A professional should always act like a professional. While in a job, you’ll come across many opportunities to ruin your reputation. One of these is when you decide to resign from your job. No matter what the reasons may be, you should never do or say anything which tarnishes your professional image. It takes years to build a likeable personality. While leaving a job, you should always focus on future employment while letting bygones be bygones.
But there are a lot of people who make mistakes while resigning and harm their professional career in future.
If you are not careful while resigning, you will –
Ruin your professional image
Affect your references
Harm your future employability
Tendering your resignation is quite easy. What’s not is to leave the job with grace, and dignity. So, don’t act like an idiot. Be really careful about the way you leave your current employer.
One of the most common mistakes that employees make while resigning from a job is that they do it all of a sudden. Leaving the employer scrambling to fill up your position might make you feel good. It might not matter to you because you have got a new, better job already. But leaving without notice is not a good etiquette or standard practice.
What happens if a higher level employee such as a team leader resigns without giving fair notice? Imagine the position of the employer then. You have every right to choose your own career path. But, as a professional, it crucial for you to keep your professionalism intact and not burn any bridges. You never know where you may need to cross the path in future. Therefore, always try to give fair notice (around one month) before you leave.
What about training a replacement? It might seem to be a joke to you if the employer has been appalling. But this is one of the best things you can do before you leave to keep your relationships intact with the current employer. If you plan to do something like this, do it really well.
If you don’t say something bad or derogatory to the employer’s face, you may decide to communicate the same via the resignation letter. Yes, there are plenty of people who can’t prevent themselves from writing their heart out and being mean in the resignation letter. Don’t do it. Always remember to write the resignation letter in a professional manner. Even when the experience of working has been bad, try to find something to use as a compliment and write about it. Talk a little about your accomplishments and show your appreciation for working in the company. Tell the employer that you learned a lot.
How can you forget your colleagues and clients? You are leaving in the age of social media. Each contact that you have made till now carries importance as far as professional networking is concerned. Once your resignation has been accepted, it’s time to send a brief email announcing the new of your resignation to all your colleagues and clients. If you want someone to include into your social network, this is a good time to do that as well.
Make your presence count till the last day. Can you do that? Well, you should. Many employees, once they have resigned, begin to become careless. They are either on leave every 2-3 days or coming late to office. This looks highly unprofessional on your part. Spend your remaining days in company with grace and don’t do anything that ruins your reputation.
Have you always resigned with grace? Please feel free to share your own stories and experiences.
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