Comment On U R NT QFD & Giving Notice

Shoulda told the boss you'd work through the first week and then just call in sick.

Makes me wonder how that boss treats his employees that don't have the upper hand (have already given their notice). That conversation only confirms leaving was the right decision.

The first one reminds me of the ads I have seen in the newspaper, asking for qualifications such as:
"Experience in Sequel"
"Must know Pearl Programming"
Obviously, the ad was dictated over the phone (and never double-checked for accuracy.

Soooooo ... what happened on the 29th?

For the newspaper ad, maybe the person was being charged by the character and abbreviated as much as possible in order to save money? Still, that is a little much.

Ah, 'txt spk', the preferred communication method of the brain dead moron.

Personally, I'd rather spend an extra 4p (or however much a text costs) to send an extra message with proper spelling, punctuation and grammar than send anything in 'txt spk'

Yeah, your boss just confirmed that leaving was the right thing. I couldn't imagine someone that pompous that thinks he can dictate when your last day is like that. Giving notice is a courtesy.

First one looks like a cheapskate. Although, we all know that ppl only rd a frst fw lttrs of wrds nywy so dsnt mttr.

Second one is just laughable. I love situations like that, because the boss is such a tyrant that he wants to show that he's still the boss, even when he can't do anything. I mean, if you already gave notice, what are they going to do? Fire you??

I normally don't even ask for time off, I calmly say *when* I'm going to take time off. Anyone arrogant enough to expect servitude instead of equality can f-off and burn in Hell.

// Sorry, some ov my keys are broken

What I found amusing is that the boss assumes he'll be working as a consultant after his departure.

My answer would have been to ask how much more I'd get paid as a consultant - I might want to leave earlier...

A Gould:

What I found amusing is that the boss assumes he'll be working as a consultant after his departure.

Or that he would be willing to work with said boss so that it is cheaper for the company. Why yes, I'll gladly work another week so you can pay me less.

At my last gig I gave four day's notice - I was moving and they told me on a Tuesday afternoon I had the gig and could I start Monday and I said hell yes (so, 3.5 days notice I guess). I told my boss, a woman in her 50's, and she was devastated. She was pissed because on our team of two people under her I was leaving her with the shitty guy and this was during a hiring freeze.

Later on she gave me the "you should have told me you were looking" bit. Right! And if I never found anything then what? She also told me that at that job nothing bad was gonna happen but "in most places, they'd walk you right out the door". Well, if I want to leave in four days, why do you think I'd see a DISadvantage to leaving today? That's just more time to pack, dumbass.

The dumbest thing there was you had to go through this long ass list of things (turn in keys, cards, fill out a survey, etc.) and the whole time I was thinking "I do you the favor of actually ever coming back instead of just saying 'after lunch I'm gone' or just not coming back (which my predecessor in that job had done apparently) and you make me do this?" Whatever, it felt so good to get out of there :)

wnkr

I don't get the comment about working as a consultant. Did the boss just assume he would be working there after he quit as a consultant? And would agree to stay on longer for less money?

I once had an employer like that second one. I tried to hand her my resignation letter and she simply refused to take the envelope from my hand. She said "No, I don't accept it."

(That was my second attempt at leaving - the first time they guilt-tripped me into changing my mind, and I was young and foolish enough to agree to stay.)

So I just left and didn't come back.

SomeCoder:

Giving notice is a courtesy.

This is true in almost every case (within the US). Lots of companies actually prefer you leave the day you resign. To protect their precious trade secrets of course.

I'm continuously surprised that some managers think they can keep you from quitting by not 'accepting' your resignation. Accepting a resignation means acknowledging receipt, it doesn't mean that you are letting me leave (I'm free to leave whenever the hell I want, and for whatever reason I want).

Take this and pass it on: If you don't accept my resignation, I'll make YOUR boss accept it. And if I really don't like you, I'll make HR accept it, with a little note that says "SoandSo would not accept my resignation on behalf of the company".

