Ask HN: How much to put in a resignation letter?
I'm resigning from my job today because, despite exceeding our sales quota for last year by 25%, senior management informed our team that no one would be receiving any increase in compensation, a bonus, or a promotion. Obviously this has had a negative affect on morale.
How much of that should I include in my resignation letter?
71 comments
[ 1.8 ms ] story [ 126 ms ] threadMy last day will be date(today + 14) % weekend.
I tried telling the truth in my first exit interview and all it did was burn bridges and make people mad. I wasn't even pulling skeletons out, I just stated the facts for why I was leaving and when they tried to counter (Another thing, NEVER accept a counter offer) and I refused they got all mad because they thought they were addressing all my reasons for leaving but I was still leaving. Don't give them that chance, you already know you want to leave, don't waste yours or their time trying to convince you otherwise.
Over the years, I've heard this advice repeatedly, but with often wildly different reasons. I'm genuinely curious what your rationale for this advice is.
The managers may also be resentful and suspicious of you.
Lose/lose.
The future consequences are also huge, you may no longer be seen as "team player" which can slow or halt your career, better to not take the chance and move on.
I'd have to disagree. Don't say anything negative. Don't talk about why you are leaving. But you can say some positive things. How you had a great time working with $team. How you hope that $project will be a success. How you will miss $company_gathering.
what a3n said.
When it comes to the exit interview, DO NOT SAY ANYTHING EITHER. It all goes into your employment record. You don't owe them any honesty, so just leave quietly and don't burn any bridges.
Think of it this way, what do you have to gain by being honest? What do you have to lose? I think you'll see being anything other than polite and positive in your resignation letter offers nothing but downside.
I had one experience where I submitted a resignation (two weeks' notice) the same day as someone else in the company.
I said the bare minimum in my letter. When questioned by the CEO, division lead, and co-workers, I also said the bare minimum and kept it very neutral. The other person, on the other hand, decided this was their opportunity to express their anger and frustration.
As a result, their last two weeks were full of tense meetings, shouting matches, threats of lawsuit from both sides, and dirty things being said behind their back.
Meanwhile, my last two weeks were easy, stress-free, and nobody gave me a hard time. The CEO made me an offer to stay (which I declined), people were spreading positive things about me (I heard this through several trusted sources), and I generally left on a positive note.
The thing is, I felt the same anger and frustration as the other person. But as the parent said, I knew there was absolutely nothing to be gained by releasing any of it.
* Have a proper emergency fund (6-12 weeks). You should not be counting on any pay after you give notice.
* Have references outside of your immediate current manager
* On Friday, "today is my last day"
* Still be honest why you're leaving
Two weeks notice is a courtesy you're not required to extend to an employer (EDIT: This is US-centric advice, please verify this is true in your non-US jurisdiction), and you should only do so if you're on good terms.
"Reasonable" is up to you. As I said, notice is not (EDIT: as asked by other posters, this is US-centric advice. Please verify this applies in your jurisdiction) required. An employer is not required to provide you with any notice to terminate you, and therefore I only provide notice if I believe the work relationship will be amiable for the duration after I give notice.
Sometimes, you gain nothing from giving notice, and I refuse to allow fear ("hassle for employer", "coming back to haunt you") to drive my decisions.
(Here in Germany these things are a bit different anyways, default period is a month and can be longer by individual contract. Sometimes it is matched to the notice times the employer has to give, which go up to 7 months(!) for people that have been employed for a long time)
This is an international site, you should be careful giving out US "at will" state advice like it applies to everywhere.
In the UK for example, you can in theory be sued for failure to give a "reasonable" period of notice[0] (although in reality this nearly never happens).
[0] http://www.acas.org.uk/index.aspx?articleid=1650
That employee was foolish to stick around. At the first sign of hassle from the employer you scoop up your things and walk out the door. Your local labor laws cover you as far as making sure your last paycheck is delivered within a certain amount of time.
So your name, the fact that you are resigning, and your proposal for your last day.
And as others have said, when you submit that understand that your employer may ask you to leave immediately, so be ready to collect your stuff and walk out the door.
Maybe it should go without saying, but if you're leaving on good terms, it can't hurt to say nice things in your exit interview.
But, if you trust the exit interviewer to both listen and possibly act on your feedback, feel free to give honest feedback during an interview. It's better to give constructive criticism ('the company could do better about communicating business challenges affecting comp') than to complain ('I'm leaving because even though we exceeded quota, my team didn't get any comp increases'). Just remember that because you aren't part of the team anymore, you have much less credibility than before.
I recently left a job and had an exit interview with the CEO (small company). I knew he could effect change, if convinced, and was trustworthy, so I offered some suggestions. I've left jobs with larger companies where the trust wasn't there, and didn't say much in the exit interview.
Keep it short unless you want to achieve something specific, and then include only the verbiage relevant to that purpose.
I have a better offer for a job I'm looking forward to starting, so there's nothing I can do that will help me personally. It feels more honest to me to be upfront and, who knows, it might help my colleagues.
