Suramya's Blog : Welcome to my crazy life…

March 1, 2023

Don’t burn bridges by behaving unprofessionally when you leave a company

Filed under: My Thoughts — Suramya @ 4:47 PM

The message screenshot below was shared by a friend who is changing jobs. It is a perfect example for why you shouldn’t burn bridges when you leave a job because you never know who that person might be connected with and they just might end up sharing what you did when you quit ensuring that you don’t get that offer.

My new boss who was my ex boss is friends with my current boss and they are neighbours
My new boss who was my ex boss is friends with my current boss and they are neighbours 😬😄🙈

It is highly tempting to vent, curse or blast your manager/seniors/company when you leave or post nasty comments in public about it but you should please refrain. There was a case back in 2017 where a US flight attendant Steven Slater spectacularly quit his job aboard a JetBlue flight by grabbing a few beers, cursing out the airline on the AP and slipping down the plane’s emergency slide. This got him instant fame and spotlight and lots of people were applauding him on how he ‘had the guts’ to tell the truth and leave in an epic fashion. But this ‘epic’ resignation cost him his job, he was charged with criminal mischief, reckless endangerment and criminal trespass and had to pay a $10k fine. He can no longer work in the airline industry because no one wants to hire him and I don’t blame them. What is the guarantee that he wouldn’t pull a stunt like this again?

There was a case where a person was being interviewed for a job at one of my old companies and one of the hiring managers was talking about the candidate to a co-worker who had worked with the candidate before and commented that the person had behaved extremely unprofessionally with their boss on their last day because they were no longer reporting to him. The hiring manager discussed this with their manager and the decision was made to drop the candidate from consideration. It is a small world and you never know where you might cross paths with a person again down the line.

This is not to say that you shouldn’t respond to inappropriate behavior or actions. You can do that in a dignified/professional way like reporting to HR, putting in an official complaint etc. Or you can do it in an unprofessional way by cursing them out or posting a profanity ridden comment about them on their linkedIn page. See the difference? If you chose the first option, you might get asked about it during the interview and in the latter case you would just get dropped from consideration.

What do you think?

– Suramya

1 Comment »

  1. […] get to work in that industry again. I covered a lot of this in my previous post that talked about not burning bridges by behaving unprofessionally when you leave a company and we can all agree that breaking into the office and setting things on fire is extremely […]

    Pingback by Sacked employees burn office documents showcasing why access should be removed for terminated employees « Suramya's Blog — October 10, 2023 @ 6:40 PM

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