The Art of Resigning Pt 1 - Planning and Preparation
How to resign from a job? The Art of Resigning - Planning and Preparation
We spend 1/3rd of our lives at work.
Billions of people around the world spend the vast majority of their waking time making a living in any one of the many thousands of careers and professions. Quitting one is not easy.
People work for people. So leaving a job for a new path can feel like a curious mix of excitement and betrayal, and ownership of the entire process of accepting a new job hinges on your ability to ride the emotional wave of leaving a workplace.
Most people think the process of resigning or leaving a job starts when you hand in your notice, but that action is merely the endpoint of an emotional choice you made before that.
Although it's logical to say you were mentally exiting your job the moment you started applying for new opportunities, in reality the ball drops when you accept your new job. The weeks (or months) of hand wringing, nervously attending interviews, the research, the negotiation, even the choice to start searching for jobs...the apogee of the entire process is saying YES.
Normally, that’s when the mental gymnastics start: the mix of happiness and confusion, of career grief and excitement, the choice to tell certain work colleagues or others, the chance you have to tell friends, family members and loved ones about your new career path...everything comes to a head.
It can be, of course, overwhelming. It can also feel rather deflating - a moment which should be full of joy can be tainted by worry, stress and anxiety (unless you’re moving from a job you truly dislike, then it’s more a feeling of relief).
How to resign from a job? So what do you do next?
Don't Rush
- The most important thing to do is not to rush into handing in your resign notice and barking your news up the company chain. Allow yourself a congratulatory pat on the back! You’ve done something incredible, and in this post-pandemic world a bit of happiness and positivity is hard earned and satisfying. Take a moment to drink it in.
Job Acceptance Hack! - Thank your new employer
- Take note from our guidance on Thank You Letters in the interview process - absolutely mirror this once you’ve accepted a job. Take a moment to send a thank you letter to your new employer and, where appropriate, communicate what this means to them. You don’t need to put anything official in it (start dates or notice periods etc), that’s for more formal channels and for consideration at contract acceptance stage. Simply thank them. It shows respect and deference and communicates to your new employer what this means to you to work for them.
Build a mental exit strategy
- Resigning or leaving a job is as much mental as it is physical. Unlearning routines and ways of doing business, distancing yourself from work colleagues, even having to consider NDA’s and non-competes (which is especially acute in Sales) is all part and parcel of preparing yourself mentally and emotionally to leave an employer.
- Our own CPC of Sales Recruiters Dallas Henry Glickel words it perfectly:
- Even though you may be floating on cloud nine now, there are a lot of emotional and logistical hurdles yet to clear.
As you’ve already learned, the job-changing process arouses all sorts of feelings. During the transitional phase that begins with your acceptance of an offer and ends a month or two after you’ve started your new position, the emotional limbo you’ll experience will be especially acute. Why? Because suddenly, the reality kicks in. After all this time, the changes you’ve been contemplating are actually going to happen. Not only fear of cheating on your employer, but what about letting down your co-workers or subordinates? There is an emotional/personal bond people develop that really affects moving away from the company because emotionally they are attached to the people! They may think that they are attached to the company, but the reality is that they are attached to the human beings that for years they have been spending more “waking hours” with than, even their spouses! This is a very tough emotional hurdle as human beings' interpersonal relationships are at the core of their existence.
Plan a physical exit strategy
- Start preparing your transitional phase immediately. Your new employer should have an idea of your notice period, but nothing is set in stone. As we analyze in other blogs here there are a few hurdles yet to jump, any one of which could set your start date back.
- Planning your resigning strategy starts with understanding your current role and responsibility in regards to handover and succession, your notice period, and who needs to know.
- Make a list of primary contacts for handing in your notice: your line manager or direct manager and HR seniors.
- Write your notice out in physical form and save a digital version too.
- Prepare to hand in your notice!