~Sticky

Some years ago I worked part-time on the floor at Canadian Tire in the hardware department. Not a terrible gig for a minimum-wage retail job, actually, I learned a lot about hardware, paint, etc. and learned the store inside and out (so I know how to scan things to see if they'll be coming up for sale in the future, etc.. :) )

I was trying to make a few bucks on the side while working on a master's thesis. I quickly found that this wasn't working (I needed more time to concentrate on writing) so I gave my notice that after this week, I was done. My boss, who was a very nice guy, was disappointed but seemed understanding.

Until I saw the schedule posted for the following week, and saw I was still on it. I called him and he gave me this huge apologetic and sheepish look, like "I know, I know, I'm really sorry, but I'm short on people and I need you to do this..."

And me, I'm too nice a guy, so I worked that extra week. But I made it very clear that I was not showing up after that, even if I was scheduled.

I wasn't going to ever show up at all, after that, until a MONTH later when my friend (who also worked there) told me that my final paycheck was still sitting upstairs in the office, why wasn't I going to go pick it up?

Seems they'd "forgotten" to tell me to come in to pick up my final pay.

That first ad was text messaged from a bathroom. They were apparently in the middle of a vowel movement and got carried away.

DeLos:

SomeCoder:

Giving notice is a courtesy.

This is true in almost every case (within the US). Lots of companies actually prefer you leave the day you resign. To protect their precious trade secrets of course.

In Europe, however, in any case in the Netherlands, it is very common to have a contractual period you have to honour before you can leave the company. Usually you can only give notice per the first of the month with a month's notice.
This is precisely because the employers want their personnel to be able to finish and/or hand over pending work properly.
It seems like US employers are far more paranoid than their European counterparts.

Anyway, if you plan to give notice and you are planning to copy some of the company secrets, surely you do so before you give your notice, if you expect your boss to expect you to walk out immediately? By the way, there are laws against such behaviour...

I left my previous employer, who provides services to long distance phone users. I was the principal (and one of only two) programmers. I told them I'd work part-time for them. It's been two years now. The question I have -- I said I'd work for the same rate as I was being paid full-time, but on an hourly basis. Should I have asked for a (lot) more?

WhiskeyJack:

Seems they'd "forgotten" to tell me to come in to pick up my final pay.

Why did they have to tell you that you were owed money? If you knew you worked the week, didn't you know you were supposed to get paid?

dogbrags:

Should I have asked for a (lot) more?

Ummmm... politely put: Hell yes.

ParkinT:

The first one reminds me of the ads I have seen in the newspaper, asking for qualifications such as:
"Experience in Sequel"
"Must know Pearl Programming"
Obviously, the ad was dictated over the phone (and never double-checked for accuracy.

The sequel thing just serves the person dictating the advert right. There is no good excuse for turning an acronym into a word unless it natural spells one. On the other hand, the adverts that amuse me in the Uk are the ones that ask for Experience of "Apache, php, perl, ASP, VB, C#, .NET, MySQL, SQL, Oracle, IIS, Linux..." - it's highly unlikely that any job is ever going to want all of those skills, and if they do it suggests the managers are too incompetent to choose a single architecture to work with and you don't want to wrok there anyway!

DeLos:

SomeCoder:

Giving notice is a courtesy.

This is true in almost every case (within the US). Lots of companies actually prefer you leave the day you resign. To protect their precious trade secrets of course.

In the UK, if the employee's notice period is stated in the contract of employment, if they leave without giving notice, they are in breach of contract. So, the employer has to pay up to the end of when they did work, but no more (they don't need to pay for the notice period), PLUS the employer can take the ex-employee to court for damages (eg the cost of hiring a temp to cover their notice period at short notice).

Also, in any references given by the ex-employer they will almost certainly state that the employee left without meeting their contractual requirements.

So - walking out without the required notice period is a bad idea. But if you give notice, then the employer has no right to make you stay longer, and often they're willing to negotiate shorter notice periods anyway.

WhiskeyJack:

Some years ago I worked part-time on the floor at Canadian Tire in the hardware department. Not a terrible gig for a minimum-wage retail job, actually, I learned a lot about hardware, paint, etc. and learned the store inside and out (so I know how to scan things to see if they'll be coming up for sale in the future, etc.. :) )

I was trying to make a few bucks on the side while working on a master's thesis. I quickly found that this wasn't working (I needed more time to concentrate on writing) so I gave my notice that after this week, I was done. My boss, who was a very nice guy, was disappointed but seemed understanding.

