.
This is true, but there is generally two weeks pay (or similar) in lieu of notice. Various state employment laws cover the situation to varying degrees.
I think as a general rule, there's no point or advantage in burning bridges or maximizing bad feeling. But that's just a general rule and specific situations, such as being told to do something illegal or unethical, being seriously harassed or mistreated, etc., would call for an exception and probably follow-up with legal action.
The question posed is "Has there ever been a circumstance that warranted quitting your job without any prior notice?"
Of course such situations arise. Giving notice should be the default, out of respect for co-workers who may have to juggle their tasks and schedules if you leave and ideally out of a respect for your employer. But if you work in an abusive workplace and have no ability to change that, then leaving immediately is often justified by the way you are being treated or by the way your employer is treating others.
Whether it is legally advisable, financially plausible, will hurt your career to leave, or will leave good co-workers in the lurch if you leave are all other questions that will influence the decision of whether to actually do it.
Real lawyers write in C++
but my employer demanded 4 weeks. I had to leave because I had discovered that they weren't paying my super, or any of the other employees, which was illegal on its own, but they were also engaged in a phoenix scam to avoid liability on back paying the super. So, in the end I lost all of my annual leave, didn't get paid for the last month of employment, even though my employer was the one who had broken contract by not paying super. This is the tale of another business that caught fire and burnt to the ground the moment I left, though, so I can't be too bitter. The life lesson I've learnt is if you are a bit of a bastard, you can literally double your yearly wage with a tactical-quit operation.
Q: Why is starting a comment in the Subject: field incredibly irritating?
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
If the employee is so angry or annoyed that they are willing to leave without notice, it is probably best that they are just allowed to leave.
Do you really want a disgruntled employee, serving your customers, maintaining your IT system, managing your finances, ... for two weeks?
It maybe in the contract but it makes no sense to force someone to stay unless they are very closely supervised.
Leave without notice and start working the next day at your new job:
Result: Guaranteed no lost income
Leave with two weeks notice:
Result #1: Company fires you on the spot, walks you out and you lose two weeks of income
Result #2: Company keeps you on the payroll the two weeks, no loss of pay
All the risk is yours when you give two weeks notice, you give all the options to the company. When the shoe is on the other foot it is pretty much guaranteed that the company won't give you two weeks notice that they are going to let you go and few will pay you two weeks even though they'll walk you out right after telling you that you are fired.
My suggestion is spend a day or two putting together a transition folder, hand it in on the day you quit and wish them the best. Tell them that for security reasons you can't provide two weeks notice.
Well, it does depend a little on circumstances, and it's not without its consequences. You should generally avoid burning any bridges you don't have to, and it's not just the company's attitude to you that you need to worry about; other employees might remember you as that guy who up and left unexpectedly which made life difficult for everyone. Which can bite you in the arse a year or two down the line when they're a different company you're applying at and might have a say in hiring.
But if the company's treating you badly, or conditions are unnecessarily dangerous? You are justified in just leaving without notice, and such things are a secondary concern. And if things are bad enough, said hypothetical other employee may remember you as the guy who had the sense to just get out ASAP.
Phyllis Hartman says employees have a responsibility to try to communicate about what's wrong. "Start figuring out if there is anything you can do to fix it. The worst that can happen is that nobody listens or they tell you no."
No, that is not the worst that can happen by a longshot. The worse things will generally run afoul of workplace bullying laws, but that's small comfort.
The last day I showed up to work, I was thrown under the bus by the manager in front of our VP and the rest of the team for a lie to cover up the manager's incompetence. I went home, got up the next day, went to my doctor for a note to get the rest of the week off, and marched in on the following Monday to the reception desk with a letter of resignation and dropping off all of the company equipment. Didn't even talk to my manager, and didn't answer any of the manager's phone calls or e-mails, nor anyone else on the team after the day I got thrown under the bus. I, quite literally, disappeared.
Why did I quit like this, especially without another source of income or health care coverage? Because leaving a gaping hole with a giant question mark in my wake was the only bit of power I had left to send a message for all of the misrepresentation, incompetence, unreasonable expectations and malice of the team that I had experienced . My mental and physical health has improved substantially since quitting, and so has the relationship with my loved ones. That team was screwed either way, but royally so with some of their deadlines that I had left the gaping hole in their roster for. I would've loved to have worked for another part of the company and was more than qualified to do so, but corporate rules prevent changes in position for the first year, and I had no expectation of a good review despite having been a high performing employee at other companies.
In the end, these issues point directly to the utter contempt that technology employers have for their employees, particularly their low-to-mid-tier individual contributors. What else should they expect when they themselves give no notice to employees when they terminate them? What else should they expect when they treat their employees like trash, expect them to work startup hours while receiving established company pay and bonuses, change job descriptions at a whim, and don't have the decency to form any kind of coherent team environment or structure?
The real message to HR departments and upper management on this phenomenon is this: if employees are quitting without notice more frequently, your problem is with your current corporate structure, management, and business, not with the employee that quits without notice, and you ignore this problem at your own peril.
In the workplace of today, when employers ditch people in favor of cheaper offshore replacement, or downsize you out of a job with no notice, or the myriad of other crap employers pull, I think quitting with no notice is perfectly acceptable. That road goes both ways after all, if employers treat their employees like disposable commodities, we the employees can and should do the exact same thing.
That's how I feel at least. My current employer has treated me well, and seems to treat others well, too. So I'd probably be respectful and give notice. But I think if I worked for a company treating people poorly, I would feel no obligation to be courteous about leaving them.
I was working for a major defense contractor. Fortune 500 (probably Fortune 100).
Manager came in and told me that over his objections, I was being transferred to the Project From Hell. Before I even had a chance to think, the first words out of my mouth were, "I quit!". And my immediate reaction after that was "Oh my G-d... what the hell have I just done?"
Lucky for me, I was fairly senior, and the two other guys who were supposed to go to said project (who were senior to me) had identical reactions.
The three of us wound up in a meeting with the division's VP of Engineering. We didn't quit, we didn't have to transfer, and (fortunately), our careers weren't ruined (probably because the PfH had a reputation throughout the division).
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
Many corps have a blanket policy against professional references. I've had a real problem with Hewlett Packard Enterprise in this regard; their HR says are OK with "personal references" but "advise against giving professional references". This is HR speak for "you can't give professional references". I had one company tell me they required professional references from a manager from a position in the last three years; which was impossible since HPE was my only employer for those three years.
Even more hypocritical is that HPE wants professional references yet refuses to give the same. And what is a "personal reference" anyway? That I can grill a good burger, and am fun at parties? That might fulfill a part of what potential employers are looking for (works well with others) but does little to ascertain how I function in a technical position. Once I finally pinned down their exact HR policy I told them the difference what they would allow for people seeking references; I guess it worked since I'm starting a new job Monday lol.
Right choice.
Never accept a counteroffer. _Never_.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
It was the employer that wrote the at-will terms into the agreement. If they don't like their own terms, Not My Problem. For me it depends on two things: how satisfied or annoyed I am at my current position, and how anxious the new position is to have me start. If I'm relatively happy with my managers and co-workers and it's just that the new position's offering me better pay or different work, I'm going to push for 2 weeks notice before I start the new position just out of courtesy. If my current employer's willing to write a certain amount of notice to me into the agreement (ie. they won't let me go without at least X weeks notice), I'm definitely going to insist on giving at least that much notice before leaving. OTOH if my current employer insists on being able to let people go at any time for any reason with no notice, I'm going to be less than insistent on giving them notice. If I'm annoyed with them, and especially if the new position wants me right away, I'm not going to lose any sleep about giving them exactly as much notice as they give employees being let go (that is, none at all). The only consideration for me will be making the departure clean on my side, all my personal stuff cleared out, company data on my workstation safely backed up where my manager knows to find it if they need it, sensitive information that the company doesn't need (eg. passwords to linked-directly-to-me accounts needed for work, SSH/SSL/x.509 private keys) wiped, etc. etc..
If an employer has a problem with that, I suggest they review the idea that I'll grant them exactly the consideration they grant employees. If they don't consider their terms acceptable, it's entirely within their power to change them. If they expect me to grant them consideration without granting anything in return, I refer them to the acronym "TANSTAAFL".
I will caveat this with that I actively have just over 14 years of workplace experience in my "field of employment", which since I am a /.'er, I guess that lumps me into IT in some what shape or form.
With that, I live in a right-to-work state and spent almost 9 of those years as a government contractor. I endured the typical BS: pay cuts, freezes, lousy raises, a government furlough, health care hikes to make you make less for that year with your raise, benefit slashes with contract renewals going to the next company, shitty co-workers, shitty projects, shitty managers, worker shortage, attrition, ect. I could go on and on. The point I am making is: I was afforded every opportunity, reason to quit and walk the fuck out and there will always will be reason after reason to make you want to quit your job without reason and throw up the double fingers. The grass is never greener anywhere, it's always the same, drab shade it will always ever be, it's just what you make of it.
When I finally decided it was time to go, and move onto another position I was approached with in the private sector, I had plenty of vacation banked to take off a month paid, then put in a hastily typed immediate resignation letter and walked right out the day after coming back in. Did I? I would have loved to like anyone else dreams of doing but I didn't. I worked out my two weeks faithfully, documented things, properly transitioned work off as best as anyone can and took the high road. Why? What reason did I have to burn bridges? None. What if I want to go back? Would it be worth the happy hour story of being the Robin Hood of Everyone-Wants-To-Be to tell that one story where you told your employer to fuck off? Probably not.