I don't think being frank will affect my ability to get references from the people here. Aside from that, are there any other risks?
That's a mistake. You may see it as frank and constructive feedback, but they may see it as complaining and acting unprofessional. Is it really worth risking it?
Keep the formal resignation letter short. It's perfectly fine to include a few pleasantries (unless you plan to sue them for something in the future.)
Then, if you wish, have some private conversations with management and give them an honest assessment of how they could better achieve their own purposes. Keep the focus on helping them. Take your former bosses out for coffee they next time they visit. Give them insights that they would not other get. Keep up your relationships with your former colleagues as well.
That's the purpose you should keep in mind. It's more than not burning bridges. It's about creating future opportunities for yourself. Create lemonade from today's lemons.
Edit: do this even if they're all evil bastards. You never know what will come of it in the future.
If you really want to let them know why, tell them in the exit interview.
If they don't perform an exit interview, well that tells you they give no fucks about what you think anyways, so you'd be wasting your breathe.
Keep it as formal as possible and be polite. If you have an exit interview, don't complain about former peers or managers.
Keep it concise.
Downside: You're in a sucky environment for 1-6 months longer.
Upside: You have a LOT more negotiating leverage for your next job.
Management might throw some short-term things your way if you smile politely and play along until you have the next position lined up. The trick is to NOT LET THEM KNOW you're looking. Don't take recruiter/interview calls during work hours. Don't use company computers to scrub job boards and handle applications.
Your impulse is to walk away, and that's a hard impulse to fight, but believe me it will look better during interviews when you don't have a gap on your resume.
How will you answer questions about that? "Oh, I walked away in a huff when I didn't get a raise" signals that you could be a potential problem if/when problems arise at your new employer as well.
Every company has financial hiccups. Even if you aced your work every single quarter there are going to be cashflow problems somewhere else. Dig in, put your ear to the ground, and find out what is really happening in your company.
You will never get a chance like that. Of course, it doesn't always work, it really depends on the situation.
There's no guarantee you can find a new job right away, no matter how hot your skills are or how brilliant you are.
Also, you have less negotiating leverage when you're unemployed. If you are currently making $X and you get an offer for $X, you probably could negotiate for $X+10 or $X+20. If you're unemployed, and have been on the market awhile, you might get lowballed into taking $X or $X-10.
That actually happened for my current job. The boss was considering initially offering me my current salary, but I honestly said "I'm not so sure. Maybe I'll just keep looking instead." Then he wound up offering a 30% rate increase.
It might help to use a reference from the current employer too which is possible if you quit first.
You can tell them that yu are giving them whoever much notice you're required to give; yu can tell them what you think your last working day is; you can ask them if there's anything they want you to focus on before you leave.
Raising the problem of mot being rewarded for work done is done through other measures, before you resign. You can mention it carefully during an exit interview - "I worked hard, my team beat expectations, I felt devalued when we didn't get the bonus." But it's probably best not to.
Sometimes tough decisions must be made, so before resigning (possibly out of frustration/disappointment) get the facts and the actual reason - and base your decision on that instead.
(of course, if senior management actually didn't inform about the reason - that might be reason itself to leave anyway...)
It could be argued that there would have been other ways to acknowledge the success in sales than handing out money (though depending on how this has been handled before, that could still have come across as trying to be "cheap" and have the opposite effect).
But if it's not possible to determine whether the increase in sale had any effect on the overall finances of the company or whether the company was all-in-all doing better or worse, that's a huge problem IMO.
I've seen business owners try to shield the actual finances of their company from their employees to siphon more money out of it far too often to see financial intransparency as anything other than a huge warning sign.
Note I'm not talking about the exact numbers. But if the company is doing badly when every metric accessible to the employees indicates otherwise, something is definitely amiss.
No one is happy with such news, as others said - start searching for a new job and once you find, then quit.
Please accept this letter as formal notification that I am leaving my position with [company name] on [full date of departure]. After much consideration I have decided to accept another job offer. My new position will enhance my career growth and will expose me to challenges and opportunities that I believe are in my best interest.
I value the professional relationships I have made with my coworkers, as well as yourself. Because of this, if there is anything I can do in my last days of employment to help transition my work, please let me know.
If you are pressed on your reasons in a meeting or otherwise, make it clear that it was a hard choice and that you thought through it very well so that they don't counter the offer.
Keep it professional. It's all upside if you do.
Once you do this, you're setting the bridges on fire when you leave, so only do it to protect yourself.
Otherwise, say something like "Dear Boss, I'm resigning my position, effective xx/yy/zz. Thank you for the opportunity to contribute and I'm happy to assist in the transitioning my work."
Lesson learned; don't swear in notices, but also keep it simple. Even if you tried to offer them your honest view of how things were, chances are they'd get filed in a drawer and stuck away.
