Notice I'm not using the word "quit." Quit just has too many negative connotations.
So you have found a new company and a new job, you've accepted and now the really hard work: how to leave your current employer gracefully. And if you think that's not important, you're naive...Life is short and the technology community is very SMALL. It seems massive when you're in it, but believe me, after 20 years in the business, it's just not anywhere near as big as you think it is. What goes around does, in fact, come around. So make friends, and keep them wherever you can.
Carol Bartz was a terrible CEO for Yahoo (unless you give her credit for Ailibaba), but she had an awesome quote: "Be careful of the toes you step on on your way up, because they're connected to the butts you have to kiss on the way back down." Something along these lines. Get the picture?
Here are 10 things to do and a few things NOT to do weaved among them, when resigning:
1. Do NOT make it personal, even if it is.
2. Once you resign, tell them early and often that you're not open to a counter, even if you think you are. And let me talk about counters for a second. If they counter, and you stay...
a.You're weak
b. People WILL find out that they had to "buy you back" and they'll resent you for it.
c. Trust cannot and will not return to the relationship
d. Statistically speaking, you are 70% likely to be gone within 6-12 months anyway, and now you're the wishy washy person who jerked them around, took a counter and left. You've now fully trashed your reputation, not to mention piss off a search firm and the company and everyone associated with it, permanently. Is it worth the extra money? Absolutely not! In other words, if you resign, then LEAVE QUICKLY and have strength of conviction. Move on.
3. Don't reference people by name or be specific about what didn't work for you, unless you're certain the information will be kept in a vault somewhere, and only one person, maybe the CEO or the head of HR, will ever see the feedback. Give them constructive feedback on the way out and reinforce what you think is right about the company or what it can do to be more successful. Give them data they can use that's positive, and while you owe it to yourself and to them to at least describe why you're leaving, couch it in terms that aren't too harsh because they'll take it as an indictment of them (for not changing things quickly enough to keep you), or as a general indictment of the place where they work, which makes them too foolish or too weak to change jobs themselves. No one wins. The truth does NOT set you free here. It just breeds bad blood. The recipient of the data will then decide they didn't want you anyway, and it becomes "mutual." References in later years won't be as good as you deserve, in all likelihood, unless you handle these situations with great care.
4. Give them plausible deniability that it's their fault somehow. Give them reasons attached to other things, events, dynamics, what have you. But let them go tell the Board or whomever else, that it wasn't their fault that you left, even if it was....
5. Remember, this blog is for YOU, not for employers. It is about karma. It's about self preservation ultimately, over the long haul of your career.
6. Smile during the exit interview. You have a cool new job you're going to! But don't be smug. Don't look bitter.
7. Clean out your desk very early in the am and get your box of your personal stuff out way before anyone shows up to work. And don't linger around. Just makes people feel uncomfortable!
8. Don't be a jackass and blog about the company, or do Glassdoor. People can find out what they want to know in other media. You don't need to be a social media superstar trashing your employer. Again, bad karma.
9. Make the change about things you wanted out of life. Shorter commute, bigger job, money was something you couldn't refuse, wife/husband really wanted you to have a fresh and new scene, change is good, you didn't want to stagnate. Anything that doesn't attach to someone.
10. Give your boss something to remember you by, positively. Bottle of great wine, something funny like a bobble head. Again, leave him/her laughing, smiling or at least not frowning and frothing at the mouth to get revenge of some sort.
Good luck!
