Well, I did it. Today I quit my part-time pharmacy job. After my French lesson (where I learned how to say "I am going to quit my job today" in French: Je vais arrêter mon travail aujourd'hui) I drove over to the store to pick up last week's paycheck and drop the bomb. I was primed. I was ready. The only hitch - the owner wasn't in! And he wasn't going to be in on Saturday (my next workday there) either.
I debated my options. Waiting until next week in hopes of catching the owner in person? Nah, it would just delay the inevitable, and the agony. Talk to the floor manager? Just didn't feel right. Call him at home and quit over the phone? Well, it might come down to that but it sure felt unprofessional.
As I considered what to do next, I saw the owner's son coming back from his lunch break. Eureka! The solution - tell the owner's son (he's an "owner" too). Best of all possible options short of a tête à tête with the actual boss.
Based on my prior post about how royally pissed I was, you might get the impression I would have opted to hit 'em where it hurts as part of resigning. Au contraire! After much thought I decided it would serve me better to just be professional about it and let them know my decision was "not about anyone here" but was a purely personal decision having to do with the demands on my time from my blossoming business. And that's exactly what I said when telling the owner's son about my decision. That was my story and I stuck to it.
Quitting a job is never easy and rarely would anyone look forward to doing it, even if you're quitting a job you absolutely hate with a passion, or leaving a good job to go on to bigger and more exciting things. No matter who you are, what type of job it was or what the circumstances for your decision to leave, it's stress-making to have to go in and tell your boss you don't want that job anymore. No matter how much they like you, they're not going to be happy you're leaving because it creates a void to be filled, which is a huge inconvenience not to mention an expense to the company when they have to replace you. And for your bosses and coworkers, it may feel like a personal rejection: "What, this place isn't good enough for you anymore? Don't you like us?"
The best way to get through resigning from a job is to plan in advance how you want to say whatever needs to be said. All of us, at one time or another, have probably fantasized about going up to some nasty bugger of a boss and saying "Take this job and shove it!", but in real life that is rarely a smart idea.
A much more mature approach is to decide how much of "the truth" you want to go on record with, when you give your reasons for leaving. I'm not suggesting you lie, but you probably don't need to tell them how lousy the job was or how badly they treated you. They won't care, for one thing, and that won't make you feel any better.
For instance, it's not always necessary to list all your grievances during your exit interview. In most cases it will serve no purpose other than to leave others with a bad memory of YOU, because rarely will your "constructive criticism" result in any lasting change. So disabuse yourself of the notion that by you quitting and telling the boss exactly what's wrong with his company, you will actually be able to affect positive change. It ain't gonna happen, my friend.
When you're leaving a job, the people you're leaving behind really don't want your helpful ideas about how they could do things better the next time around, with your replacement - even if they ask you for those ideas. Your leaving only points out that they are NOT leaving, so rubbing it in how you're going to be "free at last, free at last" is also not a very considerate thing to do.
Each time I have quit a job, I have tried to do so with the goal of being thought of as a "class act", someone who, even while I'm leaving them in the lurch, is still considerate enough and professional enough to care about those I'm leaving behind.
I start by taking responsibility for my decision to leave. After all, they aren't firing me, I'm choosing to go. This is the workplace equivalent of the "it's not you, it's me" dating breakup speech: "I really just feel this is something I need to do for myself. You've been great to me here. I appreciate the opportunities you've given me." (You can stop short of the "And I hope we can still be friends" part, though!)
I do my best to give at least a two-weeks' notice, and in several cases was able to give three weeks and even longer. This isn't always possible if you've got another job lined up, but a two-week notice is an accepted minimum standard in most cases. In addition to doing my best to give as much lead-time as possible, I also let my soon-to-be-ex-boss know I will do whatever I can to "make the transition easier on everyone concerned". And I back that up, too, pitching in to help train a replacement, document necessary information only I may be privy to, or whatever else is needed. As long as they are still paying my salary, I'm there to work, and I work until the last day.
Another part of a good exit strategy is planning what to say to curious co-workers who will bombard you with questions about why you're really leaving. My advice is to stick to the same story you told the boss when you had your "quitting conversation", because if you elaborate or change your story it is going to get back to the higher-ups. Don't even share the entire truth with your closest work friends, at least until after you're officially off the job. Management might ask you to leave early if they get angry enough at you, and at the very least it will make it very uncomfortable for you in your final days on the job if the people you work for or with resent you.
My most successful "quitting" ever was at my last corporate job in 1998. In this case, I was actually leaving solely for personal reasons -- to start my life as a freelance web designer and coach. And it really did have nothing to do with the company, my boss or my colleagues -- I had a great relationship with nearly everyone there and had developed a great reputation within the company. Yet when I gave my boss that "it's not you, it's me" speech, his body language and tone of voice told me he was very upset, and his first words were "So, what are you telling me?"
I knew what he meant. It wasn't that he didn't realize I was quitting; what he was asking was "how does this impact ME?" So I let him know I was open to negotiating a termination date of between 4 and 8 weeks, since I had flexibility and the project I was managing was complicated and would require some ramp-up time for my replacement. I let him know I would work with him and the team to make things as smooth as possible. Once he realized I wasn't trying to "screw him over" and I would pitch in and be a team player, his entire body unclenched and he was delightful to me after that, even up until the last day. He even came to my farewell party (which was a real blast). This was a very different outcome than for another friend of mine who didn't leave the company but who just transferred to another division, and he barely talked to that guy again after that. This was a boss who could really take things personally, but I found a way to take the sting out of quitting and therefore we parted on excellent terms.
Which is what I am shooting for now that I've quit my pharmacy job. I have yet to speak to the boss personally, but I plan to try and talk to him on the phone tomorrow, since I may not see him in person for a week or more depending on his work schedule. I will reiterate what I told his son - that I am willing to give at least 3 week's notice (this puts me on the schedule for The Great Flu Shot Clinic on 10/8 which promises to be a nightmare after last year's lack of shots and related panic about the flu, and since several children in our area have already been in the local hospital with the flu this month). I am even willing to stay through 10/15 if they are really stuck for help during the transition. I will reiterate that this is all about me doing what's best for my business and how difficult a choice this was, given that I know they are short-handed in the pharmacy now. I will do my best to be professional and reassuring.
How they take it is another matter entirely. I have no control over that. If they are nice to me to my face but saying other things behind my back, oh well - so what. If they think that I'm quitting just because I got reprimanded on Monday and clearly wasn't happy about, well that's their choice and I don't intend to try and convince them otherwise. They can think what they want; after all, it's their store. Meanwhile I will stick to my story no matter who says what: "It's just something I need to do for myself. You've all been great to me."
Mainly what I feel tonight is relief. Not just because I got through the "quitting" part unscathed (the owner's son was very gracious and said he understood, and it was a very short conversation - 5 minutes and it was a done deal). But relief because I followed through on my promise to myself, to free myself up from a job that once served a very useful purpose in my life but which I clearly had outgrown; and because I know that by creating this space and freeing up that energy, new and more interesting opportunities will present themselves. I've already made a new friend in France who has generously offered a wealth of information and advice about potential English-tutoring job opps there; she found me after reading my post about wanting to quit the job and how I was thinking of tutoring as an alternative part-time income source. So the payoff for the decision to walk away is already showing up, all by itself.
And I can walk away knowing I was a "class act", once again. Mission accomplished.