People have very little reason to in general to spite their employer back and not put in a courtesy two weeks --- usually the things that burn us and drive us to that point all are business or environmental culture things that are most of the time out of our control and end up in the constant cross fire in. Did your job, as long as you did it, always yield a paycheck and some sort of benefits? Isn't that why you were there to begin with?
I'm not advocating you stay in toxic, cancerous or career suicide workplaces, what I am saying is there is this definite trend in people today, especially the millennial YOLO brats that have an over-inflated ego of worth and dedication. I was raised to do a job, do it well, never half ass and build a brand and name for yourself. Others don't operate that way.
I've been laid off with no notice and no severance in the tech industry before. So why should I give any employer a 2 week notice?
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
Even in situations where the place was going to hell and was suffering under the worst managers. (In the case I'm thinking of; a big, very bro-y, MBA-ish, golf-buddies-get-promoted, east-coast logistics company acquired the close-knit San Francisco tech company I worked for. The cultural differences were irreconcilable for more than a few of us.) The thing is, I wasn't giving notice for the benefit of the company. I was giving notice for the benefit of my co-workers. (The legacy ones from our days as our own company, that is.). Two weeks may not be enough time to hire an actual replacement. But if you're on the ball, you can cram in a lot of knowledge transfer and not leave your friends and colleagues hanging (Any more than is absolutely necessary as a consequence of your leaving.).
To provoke a no-notice resignation, I think I'd have to have become aware that the company was breaking the law or engaged in a serious ethical violation. Physical violence, or sexual harassment or orientation discrimination would probably do the trick too.
Imagine all the people...
In some jurisdictions, if an employer does not give notice, pay in lieu of notice is still required, assuming that the employee has been there for some certain minimum amount of time. This is not especially advantageous to the employee in terms of employment insurance, because pay in lieu of notice still counts as income, and therefore will offset how soon employment insurance benefits will kick in after termination.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
I've been running my own business part time since 2006 while working a full time job during the day. In 2012 I finally decided to focus on my business full time.
Had our ups and downs, but I've never regret my decision.
No, there's no law that says they can't say anything they want. It's just that if it's bad, and it gets back to you, you could (in theory) sue them for defamation or some such nonsense. So most corps legal departments have issued a blanket 'just confirm they worked here, and NOTHING ELSE' order.
A thousand pounds of wood moving at 300 feet per minute. Don't get in the way.
When I last changed jobs, I spent much of that two weeks cleaning up documentation and writing a simple and direct "introduction to the position" document for my replacement. During that time, my boss and backup did my normal duties. In doing so, she ran into a few hurdles, some questions. I was there to assist. By the day I left, she had been doing my daily job for two weeks. (While interviewing, I arranged for our workload to be light for the following few weeks).
At my current job, my boss recently quit. During his two weeks, he spent probably 60 hours documenting like crazy and demonstrating stuff for those of us he left behind. That was VERY helpful for us.
If you're leaving on good terms, give notice. If your boss is an asshole, then courtesy is not owed.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
If it's "at will" it's at will, not "oh, except you have to pay 2 weeks".
As others said, employers lobbied for these provisions because they wanted to avoid paying notice.
There's nothing to stop them, when you graciously give 2 weeks notice, not to bother coming in tomorrow/leave now/whatever and no reason they have to pay you anything. And it /might/ be because they had a shitty commute that morning and are in a bad mood.
Depends how hand to mouth you are, but between losing 2 weeks pay and upsetting someone that wrote into a contract the right to fire you at will, I'm gonna side with myself.
In at-will employment states, a notice requirement can't be enforced. A lot of things that wind up in boilerplate employment agreements can't be enforced. If too many people knuckle under and feel forced to give notice to quit, we will end up with just the expectation that everyone has to give notice. Unfortunately, enough people are scared of "burning bridges" that this concern is taken seriously. Maybe we need to recover the attitude that we can do whatever we want that is not illegal, and by trial and error find out what works for us. I have both given notice and quit abruptly, and I never saw any good or bad effects from either course. Some of us are not as scared of the results as others, but we can't let ourselves be ruled by the timid.
It takes all kinds.
I've seen several types of separations:
1. Being blindsided by a manager and security for a walk to HR. Yes, severance was provided - as long as you sign your rights away in order to get it. There are conditions for the severance package. Don't want to sign your rights away? Then you get nothing aside from time owed and any accrued vacation time. For reference, see the conditions imposed on the Disney IT workers.
2. In the case of a large layoff, it still comes as a surprise, but there is a slow rundown where people are given notice their jobs will be gone by a certain day, they get training and job counseling, and they also get severance with the same conditions imposed in #1.
Both of these were done by the same company.
I tried every decent and legal way I could think of to resolve the issue w/the business before I rented the chicken suit
Call a 'Rage Quit' whatever you want: I call it a tantrum. If your purpose is to walk out as some kind of revenge for imagined (or even real) abusiveness by your boss, your co-workers or TPTB, I guess dumping a can of gasoline on your head and self-immolating is about as effective...for you. And as /.ers all say, "I'm all I care about."
Instead, bear in mind that unless you are outrageously mobile and able to take a gig several states (or continents) away, you are probably a specialist in a regional market: You will likely find yourself working with some of these people again, and their opinion of you will matter in your future employment.
The fact that at-will employment means that an employer can kick the feet out from under you in 3 seconds with a 2 second head start doesn't mean jack in the long run: That is how the world wags. My favorite manager was pole-axed *this week* for political reasons: He was gone before his morning cuppa cooled.
If you want to keep working (and eating) you will think first about the effect that your spazz-out will have on you 5-10-15 years down the line. I've concluded that anyone who wants to stay employed whether full time or contract will guard their reputation jealously. Sure, I've had a 'fantasy rage quit' script in my head. I've also had the sense to keep it there. The pay-off has been 23 years of employment at 8 companies on both coasts and a total of only 10 months of unemployment in that time, 5 months each, once voluntarily. The gravy has been dozens of people that I can reach out to who will vouch for me and help me find work quickly if I needed help. An employee who has had manure poured on them and manages to quit with grace and dignity will be remembered as someone you want to work with again. The tantrum rage quit will make great office gossip for years to come, but nobody is going to help them if they're hurtin'.
flames > dev/null
It depends on if there's some advantage. If the company finds some business advantage to letting you go, they won't think twice.
So if you get another job and 2 weeks would make it difficult then screw um.
But if everything is sorted out time wise then not giving notice out of spite is just unprofessional.
I'm sure they all miss you
lucm, indeed.
I work in a small office in the construction field, there is an average of 25 people in the office positions at any one time... not including fab shop & welders we have experience 87 people quitting or being fired in a span of 2 years...
Thanks to file sharing, I purchase more CDs
Thanks to the RIAA, I buy them used...
Both employers and employees should be courteous and provide two weeks notice. That may still translate to, "This is your last day, but we will pay you for the next two weeks."
So in my opinion, the answer to this is highly dependent on the employer. If the employer is reasonable to people when letting go of them, then the employees should show the same respect. If the employer does not treat people well on the way out, then the social contract is broken.
Evolution: love it or leave it
If you give two weeks notice, you often find yourself let go immediately.
Fuck em.
In a world of the blind, the one-eyed man is king--and the two-eyed man is a heretic.
call in sick and warn the coworkers to call in sick and then park across the street when the FBI/IRS/FTC/FCC does a raid on them.
They'll fire you "without notice" so (assuming you have a valid reason) why not quit without notice?
Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
My last employer wanted 4 weeks, which is standard for licensed medical personnel. However, they never use the time to find a replacement. By the time I left, they had JUST posted the position. It has been 2 months and they haven't filled it yet. The likelihood of finding an replacement for a departing employee with 2 weeks notice sounds even more bleak. It is a waste of one's time.
Chewbacon
The Bible is like Wikipedia: written by a bunch of people and verifiable by questionable sources.
No. There Is No Effective Fiduciary Duty to Maximize Profits
https://medium.com/bull-market...
I realise what you are saying is effectively believed to be true by millions, but its little more than a cultural myth. I'm writing in the hope people starting new companies don't behave in the crass manner you describe.
Does the company give at least two weeks paid notice to everyone it terminates?
Then my minimum will also be two weeks notice.
Does the company usually just tell people to gather their things and pay out the minimum it's legally required to?
Then my minimum will be the same.
Does the company generally give a couple of weeks severance unless for cause?
Then my minimum is also two weeks unless I'm quitting due to their cause.
Does the company have a good standard severance package?
Then I will also give them the option to have my work out longer.
Note: I say minimums. I'm also aware that, as poor as their behavior may be, I've also got my own reputation to watch out for. They may be a bunch of asshats. But my next employer is likely looking for reassurance that they'll get a respectful notice period and my quitting without notice, unless it's really easy to justify, just makes me look bad to future employers who background check.
FTA: "She said, 'I've been watching 'Suits,' and this is how it happens."
Sheeeit.
by Cyphase ( 907627 )
Was working afternoon shift on a Friday night, there were about 15 minutes to the 12 o'clock quitting time. My boss opened my door and said "I heard you were leaving", me "yes" , him "when?", me, "in about 15 minutes, him "oh". They had all weekend to find and train a replacement. I did not have anything against my boss, he was a good guy. Now the levels above him, there were some things that made me smile when I was walking to the car after the shift was over.
