Quitting your job? 5 things not to do!

5 things not to say or do when quitting your job

At any point in your career, you should be thinking about the future and making sure that what you do and say doesn’t impact your next position or your ability to get the next position. In yesterday’s post, we talked about not burning bridges. This is the first point I would like to mention today.

1. When you are getting ready to move on, don’t burn bridges. This means that you should not trash talk the company, your coworkers, or your boss. You may need those connections some day. Even if today, you feel this is the worst place in the world to work, you may not feel that way a month down the road. You may need a good reference in the future and trash talking will be the fastest way to assure that you will not get one.
2. Don’t take any company property or proprietary information with you. You may think that you will be ingratiating yourself with the next employer by sharing former company reports or training programs but if it isn’t yours, you will probably be making the new employer what you would take from their company if you moved on.
3. Don’t leave a mess behind. Some employees when they leave, leave a disaster behind them. Make sure that you restore any area to the way it should be. This includes both your physical space and your computer. Leaving an inbox stuffed with emails will only confuse your replacement and potentially leave a project undone. Clean up your computer files too.
4. Don’t boast or brag about the new job to coworkers, management, clients, or customers. Keep the information about where you are going to a minimum. It is both bad form and there could be repercussions if someone would try to sabotage your move.
5. Don’t leave work undone. You may be excited about the next position but you need to finish the job you have professionally.

These five tips will help ensure a smooth transition to your new role with no fall-out at your former company.

Image courtesy of Ambro at FreeDigitalPhotos.net