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Employees and employers alike have the right under at-will employment laws in almost all states to end their relationship without notice, for any reason, but the two-week rule is a widely accepted standard of workplace conduct. Now Sue Shellenbarger writes at The Wall Street Journal that employers say a growing number of workers are leaving without giving two weeks' notice.
Some bosses blame young employees who feel frustrated by limited prospects or have little sense of attachment to their workplace. But employment experts say some older workers are quitting without notice as well. They feel overworked or unappreciated after years of laboring under pay cuts and expanded workloads imposed during the recession. One employee at Dupray, a customer-service rep, scheduled a meeting and announced she was quitting, then rose and headed for the exit. She seemed surprised when the director of human resources stopped her and explained that employees are expected to give two weeks' notice. "She said, 'I've been watching 'Suits,' and this is how it happens,' " referring to the TV drama set in a law firm.
According to Shellenbarger, quitting without notice is sometimes justified. Employees with access to proprietary information, such as those working in sales or new-product development, face a conflict of interest if they accept a job with a competitor. Employees in such cases typically depart right away—ideally, by mutual agreement. It can also be best to exit quickly if an employer is abusive, or if you suspect your employer is doing something illegal.
More often, however, quitting without notice "is done in the heat of emotion, by someone who is completely frustrated, angry, offended or upset," says David Lewis, president of OperationsInc., a Norwalk, Conn., human-resources consulting firm. That approach can burn bridges and generate bad references. Phyllis Hartman says employees have a responsibility to try to communicate about what's wrong. "Start figuring out if there is anything you can do to fix it. The worst that can happen is that nobody listens or they tell you no."
(Score: 1) by Ethanol-fueled on Tuesday June 28 2016, @07:28PM
Bullshit. If you have skills and interview well, and okay, maybe lie occasionally - You can get another job. Nobody has a perfect work history and even good employees can get fucked over for a wide variety of reasons.
Up and leaving a job is almost always a bad thing, but I've done it. A big fancy-looking company with buildings like modern art museums hired me for a gig in an okay position, then transferred me (it was a planned move, as I was to replace somebody who was fucking up on the stealth) to the industrial wash station - I've worked in the shipyards and in generally somewhat dangerous situations and had never experienced anything that bad before.
Small parts were carried in flimsy wireframe baskets, some of which had broken welds, and those baskets frequently became snagged on the wash carriage and toppled parts into the ultrasound cleaning tanks. Then I was expected to reach into a tank with running industrial ultrasound, with my bare arms, an unpleasant experience which leaves your arms with a dull pain for awhile. I had to crawl inside the machine while it was running to defeat interlocks whenever a basket snagged (and they did - very, very frequently). The answer to my nagging questions of "Why don't they have somebody fix this shit?!" was "If we did, we'd have to shut down production and lose money." The safety trainer had a very interesting meeting in which she described an employee who was hit in the eye with a targeting laser and explained that some of the CO2 driver lasers had the power to fry your arm to the bone before you had even enough time to flinch. Fun!
I walked out of that shit outright after two weeks of that. That company's idea of "training" was to throw you on the floor your first hour of your first day and use negative reinforcement, although that only serves to hinder learning and ensure that your trainee will leave work every day wanting to beat the shit out of you.
This is a company where people actually walk down the hallways doing work on their laptops, and it has it's own company store. Apparently Stockholm syndrome is a job requirement. I ain't gonna work on Maggie's Farm no more!