Passionately Indifferent
I get calls all the time from people on my professional network asking about such or such person because they saw on their resume that they worked at a same place I used to. Often if I don't know them I will make a call to whoever I know and trust that still work there, and I'll get the straight dope. There's even been cases of double hops, with my contact reaching out to his own contacts. That's how a good network works.
When I get those calls I never badmouth anyone, but I've given enough glowing reviews about excellent former coworkers that people who ask me can tell from the lack of enthusiasm when they're dealing with a bad apple. And anyone who leaves without warning is a bad apple in my book.
Employment verification between HR departments usually serves the purpose of validating the dates on your resume. If the role to fill has any importance, it's the informal calls or discussions during a random encounter at a trade show that will seal your fate.
lucm, indeed.
If I'm doing my job properly as a manager, no one should ever be indispensable.
Highly valued? Sure. I want to build a team where everyone is exceptionally valued.
But if anyone ever becomes indispensable, I've failed in my job as a manager.
Why? The hit by a bus factor. That wonderful employee who loves me, who I love... can still get hit by a bus. Can still get sick. Can still have a loved one die. Can still have a relative offer to pay all expenses for a once in a lifetime six week world trip.
If I have any employee that I can't keep my team running without, even at zero notice, I'm not running my team well.
It may suck. It may be sad. It may require some juggling I'd much rather not do. But any indispensability means I've done my job badly.
This means, if someone quits with zero notice, I can handle it.
At that point, it's actually a good thing anyway. If they're so pissed off that they'd statement quit, I don't need them in the office, poisoning others, dragging their heels through their short timer's disease. Let's get them somewhere where they're happy and get my team of great people back doing great things. We'll live.
Strange thing? When you have a well run team that you can already be confident in, people rarely statement quit anyway. For some reason, they don't seem to feel the need. Imagine that. And when they do? You've got it handled anyway.
They will lay you off without notice and lately without any kind of severance. You can certainly walk out the door on them and not look back, especially if you see the writing on the wall (i.e. you are training your cheap foreign replacements).
The question is whether this is a SMART move or not. It will be remembered, that you can be sure of. And the boss who was about to lay you off without severance is probably next anyway, so very likely you will meet again elsewhere. There are other ways to screw upper management without shitting the bed. A good policy is not to fuck the people you work with, fuck the execs and fuck the shareholders for sure, but don't fuck your coworkers (figuratively, if they're hot, that's your business).
Quitting without notice is unprofessional. So is laying off employees without notice. Most employers would give notice in the event of layoffs or provide severance, so I think it's only fair that employees at companies which do that observe the same courtesy. However, you have to acknowledge there are exceptional cases and exceptionally bad companies, like in anything.
You may one day find yourself wanting a job where one of your current co-workers are working. Are they going to remember you as the ass who walked out and left them a stinking pile and ruined their vacation plans? Or does it suck so bad for them too that it won't matter? Everywhere I've worked it only takes one person to say no and you're not getting hired.
You employer can go pound sand.
But I have done it. Once. At Overstock.com. Their CEO and his close circle are the worst people I've ever done work for. Would never wish that on anyone.
A lot of people are making it about the employer relationship, and I don't see it that way. It's about your colleagues. Remember: you're leaving, but your coworkers are not, and neither is the work you leave behind. Depending on what kind of work you did, they might be taking over a bunch of what you were doing and they'll form some opinions about how well you did. They will not be inclined to be kind, because no one likes having a bunch of stuff dumped on their plate! Later on, they'll probably switch jobs too, and you might run into them again. If you go out as a class act, people will remember that when you run into them again somewhere else.
There are situations where you have to leave with zero notice, and you'll know when you're in them.
The converse should actually balance out nicely.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
I worked at as a restaurant cook for three years after graduating from college when I got a software testing internship. Even though I had a new job, I kept working at the restaurant on Saturday nights for another three months. A waiter-turned-assistant-manager who blew off his kitchen training tried to bully me into making more Alfredo sauce 30 minutes before closing when we still had a quarter-pan left. After he threatened to write me up, I told him to make it himself and quit on the spot. He tried to bully another kitchen worker into making the Alfredo sauce but he refused for the same reason that I did. As an assistant manager, he should have been able to grab the recipe book and make the Alfredo sauce. He couldn't. When I went back in a week later to pick up my last paycheck, all the waiters were giving high-fives and thumbs up. The assistant manager had to redo his training and became less a cocky son of bitch after that incident.
And no means no... A deal is a deal. If you agree to give notice than be true to your word. Make your word valuable.
Obviously, if you are being asked to do something illegal or immoral than don't do it. If some idiot construes that as quitting without notice, than they have no concept of honor and don't deserve a moment's more of your time. If anyone questions your motives you have the truth as a perfect shield.
Greed is the root of all evil.
The worst is when you tell your new employer you can start Monday, then give two weeks notice expecting to be thrown out a window, when they not only accept the two weeks, but ask if you could possibly stretch that out another week or two. Now you are faced with the choice of a bad reference, or a bad start to the new job.
In most cases the bad reference is the better choice, but still sucks.
When my employer of 20 years announced that there was no payment for banked vacation days upon termination, I told them there would likely be no notice when I leave. If I were to give notice and they walk me out, I'm out all of my earned vacation time. They know when I take an unexpected vacation for 8.4 days, I'll be putting in my 1.6 day notice when I get back in the office. Or something like that.
As others have said, they hold all the cards. If they aren't going to do me the courtesy of paying for time off I've earned, I don't feel the need to take on the risk that is involved in giving 2 weeks notice. And for those talking about co-workers, I'm happy for my co-worker that quit with no notice a couple weeks ago. He'd been treated poorly by the company and he did what is best for him after 5 years there.
A guy at my company gave verbal four weeks notice (stupid, but still...), then when it came the date, which was well known by everyone in the company, they said he hadn't given notice. Didn't want to work with him over it or anything, so he went back to his desk, thought for about five minutes, then got up and walked out.
I've been on the job market - while employed and with my employer fully aware that I am searching - for well over a year now. I hold an advanced STEM degree. The job market quite simply sucks giant blue whale testicles. Yeah, there are lots of jobs out there but in the geographic region I'm in they are looking mostly for engineers while I am a scientist (I try to convince them otherwise and they ignore me). The biggest problem is getting my resume read by an actual living breathing human being; many people know that the vast overwhelming majority of employers do their initial screening with a commercial algorithm that their own HR department doesn't being to know the first thing about. If I manage to hit the right key works to get past there, I find that I applied to a position that the employer already had a candidate for.
In other words, an applicant faces so many hurdles beyond their control right now that it would be a poor idea for them to place any more in their own way. I've had employers in the past with whom I gave 2 weeks notice to and they accepted it and allowed me to leave earlier to start my new job; this is not terribly uncommon. It is far better to give the notice to retain the positive reference if at all possible.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
That just reads wrong. It looks like Dupray is the customer-service rep.
At the bottom of the
The reason you can't find a decent job is because companies that are good to work at won't hire people like you.
You don't give notice because you give a shit about your (soon to be former) employer, you give notice because that's what a professional does. Walk out without notice and you declare "I am not a professional."
Small wonder you can only get shitty jobs. You're a shitty employee.
There are justifications for just about every action, in the right context, including shoving a nun down a flight of stairs...
So you've given two week notices to all people you've fired? If not, you're simply being a huge hypocrite for holding your employees to a standard you don't hold yourself to.
You don't give notice because you give a shit about your (soon to be former) employer, you give notice because that's what a professional does. Walk out without notice and you declare "I am not a professional."
And yet it's "professional" to just walk an employee out the door without prior notice? Riiiiiight.
There are cases where it's okay to up and leave, yes. Management may want two weeks to wrap up loose ends, but it's just a matter of 'being polite' or 'being professional'. Yes, your references will suffer.
On the other hand, it's remarkably rare for employers to offer the same two weeks when they want you to be out the door, ranging from "there are free cookies in the lobby" to "this isn't working and you're done on Friday". So it's really a matter of turnabout being fair play.
on the meds. message not received.
Depends on how much of a fuckhead the boss is.
I just stopped showing up to my last job, along with most people working there. The boss was out of state 90% of the time, only returning for a few days to literally scream at people. He would frequently "forget" to pay people, or pay people lower than the agreed upon amount after a week or two of them being hired.
Karma is biting him in the ass though. A whole four people working there now. He has pissed everyone off in my town and every nearby town that nobody is willing to work for him.
Today is the first day I agreed to go there in the last 4 months. His attitude sure changed once he realized few people would put up with his shit.
Walking out the door when asked to do something criminal is not going to land you in jail.
I have always found it complete absurd that a company would demand 2-weeks notice for quitting. Yet they will never give a person 2-weeks notice if they terminate their side. I treat previous employers like bad ex's. I do not allow prospective employers to contact my previous employers and it has never been a problem for me.
Support your local school shooter, give them your firearms.
Many businesses, especially software companies (my main experience) don't give employees any notice before firing them, downsizing, layoffs, etc. So what right do the have to expect notice when the employee is the one that ends it? Why don't they get a bad rep for the abrupt end of the relationship if that is a thing? It also depends on the company. Some companies want people to leave immediately as a general policy when they know for sure they are leaving.
That said I usually give at least two weeks notice when possible and there aren't extenuating circumstances. Sometimes they want that two weeks or more and sometimes they don't.
Dear Mr. Baker,
As an employee of an institution of higher education, I have few very basic expectations. Chief among these is that my direct superiors have an intellect that ranges above the common ground squirrel. After your consistent and annoying harassment of my co-workers and me during our commission of duties, I can only surmise that you are one of the few true genetic wastes of our time.
