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posted by martyb on Sunday September 25 2016, @08:37AM   Printer-friendly
from the take-this-job-and... dept.

Most everybody has been there: you've decided to quit your job and now you have to inform your employer that you're leaving. So what is the best way to resign?

Turns out, there are generally seven ways in which people quit their jobs, and there are two key factors that determine whether a person resigns in a positive way or in a way that could have damaging consequences for the business, new research from Oregon State University shows.

[...] Through a series of studies, including interviews with employees and employers, the researchers found that generally, employees quit in one of seven ways:

  • By the book: These resignations involve a face-to-face meeting with one's manager to announce the resignation, a standard notice period, and an explanation of the reason for quitting.
  • Perfunctory: These resignations are similar to "by the book" resignations, except the meeting tends to be shorter and the reason for quitting is not provided.
  • Grateful goodbye: Employees express gratitude toward their employer and often offer to help with the transition period.
  • In the loop: In these resignations, employees typically confide in their manager that they are contemplating quitting, or are looking for another job, before formally resigning.
  • Avoidant: This occurs when employees let other employees such as peers, mentors, or human resources representatives know that they plan to leave rather than giving notice to their immediate boss.
  • Bridge burning: In this resignation style, employees seek to harm the organization or its members on their way out the door, often through verbal assaults.
  • Impulsive quitting: Some employees simply walk off the job, never to return or communicate with their employer again. This can leave the organization in quite a lurch, given it is the only style in which no notice is provided.

The by the book and perfunctory resignations are the most common, but roughly one in 10 employees quits in bridge-burning style. Avoidant, bridge burning and impulsive quitting are seen as potentially harmful resignation styles for employers.

In addition, the researchers found that managers were particularly frustrated by employees who resigned using bridge burning, avoidant or perfunctory styles, so employees who want to leave on good terms should avoid those styles, Klotz said.

Have any Soylentils seen employees quit in notable or epic ways?


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  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by pgc on Sunday September 25 2016, @08:47AM

    by pgc (1600) on Sunday September 25 2016, @08:47AM (#406200)

    The NoShitSherlock foundation.

    • (Score: 4, Informative) by Kell on Sunday September 25 2016, @10:06AM

      by Kell (292) on Sunday September 25 2016, @10:06AM (#406206)

      The first time I quit a job, I told my bosses I was looking to further my academic career (moving from contract engineering to research to a post-doc). They were understanding; they made some overtures to retain me, but the job wasn't intellectually challenging enough. We parted on good terms and I even stopped by over the next few years to see how they were doing, make sure they had everything they needed from me viz support, and generally wish them well.

      The second time I quit a job was from that post-doc, where the manager had been deeply incompetent and actively sabotaged my career. I ended up getting post-doc affairs involved and we parted on a settlement. I left them with no support, until they came crawling back to beg my help to finish the project.

      Good end-of-service arrangements are not just something for employees to worry about, but employers as well. In both cases, I did my best to be professional about it all but in the one case, the former employer got the advantage of my time and good will, while in the other they were left in the lurch with no recourse but an expensive contrition. Moral of the story: it doesn't matter who you are, be professional.

      --
      Scientists ask questions. Engineers solve problems.
      • (Score: 3, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @04:33PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @04:33PM (#406303)

        I had a similar experience before. Each time I changed jobs, I helped with the transition and getting the new guy up to speed, even after I left.

        But one job I had, the boss started treating me like garbage and they gave me notice of termination. They even referred to me as "the boat anchor" in emails to the group mailing list that I was still subscribed to. They didn't even have me come in the last two weeks, but rather paid me to stay at home. I found a new job, at a previous employer who called me when they heard I was available no less, and started there before the two weeks was even over.

        A few months later, the place that fired me called, "hey we're having some trouble with the project you were working on, would you be able to swing by some time and help, some time in the evenings?" "Sure." "*sigh of relief* So I guess we'll see you tomorrow?" "Sure, I'll send you a consulting contract for my $750 an hour fee." "What? You didn't charge (other company)" "Actually, I did but your fee is higher due to what I call the 'boat anchor tax.'" "You know about that? Fuck." I'll never forget the tone of his voice.