Until I saw the schedule posted for the following week, and saw I was still on it. I called him and he gave me this huge apologetic and sheepish look, like "I know, I know, I'm really sorry, but I'm short on people and I need you to do this..."

And me, I'm too nice a guy, so I worked that extra week. But I made it very clear that I was not showing up after that, even if I was scheduled.

I wasn't going to ever show up at all, after that, until a MONTH later when my friend (who also worked there) told me that my final paycheck was still sitting upstairs in the office, why wasn't I going to go pick it up?

Seems they'd "forgotten" to tell me to come in to pick up my final pay.

Did they pay you in Canadian Tire Money?

DeLos:

SomeCoder:

Giving notice is a courtesy.

This is true in almost every case (within the US). Lots of companies actually prefer you leave the day you resign. To protect their precious trade secrets of course.

Where I work, failure to give notice ten working days in advance causes you to lose your accumulated vacation time (which you would otherwise be paid for upon leaving). Oh, and you have to actually work all ten of those days.

Rachael:

I once had an employer like that second one. I tried to hand her my resignation letter and she simply refused to take the envelope from my hand. She said "No, I don't accept it."

(That was my second attempt at leaving - the first time they guilt-tripped me into changing my mind, and I was young and foolish enough to agree to stay.)

So I just left and didn't come back.

I do remember one case where this approach actually worked, but the circumstances were so different that it won't likely be any use to any actual PHBs you encounter:

"In that case," Yellin said, and he dropped to one knee and held out the envelope, "I must resign." It was a difficult decision - the Yellins had headed enforcement in Florin for generations, and they took their work more than seriously. "I am not doing a capable job, sire; please forgive me and believe me when I say that my failures were those of the body and mind and not of the heart."

Prince Humperdinck found himself, quite suddenly, in a genuine pickle, for once the war was finished, he needed someone to stay in Guilder and run it, since he couldn't be in two places at once, and the only men he trusted were Yellin and the Count, and the Count would never take the job, being obsessed, as he was these days, with finishing his stupid Pain Primer. "I do not accept your resignation, you are doing a capable job, there is no plot, I shall slaughter the Queen myself this very evening, you shall run Guilder for me after the war, now get back on your feet."

Yellin didn't know what to say. "Thank you" seemed so inadequate, but it was all he could come up with.

StickyWidget:

I'm continuously surprised that some managers think they can keep you from quitting by not 'accepting' your resignation. Accepting a resignation means acknowledging receipt, it doesn't mean that you are letting me leave (I'm free to leave whenever the hell I want, and for whatever reason I want).

Take this and pass it on: If you don't accept my resignation, I'll make YOUR boss accept it. And if I really don't like you, I'll make HR accept it, with a little note that says "SoandSo would not accept my resignation on behalf of the company".

~Sticky

Nah, just say "Whether or not you accept it, I am giving you Notice as per my contract."

DeLos:

SomeCoder:

Giving notice is a courtesy.

This is true in almost every case (within the US). Lots of companies actually prefer you leave the day you resign. To protect their precious trade secrets of course.

Which you continue to possess regardless of how long you work after resigning, and which (if the company cares) you contractually agreed not to steal anyway, also regardless of when you leave.

I've also heard the argument of "protecting against vandalism/sabotage" - as if a disgruntled employee could not engage in sabotage /before/ resigning, or in fact arrange for sabotage to take effect only much later (which, in the news, an employee was recently charged for; I don't recall the details).

As neither of the stated reasons makes any sense, I have the theory that escorting you out of the building simply salvages their wounded pride. "You can't quit because I'm FIRING you, sucker!"

JiP:

DeLos:

SomeCoder:

Giving notice is a courtesy.

This is true in almost every case (within the US). Lots of companies actually prefer you leave the day you resign. To protect their precious trade secrets of course.

In Europe, however, in any case in the Netherlands, it is very common to have a contractual period you have to honour before you can leave the company. Usually you can only give notice per the first of the month with a month's notice.
This is precisely because the employers want their personnel to be able to finish and/or hand over pending work properly.
It seems like US employers are far more paranoid than their European counterparts.