Asking me, a network administrator, to explain every nuance of everything I do each time you happen to stroll into my office is not only a waste of time, but also a waste of precious oxygen. I was hired because I know how to network computer systems, and you were apparently hired to provide amusement to your employees, who watch you vainly attempt to understand the concept of "cut and paste" as it is explained to you for the hundredth time.
You will never understand computers. Something as incredibly simple as binary still gives you too many options. You will also never understand why people hate you, but I am going to try and explain it to you, even though I am sure this will be just as effective as telling you what an IP is. Your shiny new iMac has more personality than you ever will.
You wander around the building all day, shiftlessly seeking fault in others. You have a sharp dressed, useless look about you that may have worked for your interview, but now that you actually have responsibility, you pawn it off on overworked staff, hoping their talent will cover for your glaring ineptitude. In a world of managerial evolution, you are the blue-green algae that everyone else eats and laughs at. Managers like you are a sad proof of the Dilbert principle.
Seeing as this situation is unlikely to change without you getting a full frontal lobotomy reversal, I am forced to tender my resignation; however, I have a few parting thoughts:
When someone calls you in reference to employment, it is illegal for you to give me a bad recommendation as I have consistently performed my duties and even more. The most you can say to hurt me is, "I prefer not to comment." To keep you honest, I will have friends randomly call you over the next couple of years, because I know you would be unable to do it on your own.
I have all the passwords to every account on the system and I know every password you have used for the last five years. If you decide to get cute, I will publish your "Favorites," which I conveniently saved when you made me "back up" your useless files. I do believe that terms like "Lolita" are not viewed favorably by the university administrations.
When you borrowed the digital camera to "take pictures of your mother's b-day," you neglected to mention that you were going to take nude pictures of yourself in the mirror. Then, like the techno-moron you are, you forgot to erase them. Suffice it to say, I have never seen such odd acts with a ketchup bottle. I assure you that those photos are being kept in safe places pending your authoring of a glowing letter of recommendation. (And, for once, would you please try to use spellcheck? I hate correcting your mistakes.)
I expect the letter of recommendation on my desk by 8:00 am tomorrow. One word of this to anybody and all of your twisted little repugnant obsessions will become public knowledge. Never f*ck with your systems administrator, Mr. Baker! They know what you do with all that free time!
Sincerely
David Blocker
Network Administrator
I'm a minority race. Save your vitriol for white people.
The "at-will" thing is not a license to be an asshole. There's more to being a decent person than not breaking laws. For instance, there's no law that requires you to flush when you use a public bathroom, that doesn't mean it's ok to leave your shit for someone else to deal with.
Also giving notice is not the same as being "loyal", it's just professional courtesy. And it doesn't have to be 2 weeks; it's perfectly acceptable to have a civilized discussion with the employer, and figure out what would work for both parties. For someone in a very senior position it's not unusal for the employer to ask the person to stay on for a few months, because it's more difficult to find a replacement, but they may also feel like you're a potential liability and ask you to go. Either way doing this in a civilized manner will help a lot in building your reputation.
Like it or not, the company has taken a risk and spent good money in the process of hiring you, and even if you think that you're a special little snowflake that deserve an award just for showing up and letting a company "use" your time, it's still more classy to offer them some kind of advance notice.
As for being "mistreated", believe me you've seen nothing. I once worked in a company where a coworker was told to use his vacation days when he had to undergo chemotherapy, and where I was told by the HR manager that he had a stack of resume "this thick" to replace me when I complained about the A/C being turned off in the office on evenings and weekend when I had to do unpaid overtime. After quite a while longer than one might expect I had enough, but I still didn't leave without notice. They asked for a month, I offered a week, and we compromised on three weeks. FIVE years later, I shit you not, I was offered a juicy contract and found out that I won the business in large part because someone who used to work at that hellish company was in the hiring committee and told them I was a stand-up kind of guy. That contract set me on a highly profitable trajectory.
So yeah, I'll keep doing things my way even if the law says I can take a dump on an employer's desk when I no longer want to work there. Feel free to do things your way also, but don't be surprised if one day, sooner than you expect, you end up doing Fivers and Craigslist gigs because you can't get a job or contract. Of course you'll blame the economy and the visa workers, after all you never broke the at-will laws.
lucm, indeed.
I have worked previously in the US but I must say that I prefer the Scandinavian setup we have here (in Oslo, Norway):
You must give notice, typically 3 months from the end of the current month, and if your employer wants to fire you they must also give similar notice, i.e. 3+ months.
For older/more senior employees the notice interval increases for the employer, up to 6+ months for a worker in her sixties.
What this means is that both parties know that they have to stay civilized.
In a case of possible conflict of interest it is common for these long notice intervals to be negotiated down, sometimes to zero. I.e. when I considered leaving my then job to go work for a major client of ours, my CEO told me that I would be allowed to leave immediately. (I didn't accept that offer so the question became moot.)
OTOH, I have been in a situation where I effectively quit immediately, but that was only an in-house transfer:
I went to my yearly performance review after a year of effectively being my own boss, but I still needed someone to be responsible for signing my time sheets and travel expenses etc, so the same person was doing my review.
The guy started the review by saying "Terje, as we both know you aren't really working for me so I had to go out and ask a few of the people you have been helping over the last year, and according to them it sounded like we should put a statue of you outside the corporate headquarters!"
OK, so at this point I was thinking 'This is going very well!' but then he continued "- but since I have a limited sum to distribute for pay raises I have reserved that for my own people and given you a negative evaluation so you will not be getting anything this year".
At this point I stood up, saying "I don't think we have anything else to talk about", left the room and went directly to HR telling them they had better find me a new boss to report to.
Terje
"almost all programming can be viewed as an exercise in caching"
And yet it's "professional" to just walk an employee out the door without prior notice? Riiiiiight.
It isn't.
That why most companies don't do that either.
Asshole companies get asshole employees and asshole employees get asshole companies.
Most people and companies aren't assholes, and they'll both be decent about ending employment.
Slashdot social media options: AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber and Mobile Text. Why no MySpace?
No, what you are declaring is that you don't consider the company greater than yourself. Two-week notice for one and having guards escort you to the door for the other are primarily an obedience ritual establishing and reinforcing society's power relations. "Professionalism" is really just our version of chivalry and bushido: a set of behaviours designed to transfer power from people to structures, all wrapped in philosophical bullshit which lets people pretend they're "professionals" or "honorable" rather than what they actually are: slaves.
Of course they are, just like George Washington and his merry band were shitty subjects to the English crown. People with a sense of self-worth tend to make for shitty subjects. It doesn't mean they're wrong, though.
You're not wrong in describing cause and effect, but you are wrong in taking this causal relation as an unalterable law of nature rather than a social construct which can be changed. An unconditional and livable citizen wage, for example, would instantly depotentate unemployment as a threat and thus make people more free, or at least less beholden to the soulless legal constructs known as companies we've given near-divine status in our society.
Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.
Two weeks? Shit, can't fire someone without several months of making them aware they're at risk for a specific reason and giving them a metric fuckton of support to improve and address that area of their performance.
Even after that they'll have a month's notice in their contract. They'll get that, and often more. They just wont be able to spend it in the office, it'll be cash in hand and/or gardening leave.
Redundancies I've never seen happen in under three months, usually nearer six.
Then again, when I leave a job it's never been less than a month's notice. Usually I negotiate, preference is to avoid the three month contractual notice I normally have (current job is only one, although employer has to give me three) but on one occasion I gave them five months notice.
A small, family-run business, deserves notice and a reasonable time to prepare a replacement and some of your time to help in the transition IF they have treated you reasonably. It's a reciprocal thing, and only you know if they have treated you reasonably. "Reasonable" does not mean "lavish". Most small businesses cannot afford high pay and benefits, but ANY business can easily afford to be courteous and considerate to employees.
Modern larger businesses, however, are an entirely different matter.
They often give people ZERO notice; they often know full-well that they are doing something bad (in the case of outsourcing or replacing somebody over office politics, or as a way to replace them with a younger and cheaper person) and they are also aware that firing a person is a major disruption in his/her life and family economics, so they fear their employees and want to jettison them like expended drop tanks on a fighter plane. I worked at a company about a decade ago that told a guy on Friday that they had him scheduled to start a new large project on Monday, and over the weekend two things happened: he bought a new car, and management had a meeting and decided to cancel the project and reduce staff. On Monday after they guy had been working for a couple of hours his manager came to him to escort him from the building.
Businesses USED to behave more honorably, but in these days of globalism they too-often view employees as a burden to be used where possible but eliminated as soon as a cheaper option arises. It's standard practice to say things like "our real value is our people" just before laying them off without notice.
With modern corporations showing ZERO loyalty to employees now, they themselves deserve ZERO consideration and probably deserve sabotage, though I advise strongly against that as unethical, harmful to the co-workers you leave behind, and ultimately only harmful to you. Just because your employer may be a completely two-faced unethical snake, that does not mean you should join him in the sewer. Keep your head high. Behave at all times honorably and ethically, and count of positive word-of-mouth from co-workers. Do NOT assume that your method of departure will have ANY impact on any future job recommendations; I have personally seen managers on the phone with management of other companies bad-mouth excellent former employees who they interacted positively with as they'd left; they sometimes did it as a game, and sometimes because no matter how friendly they'd pretended to be they were mad the persons had left and that their costs had gone up when finding a replacement. One guy even trashed a good former employee in order to convince a competitor to NOT hire him and then end up competing against him.