        I ended up agreeing to be paid to help them, but they had me negotiate with the boss's boss. Got the feeling the whole idea was his because they couldn't transition properly. Turns out the "boat anchor" was doing most of the work. But then again, that whole environment was toxic, so I probably would have left on my own in not too much longer. Plus, they ended up going out of business anyway; too many Peters on top.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @09:11AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @09:11AM (#406202)

    Header: We realized there was a lot of anger in the workplace.

    Man: "STAY OUT OF MY CUBE! IT'S ALL I HAVE!"

    Header: So we made a recreation room with punching bags hooked to dynamos.
    [ A man punches one of the bags ]

    Header: Within weeks, we were generating so much energy, we could sell it back to the state.

    Woman (pointing to a spike in energy creation): "This is when we implemented the new dress code."

    Header: During an economic downturn, many people were anxious about layoffs, which led to more anger and more energy just as sales were faltering.

    Woman #2: "My job is pointless AND I'm losing it!?"

    Header: Anger energy became more and more important to our bottom line.

    Woman #3: "Hey Sam - sales are down this month. Could you tell accounting we need handwritten versions of all their spreadsheets?"

    Header: The profits were staggering. When the National Cost of Conventional Energy rose, so did rage. Supply and price increased simultaneously.
    [ A line graph shows "price of gas," "rage," and "profit" all increasing together at the same rate ]

    header: Having run a large company for decades, we were Hxperts in the creation of internalized anguish.

    Woman #4: "I don't care that you were right! I just want you to apologize for pointing it out!"

    Header: Like cows being fed milk-producing diets, our employees were given pure anger fuel.
    [ Employees read a flier which reads, "Saturday! Company picnic!!! (Attendance is mandatory) (Bring your work with you)" ]

    Header: They think they're "developing business consultation solutions," but there's no such thing. Of course, most of them eventually realize they're in a purgatorial nightmare.

    Man #2: "I DO NOTHING FOR NOTHING BECAUSE NOTHING. WHAT DOES THAT MAKE ME?!"

    Header: The others, we fire.

    Man #3: "But I'm so happy working here!"

    Man #4: "We think you may have psychological problems."

    http://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/2011-08-11 [smbc-comics.com]

  • (Score: 4, Informative) by quintessence on Sunday September 25 2016, @10:10AM

    by quintessence (6227) on Sunday September 25 2016, @10:10AM (#406207)

    Had one co-worker pull the "I'd rather not" for any demands made of him. Cool as a cucumber, didn't do anything, and gently refused any requests.

    Management finally lost their cool and went on a tirade, firing him amid much yelling.

    He then got unemployment. Smart bloke.

    • (Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @10:38AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @10:38AM (#406211)

      The Bartleby approach is a bridge-burning in reverse, so what did smart bloke do after unemployment ran out? You'll recall Bartleby never found work again and later died in prison.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 26 2016, @08:48AM

        by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 26 2016, @08:48AM (#406579)
        Never burn any bridge yourself.

        Just make sure they're well soaked in gasoline and you wander around camly with a lit match.

        Get the other party to attack you and drop the match.
    • (Score: 1) by Francis on Sunday September 25 2016, @02:47PM

      by Francis (5544) on Sunday September 25 2016, @02:47PM (#406269)

      It is, especially when you consider that many organizations have a policy to not say anything other than to confirm the dates of employment.

      As long as you can drag it out long enough that you don't have a million lines on your resume and manage a pay raise when you move, you could probably spend an entire career without actually doing any meaningful work.

      • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @06:50PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @06:50PM (#406348)

        They may not be willing to go on the record. But in any industry there is lots of back-channel communication. You pull that stunt a couple of times and word will get around. People will gossip.