Anyway, if you plan to give notice and you are planning to copy some of the company secrets, surely you do so before you give your notice, if you expect your boss to expect you to walk out immediately? By the way, there are laws against such behaviour...

I think that in Europe the difference is the concept of 'at will employment' isn't as prevalent as in the US. In the US in most states you can be fired at any time with no reason (unless you are in a group protected by discrimination laws), and in return the employee is free to leave at any time. In Europe the relationship between employee and employer is more sticky. Both ways have pluses and minuses.

themagni:

"In the event of a breach of confidentiality, the damage to the core business may be so severe that financial restitution may not be sufficient."

WTF does that mean?

It means you have to spend the rest of your life and maybe the lives of your children trying to invent a time machine so you can go back in time and prevent yourself from committing the breach of confidentiality.

Read the fine print... :)

fascinating reading, story and the comments. Where I work for 10 years, I do not remember a single case of leaving without at least three months notice. And without helping the replacement to get into stride. And without a good-bye party with the whole departement invited. No one here ever pulled a stunt like slamming door and not returning.
Now I wonder... Does it mean I am working with bunch of really nice people, or that we all are a bunch of company´s bootlicking pussies?

On the flip side, we have an employee -- a CAD Draftsperson -- that we tried to fire once. We told her that we had to let her go. She responded "No!" Dumbfounded, the branch manager started to explain that she didn't have a choice. She responded that her rich father recently passed away, leaving everything to her. She didn't need the money, obviously, but needed a way to keep her sanity during the day and she liked it here. She offered taking a major salary cut if she could keep her job. Entertaining the thought, the BM offered her half, and she accepted it.

Needless to say, she still has her job. She wasn't THAT bad of a CAD person.

Evidently he probably misread the "At Will" part of your contract where you can leave any time you want or, more importantly, they can fire you any time they want. It's cool for them to give you 0 days notice when they decide to let you go, but you have to give 2 weeks. At my last job, as chance would have it I handed in resignation 3 days before I went on a 10 day European vacation, but gave them 3 weeks notice instead. I had 4 bosses, none of whom ever agreed on anything. One begged me to stay, one gave me a reference for the next job and one basically wanted to get rid of me. Rather than just letting me go, the one boss who was a real jerk, assigned me some token busywork for 2 weeks. He kept saying, it was my "Legacy" to leave behind. What really was happening, is that they knew that the feature I had yet to implement was crucial to the success of the product and that I was the only one there that could do it.

this might have been said, I dont know, but the txt message ad was probably not, just it cost a certain amount for the ad for so many lines so they had to shorten it.

Walking employees out of the building immediately after they quit is just mimicking larger businesses. If someone leaves the company, whether by quitting or being fired, the blanket policy is typically to just get them out the door since "they have nothing to lose". Any manager who does this with you (whether you were well-liked or not) will just walk you out the door and pass the buck by blaming it on HR policy.

There is always "manager discretion" but if you quit and your boss let's you hang around and you break something, your boss is going to get reamed and take the blame.

"In the event of a breach of confidentiality, the damage to the core business may be so severe that financial restitution may not be sufficient."

I beleive that means you go to jail.
Go directly to jail.
Do not pass go.
Do not collect $200.

Actually, they'll probably be collecting money from you, and all of your houses and hotels while they're at it.

themagni:

At least two of the NDAs I've signed had language like,

"In the event of a breach of confidentiality, the damage to the core business may be so severe that financial restitution may not be sufficient."

WTF does that mean?

That they reserve the right to press criminal charges?

George Nacht:

Now I wonder... Does it mean I am working with bunch of really nice people, or that we all are a bunch of company´s bootlicking pussies?

A little from Column A, a little from Column B. It really depends on the company culture. There are some places where I'd feel bad about leaving, and offer to train a replacement and/or have a farewell party before I go. Then there are some where I really want to go out for lunch and never return.

Someone You Know:

DeLos:

SomeCoder:

Giving notice is a courtesy.

This is true in almost every case (within the US). Lots of companies actually prefer you leave the day you resign. To protect their precious trade secrets of course.

Where I work, failure to give notice ten working days in advance causes you to lose your accumulated vacation time (which you would otherwise be paid for upon leaving). Oh, and you have to actually work all ten of those days.