Recommendations from former employers used to matter a great deal. Now, however, society is infested with lawyers and most employers are paranoid about getting sued, so they all tend to give neutral recommendations no matter whether they loved you or despised you. If they give you a bad review, they worry you will sue them. If they give you a good review and your new employer is not satisfied, they worry your new employer will sue them. The best recommendations these days are from peers/co-workers, and your own work products.
Unless you have a contract with special terms, you are under no obligation to give advanced notice. If you can get another job lined-up without your current boss's knowledge do it. When you cut ties, do it as quickly, cleanly, and unemotionally as you can. I did this once with an employer who'd become a bit of a jerk and was getting all-too accustomed to doing it. I arranged the new job start date and such and then waited for the most satisfying moment. On a particular day, when we were in a meeting and he went nasty. I shocked everybody in the meeting, told him he had used up his allocation of goodwill, and I would not be returning after lunch. I told him he did not even need to send me a final partial paycheck, and he'd be wise to learn to tr
I had a CIO grab me the day after I tendered my resignation and tell me he wasn't going to make a counter offer because they don't help at all.
I told him that was fine, as I would have had to decline one anyway as nothing he could offer would address the reasons I was leaving.
He did however want to know those reasons. People left the company rather less voluntarily as a result. Other changes were made. I'm happier at my new employer, and my former colleagues also have a better working environment.
Sometimes a well regarded employee leaving is a trigger for senior management recognition that there is a problem; until then it's perceived as bitching, or they think they're dealing with it, or they lack the ammunition to tell their superiors that this is not sustainable. Twice now my departure from an organisation has led to sizeable change to improve working conditions and environment.
Yes, yes... It's a double-standard, and we all know it. It's going to stay this way until SOMETHING IS DONE ABOUT IT!
When companies hire new employees, they ask for references to make sure the applicant was not a complete irresponsible asshole at his last job. I suggest applicants do the same right back at the company: Ask the interviewer for references of people who have left on their own (not fired) so the applicant can call them and ask them why they left.
There should also be a yelp type review of companies on Linked-In (are you listening Microsoft?). This will allow people searching for jobs to determine just what kind of bullshit the company has pulled in the past.
In other words, companies that tell you at Friday 4:45 that you needn't come in on Monday aren't professional either.
I think we should assemble a list of such companies. I don't want to employ companies that have a non-professional attitude.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
The amount of time given and the general way of parting ways is nothing that is usually defined unilaterally. At least not by non-assholes. And assholes, self entitled snowflakes (which do exist on both sides, don't feel left out snow-flaky bosses!) will eventually run out of options of good employments, and good employees.
I had both in my time. There were companies that I didn't want to leave but had to, which meant that I stayed until they had found a replacement and I had the replacement up to speed (leading to 4 months longer tenure than expected), and of course they could call at any time if any questions remained.
And then there was the "here's my mandatory 4 weeks notice, and by the way, I have 4 weeks vacation left over, which I take NOW, good bye. I found something new. More money. Less YOU" job.
And both time I felt good and right to do exactly what I did.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
How do future employers know about how you left. I hear repeatedly that most HR depts. will confirm that you worked for the company and maybe confirm the positions and time frames but that's it. They will not report derogatory unless they can back it up with citing criminal charges.
So how does the new firm know that you were "unprofessional" in the timing of your departure?
I'm too lazy to compose a creative sig.
Walking out isn't going to cut it. Local law requires me to call the police and inform them that I was asked to perform an illegal act.
Employers around here know this, though, so such requests tend to be few. For obvious reasons...
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
That alone would be grounds for me to walk out on the spot.
I work for a VERY conservative company with ties to a large financial service provider. One would assume that we have to dress up, but fortunately our boss wants to focus on what matters. Coworker just walked by in shorts and a Metallica-Shirt. I question his taste in music, but aside of that...
Of course it's suit and tie when we're with a customer, and everyone has a full set in a cupboard or locker somewhere in case of an emergency, i.e. a customer shows up unannounced. But as long as it's just us, why the hell should we parade about in costume?
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Glassdoor.com
Contracts in Germany usually have a probation time of 6 months. Within that time both sides can quit anytime, that same day. After that the contract transforms into a so-called unlimitted/permanent contract. From there on there is a contractual quitting peroid, usually between 2 or 3 months for both sides. It enables both sides to be able to prepare for changes when someones leaving a job.
I like it this way. Jobs are more stable that way. Germany has strikt employment laws, which levels tge playing field for employers. Good thing.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
The norm in Sweden is 1-3 months.
Goes both ways.
My last working place had 3 months, I gave them 3 months+3 days (well, really just wanted to start the current on a monday).
Heck, even that was a hard time to replace me in (in fact, my boss didn't succeed and the workload had to be spread so I've been consulting for them every now and then to clarify stuff since handover wasn't perfectly handled (the guy I was supposed to give my position with got fired almost instantly since he was a screwup))).
This place has got 1 month, with a progressive scale the longer you work here (up to three months).
Less than a month is only for people paid by hour in one way or another.
Me too, but I guess that's 'cause the law requires them to around here.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Yes that would be required as well.
The "greater than" symbol in the subject heading was removed. Criminal law is more important than laws about hiring and firing everywhere. It should be obvious IMHO that in such a situation giving notice is not required so I just do not get why the summary above suggests otherwise. We have not yet gone full libertarian and do not have to obey an employer above a state.
Clearly a bright spark. Open the door before you walk out, genius.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Reading through the comments, you'd think Armageddon has hit us. I'd like to post that good companies to work for still exist.
I've been with my company for 16+ years, there have been only 2 firings. One was a guy who was routinely changing performance numbers to make his own performance look good.. he was warned but kept doing it. The other was a guy brought in to help improve our systems and connectivity with the manufacturing side, turns out he had vastly overstated his skills.
There are a number of people in this office that could easily be replaced.. but my company doesn't believe in managing by fear.
Point of my story, don't be a dick and don't stop looking for one of those good companies to work for.
"Action without philosophy is a lethal weapon; philosophy without action is worthless."
I worked fast food in high school, and apparently there was a rule in our restaurant against having your cell phone out during a shift. No one knew this because it was never enforced and people were on their phones constantly (not talking, just texting and what not during down times). I pulled out my phone to read a text from my mom (actually, her phone had gotten a virus or something, and that text was a picture of a gummy bear with a penis) and my manager asks, "Oh can I see that?" and just takes my phone and puts it in the office. I thought he was joking at first because it seemed so ridiculous. Our "team leader" tried to convince him to give it back but he wouldn't do it, finally I just told him he could either give me my phone or I could quit and he'd have to, he chose the latter option. It felt fantastic, to be honest, and I heard later that the manager felt like an idiot for being responsible for me quitting.
P.S. There are a few comments itt suggesting that doing this could put a "black mark" on your resume forever. Be aware of your company's reference policy. Both there and my current employer, which are vastly different places, prevent managers from providing any official reference other than confirmation of start and end sates of employment.
hi
Employment is a contract you consented to. It defines a set of rules you need to abide to, otherwise you have a breach of contract.
Breaching a contract is a bad idea, and exposes you to being sued and having to pay ccompensation.
WOW, it is really like this??? I've owned 3 little firms with a total of 10 to 20 employees each.
Fired about 3 people, I've always told everyone 2 weeks in advance, with 2 weeks of pay extra
when leaving. Has anyone ( whom won't post as an A/C ) ever been walked out the door with security?
Never seen it in my 35 years of working. Even on Wall street, people don't get escorted unless it's
fraud related.
if you see me, smile and say hello.
A useful rule of thumb... if you quit without notice and HR are the only ones who seem to care, then you probably did the right thing.
Log in or piss off.
Depends on the situation. As always it depends on both sides. In Belgium the standard is 6 weeks for the emplyee and 3 months for the empleroyer. In once case an emplyee came to us and we talked and we decided to end the contract right at that moment. So no notice at all.
In Belgium you do notice because it is the law. If you want something different, you have to talk together and find a solution like adults and I have never seen where not some sort of solution could be found if both parties were reasonable.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
I was working for a government help desk and it was revealed to us that our contract was ending. Well, the point of giving notice is to give the company an opportunity to hire and train your replacement. There were no replacements coming so I just decided to give a 1 day notice. I can no longer work for that company due to my exit strategy however the company itself is currently not projected to last another 3 years on it's current trajectory so I felt that this was not a particularly valuable bridge to maintain.
Simply put, if the employer is more likely to make your two week exit period a living hell, or the maximum inconvenience they can possibly engage in, then you are by far best served with a no-notice exit strategy.
Personally, it's not about sticking it to them, so much as avoiding them sticking it to you!
Most of the time, places will likely drop you like a hot rock the moment you give notice so they don't have someone around that can poison other employee's opinions about them and get them to quit as well, thus minimizing their losses by paying you off rather than "working you out the door".
HR can state whether someone is rehireable or not. If they say no because someone didn't turn in notice, it leaves the new employer left to wonder WHY and might assume something far worse than lack of notice.
It isn't equivalent because professional companies typically give you severance when you quit. Meaning they pay you not to come to work. A worker who quits suddenly doesn't do that. Be professional.
I've seen it happen.