  • (Score: 4, Funny) by f4r on Sunday September 25 2016, @10:36AM

    by f4r (4515) on Sunday September 25 2016, @10:36AM (#406210)
    I once wrote my 2 weeks notice on the ripped-off cardboard lid from a corona box and kept it on me for a couple of days. When the manager in situ mouthed off at me again, I simply handed it to her and walked away from that argument. I only ended up working a few more days before leaving by mutual agreement, but god damn it felt good during those few days that I wasn't long for that job. All the shouting and anger stopped, I think they realized there was no point in screaming at me when my ass is halfway out the door.
    Quite easily got another job without requiring her "reference" (although I did inform my prospective employer about quitting my previous job in that manner), and have since been offered a full-time contract. You really can't appreciate a good boss until you've had a bad one.
    --
    Do not use as directed.
    • (Score: 1) by Francis on Sunday September 25 2016, @02:51PM

      by Francis (5544) on Sunday September 25 2016, @02:51PM (#406270)

      I think the references are the only potential sticking point and that really depends upon the industry. Most employers refuse to comment on employees for fear of being sued, which means that there's not a whole lot of consequence for folks that don't handle the quitting completely professionally. Reserve the bridge burning for cases where the company is a complete shithole and you're probably not going to suffer much, if at all for it.

      The thing about giving notice though is that some companies don't allow you to have access to the materials necessary to work if they know you're on your way out the door. Which can mean that you wind up quitting a couple weeks earlier than you intended. Companies like that deserve no notification, but usually that information is in the company handbook. Otherwise, just make sure you've got roughly a month worth of expenses lined up and take a vacation if they pull that stunt.

  • (Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Sunday September 25 2016, @10:46AM

    by NotSanguine (285) <NotSanguineNO@SPAMSoylentNews.Org> on Sunday September 25 2016, @10:46AM (#406213) Homepage Journal

    But many years ago, I worked for a company whose products were quite popular because we'd "reverse-engineered" the big dog in the industry's proprietary code, thus relieving us of paying royalties to the big dog. Needless to say, our product was much less expensive than our competitors', and we sold a lot of product!

    The truth was that one of the original employees had actually gone to work for that big dog and "appropriated" certain information which allowed us to "reverse-engineer" the proprietary code. He then resigned and returned to help develop the product in question and was well compensated for his endeavors.

    A number of years later, a new manager was placed above him and actually required him to do a variety of tasks he found distasteful.

    The new manager was quite firm in his desire for this employee to perform the tasks asked of him (I'd note that subtlety and tact were *not* this manager's strong suit), which enraged said employee.

    So one day he walked into the manager's office and during a discussion, he screamed "Fuck You!" and stormed out and back into his own office, slamming his door along the way.

    I was rather amused by the whole thing. However, the company's senior management were much less so.

    I believe that he was "terminated for cause," but in truth the "fuck you!" was code for "I quit." As such, this guy really gave them no choice. I suppose this would go into the "Burning Bridges" category.

    --
    No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
    • (Score: -1, Redundant) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @01:02PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @01:02PM (#406239)

      Management antagonized and then fired the one guy who could tear down the company by proving he stole info from their competitor so they could clone their product? That seems unlikely.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @01:40PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @01:40PM (#406248)

        Some people are just idiots. Some of those idiots somehow find their way into management positions. So it seems plausible.

        That employee could (most likely) provide evidence of the stolen information, but given that he was directly involved in it he probably would have landed himself in jail by doing so.

        What is perhaps a little less believable is that "big company" didn't cotton on to this employees movements between "smaller company" and "big company" and back again and the development by "smaller company" of a similar competing product and take legal action. Though I suppose they may have thought the likelihood of winning a lawsuit would be high enough given that they probably only had circumstantial evidence and would have to rely on finding incriminating evidence in the discovery phase of the lawsuit.

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @02:23PM

          by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @02:23PM (#406259)

          Suing would probably be overkill and not worth the effort but I think you began to get at what's unlikely here.

          What's slightly unlikely here is that the big company didn't catch onto the fact that one of their employees was taking code and giving it to their competitors and hence the big company didn't simply fire the person that copied their code and gave it away.

          But big organizations can be like government, a big giant slow monolith that takes forever to catch onto anything. Also there is way more to a product than simply code, there is the service that backs the code. So if the little company wasn't really affecting the big company that much it might easily slip under their radar for a while.

          • (Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Sunday September 25 2016, @06:05PM

            by NotSanguine (285) <NotSanguineNO@SPAMSoylentNews.Org> on Sunday September 25 2016, @06:05PM (#406332) Homepage Journal

            What's slightly unlikely here is that the big company didn't catch onto the fact that one of their employees was taking code and giving it to their competitors and hence the big company didn't simply fire the person that copied their code and gave it away.