If you work in California that is illegal and you can sue them for that.

Pez:

Personally, I'd rather spend an extra 4p (or however much a text costs) to send an extra message with proper spelling, punctuation and grammar than send anything in 'txt spk'

In a small newspaper, another 10 words might cost $25 to $50. In a newspaper you might expect people to <i>read</i>, add a 0 or two onto that figure.

When I left my first job I gave the standard 2 week notice. My manager said, "That may not be the case. I'll need to talk to the president first." I then asked, if that meant I would be asked to leave sooner. If so, I would like to know as soon as possible so I could arrange to start my new job sooner. His reply again was "That may not be the case because we need you to finish your current project". His definition of project was busy work. I replied that if he expects me to show up for work after my last day then "that my not be the case". He came back a few minutes after meeting with the company president and replied "We've accepted your resignation." I wanted to say "I'm so honored!!!!!" but I bit my lip.

JimM:

On the other hand, the adverts that amuse me in the Uk are the ones that ask for Experience of "Apache, php, perl, ASP, VB, C#, .NET, MySQL, SQL, Oracle, IIS, Linux..." - it's highly unlikely that any job is ever going to want all of those skills, and if they do it suggests the managers are too incompetent to choose a single architecture to work with and you don't want to wrok there anyway!

This could be because of some UK law that means that they have to place an advert even if they want someone's relative to take the job. So they place an advert so specific that only one person fits... (guess who)

I've seen that in the context of clauses that require "specific performance" which, if you're not a lawyer, is put into contracts to cover cases where your expertise is so singular that you're irreplaceable - for example, if you're the only person in the world qualified to do a certain kind of work, and the company has built itself and sold itself on your expertise. I've been told (by my lawyer, who also happens to be my wife;) that for this kind of work specific performance claims are bogus and would probably never stand up in court.
So basically, they're intimidation clauses - if we go after you we can ask a court to force you to fix it for us for free, yadda yadda. OTOH, signing it because you're forced to or can't get the job without it will probably not get you out of responsibility for it. If they're asking for unfair things they're officially bastards.

One company asked me to sign something saying that I agreed that in any dispute I'd be responsible for their legal fees. The same company asked people (who walked in for an interview) to grant authorization to see all of their medical and educational records for their entire lives!. The world is just chock full of nice people, isn't it?

Patrick:

Someone You Know:

Where I work, failure to give notice ten working days in advance causes you to lose your accumulated vacation time (which you would otherwise be paid for upon leaving). Oh, and you have to actually work all ten of those days.

If you work in California that is illegal and you can sue them for that.

I'm in New York. Why is it illegal in California? The contract doesn't say you can't leave without notice; it only says that if you don't, you don't get paid for your unused vacation days.

Chuck:

For the newspaper ad, maybe the person was being charged by the character and abbreviated as much as possible in order to save money?

But in typical business fashion, ignores the fact that they are probably hurting themselves in the long run because I suspect most people would skip over it. That would not be an ad I would follow up if I already had a job.

DeLos:

SomeCoder:

Giving notice is a courtesy.

This is true in almost every case (within the US). Lots of companies actually prefer you leave the day you resign. To protect their precious trade secrets of course.

I once worked for a company where a LOT of people were quitting. You could tell how valuable you were by what happened when you gave notice - the valuable employees were allowed to stay as long as they wanted (2 weeks, etc) while the employees no one liked were escorted out the door immediately.

Someone You Know:

Patrick:

Someone You Know:

Where I work, failure to give notice ten working days in advance causes you to lose your accumulated vacation time (which you would otherwise be paid for upon leaving). Oh, and you have to actually work all ten of those days.

If you work in California that is illegal and you can sue them for that.

I'm in New York. Why is it illegal in California? The contract doesn't say you can't leave without notice; it only says that if you don't, you don't get paid for your unused vacation days.

"Employment at will" (most states) says you can quite anytime you want, and you can be fired anytime the company wants. Vacation time is a separate issue - normally they are required by law to pay you unused vacation time, which is considered as much of an entitlement to the time you worked as getting your last paycheck. But, some devious companies no longer grant earned vacation, they provide a catch-all "personal time off" which they are not required legally to pay you in the event you leave.