Out of over a dozen jobs I've held there was only one where I would have gladly given a 1 month notice. That employer had solid benefits including bi-annual profit sharing and made a good effort to train and promote within the organization. They routinely held company outings, paid for travel expenses without any hassle, and provided financial assistance for me to relocate to another office halfway across the country. Loved them dearly and was sad to see them get bought out by a larger evil corporation that outsourced their entire IT department to India. I made some decent money as an independent contractor taking care of call backs to fix what the Indians kept breaking.
On the other hand, most jobs I would have quit without remorse if the manager had given me any sh!t. The way I saw it, employment-at-will is only acceptable if the ax swings both ways. Employers must encounter the pain of an employee quitting on the spot if they expect to have the right to fire on the spot. I've quit by simply leaving a post-it and my office key on a manager's desk while they were away on one of their 3 hour lunches.
My last contract gig I received no notice, simply got called into an office for a conference call with the local department manager who was halfway across the country and advised me I needed to leave on the spot. They didn't bother to have anyone from security present which I thought was rather dangerous for them if they had attempted to do that to someone less civilized than myself. The on-site department supervisor was at least shocked and ashamed of her boss to the extent that she told me to take as long as I needed to gather my belongings. Most companies I have worked for or contracted at will give a one week notice. Never have I received a two week notice.
-==- Buy a Mac and leave me alone!
I've been working in IT 27 years mostly in large corporation environments and have never been asked to sign an employment contract. Further "At will employment" laws generally say that either party may terminate the employment relationship for any (or no) reason without notice unless other terms are negotiated and agreed to, presumably with a contract to back that up. Even if I disliked the company I would still give notice simply as a courtesy, to allow time to transfer anything I had in progress to another person.
I've also never been perp walked to the door by security or let go at 4:45 on Friday. The one time I was RIF'ed I was told I could go back and say my goodbye's to the team, no escort etc.
That is not to say that if the work environment was toxic or if I thought an actual crime was being committed I wouldn't, but I have never had that happen.
The reasons you are leaving are never only money. Money won't fix them.
Also when you accept the counter consider the next steps. There are only two options:
1. Management is pissed about shot term plans you are fucking. They will keep you only until they can hire a replacement, then fire you, likely for cause as they will have all the time they need to fake it up.
2. You are actually needed, long term. You will not get another raise without an offer on the table for the foreseeable future.
More basically, the fact they are willing to counter tells you that they have long considered you a bargain but were unwilling to pay you what you were worth. Fuck them, right in the ear. Fuck their schedule too, right in the accounts receivable.
Finally: If you want money you need to get it coming in the door. For you stay at a company, all raises will be seen in scale to your _original_ starting salary. If you and a new coworker are getting the same money, but you already doubled your pay there, the new coworker will always get better 'default raises'.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
For example if you order me to commit a crime, I quit on the spot.
Employers routinely fire people on the spot without notice, so employees can do the same.
Is it rude? Yes. Does it burn bridges? But sometimes you NEED to be rude and NEED to burn bridges.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
Bingo. I'm always amazed at folks that thing just because HR at companies states that you can't give references that there aren't calls being made from the hiring manager's personal network.
I've been walked out twice. Both of them were layoffs and everyone was walked out. I didn't have any personnel issues and neither did most the other people. So I can't say it was just me; it was just policy.
Now I know people who worked for dotcom startups that quit and left the same day. Most of them did it because their paychecks bounced. They figured they were never going to get the money anyways.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
Glassdoor should be like this, but it's more like a random bitchfest.
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
When your paycheck bounces, it's time to walk out a server or two. Not just quit.
First machine to go should be the one that's recording the security cameras.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
without notice. Then, yeah.
Both things have happened to me in my lifetime. I had an employer who just stopped paying for health insurance, telling no employees. We found out when someone made a claim. The owner, unsurprisingly, was infuriated at the employee who outed him. FYI, I found out later that my tax withholding somehow never happened and eventually they just stopped paying us, allowing us to work a few extra weeks, unpaid.
Good times. Owner was never charged with anything and never went to jail. Welcome to American capitalism.
Please do not read this sig. Thank you.
Completely agreed. People will remember you. What you can do and get away with legally or even ethically is not always what's best for your future.
It's a bad idea to tell to your boss why you're quitting, and it's a bad idea to quit without giving your boss and coworkers notice so they can make plans to handle the mess you leave behind as easily as possible.
Likewise, employers should do what's best for word-of-mouth, too. They might have every legal right to terminate without notice, and they might even feel it's ethical to do so for various reasons, but ex-employees will talk, and current employees are paying attention too.
There are always exceptions, when quoting immediately or firing immediately is called for. Those situations should be obvious to everyone.
-mrxak
Onions Will Kill You
Having never been fired before, I don't have a lot of first hand experience, but I have been associated with a number of people that got fired. I have NEVER seen or heard of anybody that was fired abruptly without cause. (Turning tables over and yelling profanities is definitely cause, I've seen that a few times.) Even in right to work states, an employer will build a case against you, and you will be aware of that case being built. I've worked for a number of companies, every one of them had a similar "three strikes" policy. Verbal warning (that is documented, and signed by you), written warning (also signed by you), and then they show you the door.
3 months is the standard notice time for a developer (and for most qualified jobs) in France. This is written in your contract when you get a job. This is both ways: when you leave or when you are fired.
So leaving without notice time (or with a shorter time) is something you have to negociate.
I usually give a couple weeks notice, I've occasionally gotten counter-offers but never accepted. When asked I have given feedback. For a couple of companies where I truly loved working for I gave them as much notice as possible and turned over 100% of what I knew. I couldn't give them my experience but I did give them knowledge. At one company I was contracting for, by doing this I amazed my boss at how much information I had collected over the years. She did try to arrange my employment either as a direct hire or another contract house (with the company absorbing the penalty) but neither could come close to match the learning opportunity that I was being given. If either of those places had an opening that would support what I need to make I would go back in a hearbeat, and I know they would love to have me. I do love the company that I work for now (I might be a contractor but the company I am at now treats us as employees).
How about some details? Was this person sitting calmly at their desk, diligently working, or were they in the boss' face using a bouquet of four letter words when they were escorted out? I've personally never seen or heard of the first one happening, I've seen the latter happening a few times.
But if the system is like in France, they are also giving that notice time when they are firing, isn't it?
Time to go back?
I for one, am sick of the double standard. Employees are expected to be professional and give two week's notice, however employers are not held to the same standard of professionalism. Whenever it is feasible and possible, I'll give two week's notice but I don't have qualms about leaving with less notice. Anyone defending this double standard is either an employer or an employee that has been so utterly brainwashed by corporate America that he or she will literally lick their boots.
Do employers give 2 weeks notice on a layoff? Or do the "affected" employees get a debriefing meeting and same time to gather their things before exiting the building that same day?
At some places today, if you give your 2 weeks notice, it very quickly turns into the above, and you end up going home same day at the employer's preference.
I think that if you are the employee wanting to leave, it really depends on your reasons and your relationship with the employer. If you're all on good terms with each other and in the middle of something, that it can be a polite thing to offer to stay on for a bit so they have some notice, but accept the possibility of being walked out anyway. If it's a difficult situation, then you can do so, but be prepared to be walked out.
This example sounds so ridiculous that I question its authenticity, but I think the alleged employee was very right to walk out right then.
http://www.askamanager.org/201...
I've never heard of a place that fires somebody and then lets them work there for 2 more weeks. That's insane. It is common to fire somebody, and then pay them some kind of severance, to smooth over hard feelings. It is also common when somebody gives their 2 week notice, to send them home immediately and pay them for those two weeks, unless their knowledge is critical for training coworkers who will take over their duties.
Whether them leaving is the employee choice, or the employers, there is risk in having somebody around who has, at best, little motivation to work, and could be toxic to other employees, or at worst, could be motivated to harm the company / exacting revenge on other employees etc. When somebody is fired, in my experience they are generally given a token escort out by HR.
It does happen. Happened to me, too, but not out of spite but more because my boss and me did actually part on good terms. It meant 2 weeks additional paid vacation for me and full plausible deniability should anything bad happen because I could not have done it, since I was not there anymore.
Being hovered over by security while you pack is not necessarily a bad thing. I do enjoy having a witness when it comes to proving that I am not a disgruntled ex-employee.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
You are owed nothing from your employer beyond the paycheck you agreed to work for. You owe the company nothing beyond the full effort required for the job you're paid to do. If you leave, they don't owe you anything but pay for the time you did work. If they fire you, you don't owe them anything. It is that simple. You work for a paycheck, they hire you for your work. It's a simple agreement between two parties, no different than you going to the grocery to buy bread.
They were called into the bosses office from working calmly - told they were terminated - at that point security (which was aware and waiting prior) showed up. After that they were escorted back to their desk to collect things - at that point they started crying - this was a guy for what that is worth - pretty emotional. The guard stood outside until he was done and then walked him out the building. Unsure why security was involved - I've seen everything from extended 2 month notices to 'never showed up' to this perp walk out the door. I'd say 90% of the time it's a usual notice - of the 10% not many get the 'walk' - although I've been told there are some positions that are deemed especially sensitive where any notice results in instant termination along with revocation of security clearance and access - these are higher up the food chain.
For me it was "you told me you are pondering to quit, here's the deal: I have to lay someone off, and if you agree, it's gonna be you, 2 additional weeks of paid vacation, starting NOW, and the job reference will read "left the company of his own accord and to our greatest regret". What do you say?"
It was less kicking and screaming, more trying hard to keep dignity while skipping down the corridor...