            As I understood it, the employee (he didn't take code, rather proprietary info used to write the code) took the info as he left the big dog.

            So it's wasn't as cut and dried as you're making it out to be.

            Regardless, the point was that this guy felt entitled enough (given his past activities) to assume he could to whatever he wanted (and not do whatever he didn't want to do).

            I suppose that might fly in some places, but I think he got what he richly deserved.

            --
            No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
      • (Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Sunday September 25 2016, @02:23PM

        by NotSanguine (285) <NotSanguineNO@SPAMSoylentNews.Org> on Sunday September 25 2016, @02:23PM (#406258) Homepage Journal

        You can choose to believe it or not.

        I was there. The company (in fact the big dog too) is long lost to the dustbin of history.

        I wonder if anyone on SN was there too. If so, they'll know what I'm talking about.

        --
        No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
  • (Score: 4, Insightful) by art guerrilla on Sunday September 25 2016, @11:02AM

    by art guerrilla (3082) on Sunday September 25 2016, @11:02AM (#406216)

    um, i realize this is impertinent for a mere prole, a technocrat of little import, a cog in the great machine of Empire, but why is it *I* a lowly nothing-burger of a droid is 'required' to give at least two weeks notice WHEN I *FIRE* THE COMPANY i work for; but THEY have ZERO expectation/requirement to give me ANY FUCKING NOTICE AT ALL should they decide to toss this used tissue away ? ? ? (for little or no reason at their convenience...)
    okay, okay, i know the reason: because we have ZERO POWER as workers and are subject to every whim of Empire, while they have ZERO obligation to us to treat us in a humane manner...
    is that they way it *should* be, is that the brave new world 'we' want ? ? ?

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @11:22AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @11:22AM (#406219)

      And don't try COMBINING your POWER through COLLECTIVE BARGAINING because every little cog has DELUSIONS of EMPIRE.

      "The whole deal is some kind of crazy game. The name of the game is: Make it through life. Only everyone is out for themselves and looking to do you in. You do what you can, but I'm going to do my best to blow your ass away."

    • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @01:04PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @01:04PM (#406240)

      > a mere prole, a technocrat of little import, a cog in the great machine of Empire,

      That word does not mean what you think it means.

      • (Score: 2) by art guerrilla on Tuesday September 27 2016, @01:13PM

        by art guerrilla (3082) on Tuesday September 27 2016, @01:13PM (#406930)

        um, which word ?
        prole, meaning working class ?
        technocrat, cog, Empire ?
        words, i got so many words...

    • (Score: 1) by aim on Monday September 26 2016, @08:19AM

      by aim (6322) on Monday September 26 2016, @08:19AM (#406572)

      You're simply living/working in the wrong country. Civilized countries have laws that require employers to give you some time (e.g. 1-3 months notice depending on how long you've been working there) when firing you, possibly even to help you find another job (depending on context). Yes, I live in the EU.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 26 2016, @08:39AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 26 2016, @08:39AM (#406578)

      Because you live in the corpocracy known as the USA. Over here, they get one month notice if I quit, but if they fire me, I get between three and six months depending on how long I've been working for them. That's by law, and goes for any white-collar job (I do not know the details for blue-collar jobs).

  • (Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @11:19AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @11:19AM (#406218)

    When I was a compufer tech many moons ago our repair shop, a big warehouse-style contractor which did warranty repairs for retail chains, had a pretty liberal policy about techs borrowing other techs' tools.

    Well, one day, the team lead decided to borrow a new negro employee's tools without asking him, and when the negro came back to his bench and found his tools missing, a category-5 chimpout ensued.

    "Goddam sticky-fingad mothafuckas always stealin' muh SHEEIT! Fuck this place! Fuck y'all!"

    And literally walked off the job never to be seen again.

    • (Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @11:30AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @11:30AM (#406221)

      Racist crackers set up the negro to fail by not telling him about the tool borrowing policy. He obviously didn't belong so just let him chimp out and be rid of the nigger.

    • (Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @04:28PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @04:28PM (#406301)

      Did you hear about the jew whose tools were borrowed without asking him?

      I didn't either. No jew did anything considered useful.