It took a number of people handing notices day-by-day at AOL before HR clicked that something was wrong, so at that point they invited the Sales team to the NY office (the sales team hadn't been on an overseas trip before). It was a nice gesture of the company; shame that the people got food poisoning on the first night.
In some ways, you could say that swearing got me my bonus.
#1 The tech industry is small. #2 The circles you move in are smaller.
Keep it professional, keep it simple, and always resign with decorum.
Many others have stated here the purpose of a resignation letter, but I would add that I extend it to verbal too.
I've decided to resign my position as <position> at <company>.
My last day of work will be <2 weeks from today>.
Sincerely, <name>"
During the exit interview your reason for leaving is "decided it was time to leave to pursue other opportunities."
Public leaving letter you send out to coworkers: "Hi guys, it's been awesome working with you. I've met some truly exceptional people and you all have lots to be proud of.
I've decided to move on and pursue other things, but I truly wish everybody here the best and continued success and good luck!
Feel free to reach out to me at <personal email address>"
Your employers aren't stupid and people leaving right after they decided to do this will be an obvious cause and effect. Bonus, if they're contacted later on by a future employer for a reference, your outgoing personnel file won't be filled with bridge burning that could harm you later.
Everybody gets dissatisfied with their job at some point and leaves, it's part of being a working professional. Learning how to do it in a professional way is an important skill to develop.
Even if you're very friendly with the C-team at your company, DO NOT GIVE HONEST FEEDBACK. It can only hurt you in the future. I, myself, made this mistake a few years ago, and now I'm always worried a potential employer will ask for a reference from that particular employer.
Seriously -- thanks for the input, everyone. I'll keep it short, simple, and professional.
You may be able to use your current employment as leverage as you locate this new job. I was personally in a very similar situation, the end result was that the new company wanted to hire me ASAP and offered a decent pay raise over my current job; I put in my two weeks notice and revealed nothing. In the end, I was offered a raise at my old job (turned down); months later they wanted to contract me for some work on the weekend, and they've made it clear there's an open door if I ever want to return. Requesting two weeks before you can begin work (for time to put in your two weeks notice) to your new employer also demonstrates your loyalty and stability, something a good employer will recognize & respect.
edit: My resignation also marked the first of my team's mass exodus. 6 months later, everyone I worked with has left, and they've got a completely new team. A word of warning (at least in the US), you don't want to be caught trying to get your coworkers to leave, and especially not to get them to follow you to a new employer.
I made the mistake of trying to be honest. I explained why I felt that the work environment needed to be improved. I tried not to come across as accusatory and didn't blame anyone, just stating that the environment negatively affected my health and that it was likely the reason for other systemic problems (e.g. the high turnover) the company was facing and should be addressed.
Big mistake.
To keep a long story short, I ended up suing the company because they withheld payments arguing I owed them work (and in fact threatened to sue me over that). I would have likely won, but agreed to a settlement (that mostly consisted of them giving me money and me signing a statement that I had already turned in all property of theirs before quitting -- which wasn't really contested to begin with).
All in all, it wasn't worth it. I lost a budding friendship with a colleague who stayed with the company (and likely had to bear the fallout from my resignation) and the first couple of weeks after the resignation (before I decided to sue and was able to hand it all over to a lawyer) were a complete nightmare, even though I didn't spend a single day of it at the company.
Now there is a company out there where employees think badly of me because they were either hired during the fallout or were told stories about it if they joined after the fact. There's an employer who hates my guts and may have told others to avoid me. And there's a company I'll have to avoid working with (directly or not) in the future.
I'm sure there was no possibility of a "good" ending at the point I quit to begin with because my biggest mistake was holding out until I was too broken to leave gracefully. But I'm also pretty sure a simple "I'm leaving for greener pastures" type resignation could have at least avoided fuelling the fire.
Don't ever go into the details about why you're leaving. If anyone depends on you, make sure to find a graceful transition for them (if only by informing them well in advance), but don't ever say anything that implies they should have done things differently.
Despite what people say, most of them don't want your honest opinion. They just want to hear they've done nothing wrong. You're already causing a disruption for them by leaving, don't allow them to spin it into an attack. You're far more likely to make them think if you don't give them an opportunity to think of you as an aggressor (and if they will do so anyway, you have lost nothing).
On the flip side, the right time to bring up problems is while you are still intent on working there. If delivering outstanding work is not acknowledged, address it before you have decided to leave. As an employee, your opinion holds weight (because ignoring it may result in your resignation). If you've already resigned, you've already played your hand.
(If you do, however, maintain a friendship with your former employer, you may be able to talk to him about the reasons why you left, but not as an ex-employee at work, but as a friend -- preferably in a different environment altogether.)
Is the lack of increased compensation/bonus/promotion truly the deciding factor to resign? or were there other issues?
Especially in early-stage companies with ambitious growth plans it's easy to promise these things. But it can be very hard to actually deliver on cash-flow, in spite of achieving managements projected targets. You may for example, negotiate a differed comp/bonus plan if you decide to stay.