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Because 90% of the time, when an employee gives two weeks notice, they are sent home that very day. The result is often the loss of 2 weeks of income for the employee. Few employers offer any severance in such situations. So basically, the hostile nature of employers is teaching workers that it is against their interests to provide 2 weeks of notice.
That's what they used to do. Except, employers these days pretty much universally let you go if you give 2 weeks notice. It is the companies that are not being professional and creating this new deviance from the past norm.
Balogne....I work at one of the largest IT corporations in the world. If they let you go, and not for any fraud. You are told to gather your stuff and walked out the door.
^^^ YUP
While at my last job, I got an offer for something better in a new state. So I told the new company I'd need a month; two weeks for the current job then two more weeks to relocate. They agreed so I turned in my two-week notice. However it just so happened that I had to give the notice on the Friday just before the company shuts down for a week for Xmas/New Year's holiday.
Some give severance when they lay off workers. Very few give any when you quit. Give your two weeks notice, you'll be out the door that same day.
And that is for 90% of businesses today.
They don't care if they burn out, destroy moral, etc. They'll just import more H1B Visas.
You print out a two copies of your notice. You sign it, you have them sign it. And you leave.
If they list your as terminated for abandoning. You sue them for slander and libel. And since you have a signed receipt of your notice to quit. They will be in a fair bit of trouble. Because if they have told any other potential employers that you were terminated when you in fact quit. And you did not receive the job. You can claim that financial harm....and sue for that income.
Walk out without notice and you declare "I am not a professional."
... but your employer terminating you without notice is considered "professional" and "appropriate."
ELOI, ELOI, LAMA SABACHTHANI!?
Very few
It's because we witness it the majority of the time.
Few managers do their jobs right.
For some reason, Salary now means that employers can demand you work without pay. But you're not allowed to adjust your hours at all.
It's a one-sided law/policy that offers ZERO benefit to workers now.
My current position started out as a short contract job. When I took it, I had high hopes of it becoming permanent, but there certainly wasn't anything definite over where a permanent position would be open. Instead of quitting my old position, I took some of the 6+ weeks holidays I had banked up. This also meant I was still getting medical (which the contractor didn't give me), and if I didn't feel like things were working out I could go back.
I told my old boss and some co-workers in my department what was going on. I *didn't* tell HR. Near the end of my leave, it looked like chances of getting a permanent position at the new company was good, so I told my boss I wouldn't be coming back after holidays. I did offer to do some remote work in my free hours if they needed help, or to answer questions via email etc for free for the next while. They'd already known what was up, so they'd talked to some local talent and prepared for my departure. Thus they had somebody in mind already who filled my position after I left, and neither of us were worse for the wear.
So how does the new firm know that you were "unprofessional" in the timing of your departure?
That's an easy one. They ask if you're eligible to be rehired.
If you've done something bad or pissed off your management, the answer will be "no".
Since the company isn't disclosing any personal information or making any allegations regarding your conduct, there is nothing they can be sued over.
This is a fairly standard practice in corporate HR.
If you worked for a large business, you could probably dream up a not-entirely-terrible explanation since you know they will not provide any other details. It will still be a mark against, but you can mitigate it quite a bit.
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According to the latest ruleset, this post should be modded as Vorpal Flamebait +5.
I have 3 month notice period. If employers want notice from employees has to be bilateral.
But on side note irrespective of notice period be 1 day or 3 months always do a clean handover if you expect to encounter your Co workers in other jobs.
Don't burn bridges
At a decently run company, getting fired is never a surprise. So yeah, that is unprofessional.
And the company being unprofessional doesn't make it acceptable for you to be as well. Again, you're just telling future (not) employers that you're not a professional.
Actually it's been a 2 way street. I've had some do the 445 treatment and I've done the not go back because it was a shitty company and found a better one. New company says "can you start tomorrow", I'm not going to say sorry must wait 2 weeks and stick around shitty previous company. I have given the 2 weeks notice before, I've found the company treats you differently once they know you're leaving. Like they lost their leverage against you.
Worth every penny you pay for it. Which is nothing.
Generally, in ink.
At a decently run company, getting fired is never a surprise. So yeah, that is unprofessional.
Right. It shouldn't be a surprise. Most HR departments document firings by putting employees through performance improvement plans. Odds are if you get one, they want to fire you. It's basically your employer giving you notice, and it's often more than two weeks. If you work at a large company that fires people randomly out of the blue for "performance reasons", they're probably going to be sued.
I have always given notice, and in two instances, (Brandeis University and a retirement home I worked at in the 80's) been convinced to stay on an extra two weeks, only to THEN be burned by those employers. That said, how is it businesses can reasonably expect any notice at all when they will fire you at will with no notice whatsoever? I mean, some businesses have a heart, when Lockheed Martin let me go with no notice, after having told me my job was secure just two months prior, the manager 'felt bad' so gave me 6 weeks severance pay (unwarranted, I had been there less than a year)... but in general if they reserve the right to say GTFO to you, then you have the right to just say, "I quit." and walk out the door and they should feel nothing. This is business. Not a love affair. I am sick and tired of hearing how you, the employee, should be 'loyal' to your employer when they are mostly sharks waiting to ditch you to save a nickel.
My not responding to your flame is in no way indicative of my submission to your statement, it just means I don't have t
So how does the new firm know that you were "unprofessional" in the timing of your departure?
That's an easy one. They ask if you're eligible to be rehired.
If you've done something bad or pissed off your management, the answer will be "no".
Since the company isn't disclosing any personal information or making any allegations regarding your conduct, there is nothing they can be sued over.
This is a fairly standard practice in corporate HR.
If you worked for a large business, you could probably dream up a not-entirely-terrible explanation since you know they will not provide any other details. It will still be a mark against, but you can mitigate it quite a bit.
I'm sure it varies by company, but you usually have to do more than just piss off management to be ineligible for rehire. Usually it's things like quitting without notice, stealing, etc.
Don't wait until after you've left. Don't rely on Personnel or your boss. Get some company letterhead and envelopes, find a trusted coworker and write each other undated Letters of Recommendation. Don't exaggerate, and write in generalities - reliable, conscientious, hard-working, etc.. Be brief.
Contribute to civilization: ari.aynrand.org/donate
Once, after a layoff.
I worked at a call center for Sears, and one day about 20 guys in suits walked in and the place fell silent. We all worked in a big "pit" so everyone could see.
All of us who were part of the first round of layoffs were escorted to a room, processed and handed a check and shown the door. It was a "hotseat" arrangement, so I had no personal effects except what was on my person.
A female friend mentioned they laid off all the guys who were not managers, and anyone else who was considered a "troublemaker" and we were given a severance check.
Everyone else spent two weeks boxing up files to be sent to the new call center in Idaho.
Never answer an anonymous letter. - Yogi Berra
My former employer sent the HR rep over at 3pm on a Tuesday with my supervisor and terminated my employment without cause, or notice. I found that it was in lieu of layoff. As the company had been paying severance in prior layoffs I could have made a case in court, so about 26 of us ended up Right to Worked one afternoon.
Yes, it is this way. In most corporate environments this is standard procedure. Unless they are mad at you the escort is normally your supervisor or what have you not security. And usually they will tell you at the end of the day or before you start your day. This way an employee has no opportunity to steal company property, sabotage systems, etc.
Things are generally very different in an environment with 20 people. When I've worked in small environments two weeks notice was never an issue and leaving was treated with dignity and discretion. Although not severance, most small businesses couldn't afford severance. When people are talking about corporations and profit machines they aren't talking about incorporated small organizations. Large organizations including publicly traded are a different animal and it isn't the same problem scaled they enjoy efficiency of scale that allows for larger cash flow and substantially greater profit and can/should be passing the benefits on to their staff. Small business on the other hand has to try to compete with those advantages and trying to do so actually just makes it even more difficult for them... which of course just gives that much more benefit to the large entities.
I've been "terminated" (without cause) from about half the jobs I've worked and I've never been given any notice. Faceless bean counters make decisions without regards to the consequences of their decisions. Security best practices never allow for an employee to know that they are getting terminated ahead of time. One place I worked at, Andrew Corporation, had my personal items boxed up over the weekend so when I came in Monday morning, they were all ready to walk me out. If you do leave and give notice, never tell your former employer about your new job. I worked at Platinum DB for four years, decided it was time to move on and took a job. Platinum DB contacted my new employer and made a lot of baseless accusations that sabotaged my new job completely. So word to the wise, never update your "linked-in" right away with your job information. With that, no one can ever say it is "professional" to give two weeks notice and do so with a straight face. Your individual relationships and contacts are much more important than your relationship with any one company, that's where you get your references for future jobs. If companies were loyal, you wouldn't see so many H1B visas getting trained as cheap labor replacements. I've kept myself relevant so I've always been able to find work, but IT wages are dropping because of H1B visas. Like my title says, there is no such thing as company loyalty anymore, almost all companies could care less.
I was working at a large investment bank dong electronic trading support and stayed on about two years too long. Things were great for the first few years; learning about credit and rate trading, learning how products like credit default swaps and interest rate swaps work, etc. Then the mortgage meltdown happened and things started going south.
Over the next few years staff was reduced to the point that members of my team were now covering both first and second shift. We had a rotating weekend schedule where we would either shut the environments down on Saturday, or perform a software release, and then we brought the systems back up on Sunday morning and then covered the beginning of Asia's trading. We used to get time off the following week, but because of the staffing situation that went away. When I asked about overtime I was told that I was classified as an exempt worker, which I later found out was not true. So I went from working a standard 40 hour week to working 40 hours each week plus two weekends of 10 to 20 hours of work each month; about 200 hours.