      • (Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @06:58PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @06:58PM (#406355)

        Did you hear about the Muslim? He got very angry and exploded. Too much chapati flour.

  • (Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @11:29AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @11:29AM (#406220)

    I worked for a small company whose business model consisted of replacing company and state phone numbers with premium rate phone numbers; think tax office, welfare, utilities, telecoms, insurance, banks etc. It was a matter of putting them all on a directory website then getting said numbers to the top of Google search results, hence commission from the resulting calls. At first, the manager/co-owner claims it's all legitimate - great writing and good, clean web design equals prominence, equals revenue.

    With time and evermore duties given to yours truly (job creep), it became obvious that revenue was mostly down to 'black hat SEO' link building techniques. This consists of buying or otherwise garnering spurious links to effectively jump the queue; ranking top for as many profitable numbers as possible, as fast as possible. Partly these measures were taken due to certain companies mailing takedown notices for trademark misuse, but mostly it was for the cash.

    The shady back linking reached the point where we'd seek out expired domains still receiving .gov and .ac links (these have plentiful link authority under Google's algorithm), then registering them en masse. After that, we threw on some token good content so Google indexed them, waited awhile, then slowly drip fed the link authority: pointing it onto the various number sites. Thus page rankings boosted, revenue boosted.

    One day I casually asked how things were going, whereupon said manager shows me a chart. From said chart I was able to work out that the business was bringing in roughly $75-80k each month in commission revenue, and rising fast. It could still at least double, he said proudly.

    A week later, I sent an email requesting a small stake hold in the business in lieu of my pay - at this point I was doing the lion's share of the donkey work and website housekeeping, far beyond the original criteria under which I was hired at $3000/mo. Kept it polite and formal, and didn't budge. Eventually the dude lost his cool, started ranting about how I ought to know my place, how anyone can do my job, he's doing me a favour etc.

    So I quit.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @08:58PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @08:58PM (#406388)

      Did they go under not long after?

      Did you start your own equivalent of that business and run them out of business?

      Did your next job pay better?

      Have it ever come back to bite you in the ass?

  • (Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @01:10PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @01:10PM (#406241)

    The Verge just had a guy quit to work for Apple and he didn't tell anyone. [theverge.com] He was at Apple for nearly 2 months before his previous employer finally figured out he was gone and fired him. That might be a record for the most douchey, passive millenial-style way to quit a job.

    • (Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Sunday September 25 2016, @02:25PM

      by NotSanguine (285) <NotSanguineNO@SPAMSoylentNews.Org> on Sunday September 25 2016, @02:25PM (#406260) Homepage Journal

      There was a an exec at an Ad agency who took his accumulated vacation all at once and immediately started working for a different, competitor ad agency while on vacation.

      He timed this for the end of the year so he would receive his bonus too.

      That guy was a Boomer, so generation has nothing to do with douchebaggery.

      --
      No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
      • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @02:36PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @02:36PM (#406263)

        He earned that vacation time and the bonus for work already performed. Collecting on what he is owed is not the same as skipping out and still collecting a paycheck for work not performed.

        And the point is not that any generation is more douchey, but that ghosting is a millennial cliche.

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @04:07PM

          by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @04:07PM (#406292)

          "Ghosting" is just the time honored tradition of the "Irish goodbye" or "French leave" it is definitely not a "millennial (snake person) cliche"

          http://www.slate.com/articles/life/a_fine_whine/2013/07/ghosting_the_irish_goodbye_the_french_leave_stop_saying_goodbye_at_parties.html [slate.com]

          You're welcome.

          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @04:46PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @04:46PM (#406305)

            Ghosting isn't just about an unannounced exit, its about ignoring attempts at contact after you've exited.

            The irish goodbye isn't final, its just for that particular event. The expectation is you'll be at the next event. Unlike ghosting which is intended to be final.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @02:37PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @02:37PM (#406264)

      If it took his employer two months to notice he is no longer there then clearly he wasn't doing anything worthwhile anyways. Good riddance!

    • (Score: 2) by Nerdfest on Sunday September 25 2016, @03:41PM

      by Nerdfest (80) on Sunday September 25 2016, @03:41PM (#406282)

      You mean Apple and the iVerge are actually two different companies? Are you sure?

