2021 will go down in history as the year of THE GREAT RESIGNATION. If you're not yet familiar with the term, don't worry, that might be a good thing. The great resignation is essentially the movement of employees out of their current jobs into new ones. After the 2020 pandemic, it's natural that most people felt their frustrations with their current jobs multiply under the strain of dealing with the pandemic. As a HR professional, I saw the increase in employee frustration as most grappled with work life balance in a whole new way! Not just that, with so many businesses feeling the strain of the pandemic, it's only natural that the stress would filter down to employees and make them question whether they would continue. Based on my own observations and personal experience, when it's time to go it's time to go! Here are 5 things to look out for:
You feel it: I always tell people to trust their gut. For most people, trusting their gut will always be the best thing to do. When you've been in an organisation long enough, you naturally get a sense for where it's headed and can make a good calculated judgement of what lies ahead. This will be based on your own experiences and what's happened during your time there and what the business communicates about what's coming up.
There's no trust: trust is HUGE for me. If I'm working with people I don' trust (or even like), I don't usually see the point in staying. You've heard is said many times that people leave their managers, not organisations. This is right for most. For others, it could be a toxic team or even being surrounded by people who do not inspire you to be better or even help you up when you're down.
No progress: if in the last (or next) 12 months you don't see any progression, do I even need to say any more...? That goes for the organisation too - if you don't see any growth in the organisation, it's very unlikely you'll see any for yourself. Not impossible, just unlikely.
No satisfaction: if the work you do doesn't give you a sense of achievement or even a feeling of satisfaction at the end of the day, you'll start to feel really bad about yourself and that will affect the quality of the work you do. You end up in a vicious cycle of dissatisfaction and ineffectiveness. Ultimately, this will cause anxiety or stress.
Something else: Last but certainly not the least, there are times opportunities come knocking and we'd be unwise to turn them down. You don't always have to wait until things are bad to leave. Sometimes other roles will come along that are too good to turn down 😉
The above points are not an exhaustive list of reasons to join the great resignation and you certainly shouldn't join "the movement" if things are still good where you are. What are the things you reflect on when you think it's time to leave an organisation?