I finally was fed up enough to contact my recruiter and got an interview with a tech startup. Things went well and I was just waiting for the Board to approve the role. My plan was to take a week off work, go to Las Vegas for a few days, then put in my two weeks notice the following Monday. Unfortunately the Board took a couple more weeks before they signed off, so I was getting up every morning and signing a new resignation letter that I then carried around while waiting for the phone call. That was was pretty hard to do since I wanted nothing to do with the place and I kept thinking to myself that I should just leave, but I stuck it out.
So I'm finally out and getting up to speed in my new position. Then I get a letter in the mail from my former employer about applying for COBRA health insurance. It turns out that they had cancelled my insurance coverage two days after I left instead of deducting the premium for the rest of the month from my final paycheck and then waited weeks before letting me know. Thank goodness I didn't need it! I received another letter a week or so later saying they accidentally overpaid me on my final paycheck and would I please send them a check for the difference. Ha! At around the same time I had been doing some research about the laws regarding overtime and who qualifies as exempt. It turns out that they lied to me when they said I was exempt and they probably owed me ten or fifteen thousand dollars of overtime. I keep a work log of my hours and the tasks I do each day, so I had the records I needed. I was so fed up with them at that point that I just let it go rather than contact an attorney, I didn't need the stress.
In hindsight I really wish I would have just handed in my resignation letter and walked out the door. They were totally incompetent and I absolutely hated going to work every one of those last ten days. People always say not to burn bridges, but there was no way I would ever apply for a position with that company again so I do somewhat regret not giving myself some additional time off before starting the new job.
The ONE time I didn't give notice was a company that tried to pull some shady stuff and involve me in it. If a company tries anything illegal you shouldn't be made to feel you owe them, or any delusion of "professionalism" a thing.
Told my boss he was MIA on the second day of absence. Turned out he died in his hotel room.
Linkedin still tells me he is someone I should connect with.
Tracy Johnson
Old fashioned text games hosted below:
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BT
A courteous employer, that cashes out unused Time off, provides severance when laying off employees, even gives a heads up that layoffs might come in bad times, deserves an effort on your part to minimize the impact of your departure. An employer who doesn't pay out all of the left over vacation time, or lays folks off without severance, or is abusive, you can still be the bigger person, but it's not necessary.
(If at first you don't succeed, do it different next time!)
I have had only one in the last 20 years give me any notice the job was ending. For the record, I've never quit.
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
The blade cuts both ways . . . and based on the way the world actually is, the answer is a resounding "YES"! Done it myself a few times - employer dishonesty being the primary cause (like employees, employers can be shiesty).
so, that time when a coworker (ex-con) got angry and pulled a knife and started threatening everyone in the cube farm, I went to the boss and said, "this has to stop!" his answer was to say that he had no control over whether that guy brought a knife to work or not, I should just 'keep my head down.'... when I walked out then, I was 'unprofessional' in your eyes. Cops, when called, showed up three hours later, could find no one to admit to seeing the knife... and no knife on the perp. Good, I am glad to be that unprofessional.
My not responding to your flame is in no way indicative of my submission to your statement, it just means I don't have t
Yup, the point being that most of these fears about angering previous employers are unfounded. At least at larger companies, smaller companies might well say more or not even require a supervisor getting that call to forward to HR at all.
This is a myth spread from older times before people were so successful suing companies that were hindering their ability to find new gainful employment. It's spread through both ignorance and a deliberate misleading by employers.
If it's OK for an employer to lay someone off without 2 weeks notice, then it is automatically OK for that same person to leave (If they want) without 2 weeks notice.
If you are an employer and want notice from your employees, then sign a mutually-beneficial agreement that works both ways.
Summer of 2009. A Defense contractor in Sterling Heights, MI. They hired outside security to come in and escort people out (govt contracts got cut/canceled) I saw it first hand. I left on my own a few weeks later. 750 people were walked out the door the first week of "layoffs" without any prior notice. It happens, i lived it.
#include bier;
BTW, a couple of people freaked the f out..screaming and yelling, throwing stuff, etc. A couple of people collapsed and needed medical attention....as you can imagine the work environment was a mess for weeks after. I think around 1600 of the 3500 employees got walked out withing a month. Those who could left on their own within a few months. Hard to focus when the ax is over anybody's/everybodys head...
#include bier;
That's a lovely pretend wonderland you live in, there.
http://www.askamanager.org/2016/07/my-best-employee-quit-on-the-spot-because-i-wouldnt-let-her-go-to-her-college-graduation.html
If you reward your hardest working employees by fucking them over at every turn ("My go-to for weekends and holidays!") then it's little surprise when your best employees leave.
She wasn't a shitty worker. She was an abused one.
Read studies on this and they say 80% of the people who accept counter offers leave within a year anyway. The study didn't deal with those who were terminated, just those who took the counter and then quit anyway.
It is legal for a company to offer some advantages to giving notice rather than quitting on the spot.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
For example, if you explicitly tell your employer that there is a job you don't want to do and at some point they assign you to do that job, you are justified in quitting on the spot.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
And that is why I had the best teams around, I hired people whom I could trust, and when the shit hit the fan, they still could be trusted. I happen to agree with you that what I did might be wrong in the future. But the past has proven right. I'm still friends with all my old employees, even the fired ones ( one whom happens to be my best friend and still calls me boss )
if you see me, smile and say hello.
Newsflash: the management likes the idea of engineers not wearing suits and dressing like hoodlums. There is a reason why slaves were forced to work naked and nobles were more clothing than they needed. It creates a perception that you produce something with your body rather than with your mind. A suit restricts the range of your body movements. It serves to make the statement that only your mind and the palms of your hand are involved in doing your work. Getting engineers to believe that grit is a virtue is effectively a way instill an inferiority complex into them. Full disclosure: I do not sell suits or any formal wear nor have any investments in suits (or any formal wear) manufacturing or distributing ventures.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
In Sweden, the employer must give you one month notice, and if you quit, you must give the employer one month notice. Refusal to work during this time is breach of contract. When you have been employed for a year or more, this time is extended to 2 or 3 months. Some contracts can even require the employer to give you 6 months notice if you worked for several years, but when you quit, it often doesn't exceed 3 months.
Does the employer pay severance when they terminate an employee? For how long? I've worked for firms that gave a week of severance for every year of seniority -- and the troops returned the favor with a week of notice for each week of severance.
I've also worked for places where they came up to you at your desk at 14:30 and handed you your final pay calculated to 14:30 of that day. Sometimes people just didn't come back from lunch, and none of us were surprised.
Lacking <sarcasm> tags,
Wouldn't two weeks of severance pay be roughly equal to two weeks' notice? The deal here is that I do stuff and they give me money and other bennies for it. I can't do the stuff if I'm not here, but I can get the money and bennies even when I'm not.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
I know you are correct, but I have decided to hear it as "I could care less (but that wouldn't be worth the effort)".
Alternately: "It might surprise you to know, seeing how little I care, that I could care less than I appear to, but it would take quantum observation to discriminate between how much I care and the theoretical zero point."
So it's wrong but it's not wrong-wrong.
This is hand-in-hand with "It's not 'apathy' per se, I just don't think I care."
In english the ironic is normative. 8-)
Innocent people shouldn't be forced to pay for inferior software development.
--"Code Complete" Microsoft Press
Inferiority? Erh... no. Being stuffed into a suit is generally seen here as a sign that you're too dumb for anything and need to be restrained so you can't fuck up what people who are actually working have accomplished.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
I've quit without notice twice. In both cases the employers were maliciously incompetent--I was sure I wanted to burn the bridge, sink the boats, and raze the village. The last thing I wanted was a good reference from these people. In both cases, the companies went out of business--shocker.
In other cases I've given a month+ notice because I worked for great people and cool companies, I just had found a better opportunity.
ralphbarbagallo.com
I've seen the whole spectrum. One guy gave a years notice. I've seen a guy that relocated himself across the country and told us almost a week later he quit the week before. Yes, thanks for telling us. We all wondered if he was murdered, taken by the Govt or something.
The whole thing is, do you need that employer for a favorable recommendation? If you already have another job, not so much. However don't be a jackass. Don't leave people that are depending on you holding a bag. Just as you wouldn't want some else to just evaporate and leave you holding the bag. You never know when someone you screwed has a say in your future.
Just be respectful. Don't screw others.
I have seen a guy simply walk out due to a big disagreement with management. He was promised stuff and they told him to pound sand. He said - ok... here's my badge, pass, keys, see ya! Just send me my last check.
...Yes. Do you get two weeks notice when they fire you? No. Nuff said. All you other guys can say it's not professional, but you have to look out for yourself and your family first.
"Actually working"? You mean working with your mind is not "actual" work? Only getting "your hands dirty" is work? Didn't realize this was a site for plumbers.... I exaggerate, but that's the sentiment. Respecting the product of your own mind means emphasizing that it is your mind that's doing the working rather than the rest of your body.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
Some employers want you out as soon as you indicate you're leaving, so you might think you're leaving in two weeks, but you're actually leaving right now, as soon as they take your badge and escort you out.
No, I mean working. Getting shit done. In what universe is playing golf considered "working"?
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
In most cases you probably got 2 weeks pay in lieu of notice, perhaps even 60 days if the WARN Act was triggered.
I wasn't aware the WARN act covered non-union salaried employees. Only twice have I ever got severance pay at all, and in one of those cases, it was the one where I had a full month's warning.
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.