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @03:32PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @03:32PM (#406281)

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MS4n84a2Mw4 [youtube.com]

    Depending on your situation, this might not be the best choice for some of you.

    BTW the music was switched b/c Kanye West asserted copyright.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @04:01PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @04:01PM (#406289)

    SigOther once worked for a biotech company then found out 2 months after starting that they were being sued for negotiating in bad faith with another biotech company. Turns out the CEO at the time had made a deal with another company to use some tech but with plans to never pay the favor back. The board of directors fired that CEO in a semi-distasteful way and he decided that he would sing like a canary and became the prosecution's star witness. He testified that the board had forced him to negotiate the deal in bad faith and that there were no plans to pay for the use of the other company's tech.

    Needless to say the rest of the company had a terrible toxic management culture. Also the job was in a "Right to Work" state. SO then decided to leave with no notice because it was quite obvious the company was going to lose their defense of the lawsuit and go under (also his boss was a micromanager and a dick).

    Three weeks later. The entire R&D department, all IT staff except one desktop support, and most of the office faculty were escorted out of the door (many thinking it was for a breakfast meeting/event), THEN told they were fired and to go home immediately (including said micromanager dick boss). Company lost the lawsuit. Stock plummeted. Company was de-listed; then filed for bankruptcy.

    SO got a sweet new gig in Europe.

    Score one for escaping a sinking ship!

    • (Score: 0, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @04:54PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @04:54PM (#406308)

      > Also the job was in a "Right to Work" state. SO then decided to leave with no notice

      "Right to work" means companies are forbidden from signing exclusive labor contracts with groups of people (aka unions). One of those cases where republicans think having big government interfere in private business is good because fuck the working-class.

      You mean "employment at will" which is all 50 states.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @05:00PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @05:00PM (#406310)

    I think the point now a days is that the name of the game is to make money, not necessarily hunt for an impossible to find job for an employer that is going to end up being a jerk if he is generous enough to hire you in the first place.

    People have diversified the ways they make money. Think of a cat vs a dog, a dog is very appreciative because you are his only source of food. But a cat is very diverse with their diet, they dig in trash cans, they go after birds and mice, and they take food from humans. But if any one human is a complete jerk to the cat the cat can find another source of food.

    People sell stuff on the Internet, perhaps they do other things like offer their tutoring services on the Internet, offer to wash cars (and post that they wash cars on the Internet), real estate, offer to fix things like fixing your computer or your broken phone or whatever it is, offer to mow your lawn or paint your house on the side, cleaning services, offer DJ services, etc... in addition to working a regular job. If they devoted all the time and effort they put into their regular job to making money through alternative means in many instances they can make just as much, maybe even more. So their day job is only one source of income and if you lose it they can just redirect their efforts towards making money elsewhere instead so it's not that big of a deal anymore. You'd almost have to be crazy to only have one source of income these days and be desperate for that only source of income, you are asking to be taken advantage of.

    Consequently if your boss is a complete unreasonable jerk you aren't desperate enough to put up with it. You can either find another job or keep making money on your own while looking for another job. Pretty much every non-lazy person thinks this way and so if a boss wants a non-lazy employee they pretty much have to be reasonable. Of course that's not to say that an employee can be an unreasonable and lazy jerk either, if the employee is going to be unreasonable and lazy and not flexible at all and whatnot no one is going to hire them and they probably aren't the type of person that is willing to work hard to make money doing odd jobs on the side. The point is that all it takes to make money is to not be lazy and the name of the game is making money, not necessarily finding that one impossible to get dead end job that you never want to lose or else you will not be able to make money whatsoever.

    Employer at Interview: "I'll pay you 2K a month to basically run the entire company and do everything"

    Potential employee: "I make more money selling stuff on Craigslist. You have to do better..."

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 26 2016, @12:25AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 26 2016, @12:25AM (#406447)

      I agree it's nice to have more than one income stream, but the examples you gave--washing cars, DJing--Jesus, your main job must make chump change to justify wasting spare hours on pissant pay side jobs like those.

      An even better strategy is to get a job that really pays well--this beats a handful of crappy jobs together. With the greater money you make, you can save up an "emergency fund" to tide you over should you lose your high paying job until you get another like it.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 26 2016, @01:23AM

        by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 26 2016, @01:23AM (#406477)

        Some of the richest people I know do these sorts of things. I know people that live in multi million dollar homes and own tons of properties because they worked their butts off doing all sorts of things.

        A good DJ can charge a lot of money for instance. I know someone that brings truck loads of equipment to events, thousands of dollars worth, and they have been a DJ their entire life. The least they charge per event is like $800 (probably more by now because this was years back), they can charge in excess of $2K per event (well, they must also hire an employee to help set things up and sometimes even more than one employee and they have their fair share of expenses obviously). But they're really good at what they do and if a couple with money wants to have, say, a wedding where they don't want to risk having the DJ mess up the experience for everyone and have everyone talk about how bad the DJ was for years to come and have video footage of the wedding that's going to be remembered for a long time capture a lousy DJ they will hire a good DJ and pay good money. People spend a ton of money on weddings and things like decorators, I've been to many 6 figure weddings (though I still find the presence of armed security creepy). Heck, I know people that spend $500 for a dress that they only wore once as a guest to an event such as a wedding. It's crazy what people would spend their money on, a good hair stylist with a degree that's been doing it for years can charge a fortune too depending on who their audience is.

        and this person's day job (the DJ's) is an ordinary day job but this person is probably wealthier than most people here. They also do other things to make money (they made money in the stock market, also made wise housing investments, his wife probably sells things on the Internet too I imagine but I probably don't know about it, etc...).

        Everything counts. I know people that make good money selling things on the internet on the side, more than what they make with their full time day job and probably more than many people here (we're talking decent five figure values a month on the side before taxes. Then they complain about how much they have to pay in taxes, lol).

  • (Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @05:18PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @05:18PM (#406316)

    Back in another decade, I worked in a restaurant as a cook, waiter, dishwasher, busboy, etc. It was minimum wage. My boss had told me for two months that he had put in for my vacation pay and a raise. He was lying on both counts. I waited until the worst possible moment to quit on a very busy night when he was planning to have me serve as the dishwasher. I came in picked up my paycheck and heard him yelling at me to hurry up and clock in cause it was getting really busy. I picked up my pay and walked out the door without acknowledging him at all. Later, when I returned to get that last paycheck and vacation pay, I heard that he had to wash dishes himself that night, and was overheard muttering my name and cursing me with every dish he washed.

  • (Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @05:22PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 25 2016, @05:22PM (#406317)

    I was an employee of a company that HP acquired. I did engineering support. They had a position open up for on-site support at a major client. I decided to take it because it seemed cool. I ended up putting in a lot of over-time at the client site. I was salaried, but HP billed the client by the hour. I worked 12 months worth of hours in 11 months. So HP's contract was up, there were no more hours left.

    I suggested to my manager at HP that I take vacation for the remaining weeks of the contract since they could not bill any hours anyway. They had a new contract due to start at the end of 12 month cycle and I would pick back up when that kicked in. He literally asked me, "What will you be doing for HP during those weeks?" He could not grasp that I had already generated 12 months of revenue for HP. Eventually they extended the current contract with more hours to cover the gap and my manager told me, "If you take care of us, we'll take care of you." So I continued working without taking any time off. When the end of the year came around, I got a bonus. Of $300 after tax. HP was billing my work at $250/hr. I did not feel "taken care of."

    So I negotiated with the client directly. We split the price down the middle, I started billing $125/hr + expenses and became their technical liaison to HP. HP didn't have a choice but to suck it up because the client liked me and HP had a $100M contract on the line. That was 20 years ago and I've been a contractor ever since. Ironically (or maybe not) I ended up doing the exact same on-site job as a contractor to HP for another client for a few years until HP cut me loose because their 50% markup on my rate was not profitable enough. Which was OK by me, I was able to bring my rate up to $240/hr by cutting HP out of that contract.

    That's my story. When you've got leverage use it for all its worth. Also, price is just what someone is willing to pay, it doesn't mean anything more than that.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 26 2016, @05:07AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 26 2016, @05:07AM (#406539)

    Of course the poor little abusive corporation! Who else!