Friday Forward - Two Weeks (#459)

The way people leave companies is due for an overhaul

Several years ago, one of our partners reached out to me with a job description, asking if I knew anyone who might be a good fit for the role. I’m fairly certain she didn’t expect my response: I suggested she consider hiring one of my best employees, who we’ll call David.

David was a longtime employee of Acceleration Partners, having joined us when the company was just a handful of people. He was a great member of the team, well-liked by colleagues and clients, and passionate about our industry. But as the years passed and the company grew, we noticed a slow decline in David’s engagement. Rather than reacting with disappointment or frustration, his manager wanted to understand why. 

What came next was a series of open and honest discussions. David’s manager learned that, as the company had grown and David’s responsibilities elevated, the work he found most engaging was slowly disappearing from his role—a common problem employees find when they move from individual contributor to manager.

Leadership discussed the situation, attempting to find a way to move David back into a role focused on the type of work he loved. We soon realized that while we’d eventually need a position encompassing what David wanted to do, it was one or two years down the road in our company’s development. We didn’t have the means to accelerate the process, and it seemed David couldn’t wait long for a more fulfilling job.

When our partner shared the job description with me and I sent it to our leadership team, a few of us recognized it as David’s dream job. We knew he would likely leap at the opportunity and have a good chance to earn the job, but we’d lose him as an employee.

It didn’t take long for our leadership team to decide what to do: we told David about the role and invited him to apply with our leadership team’s full support. Crucially, we made it clear that his role with us was safe if he applied unsuccessfully for the new job; he could stay at AP and we would jointly figure out what to do next.

David got the job and has been successful and happy at that company ever since. We still keep in touch and see him at events and conferences, and his company is one of our clients. To this day, it is one of my favorite stories about our culture and talent development strategy.

The events that led to that happy outcome offer key insights into addressing a deeply flawed paradigm in business: how people often exit organizations either by leaving with two weeks’ notice—after a covert job search—or getting dismissed without warning. The reason this happens is because, when someone is unhappy in a professional relationship, an honest conversation that would lead to a better outcome never takes place.

Over time, I’ve come to call this status quo the two weeks’ notice paradigm, and I’ve advocated for years that it’s long overdue for a change. That is the reason we developed an open transition program (OTP), which facilitated David’s successful transition and is the subject of my new book, Rethinking Two Weeks’ Notice, which launched on Tuesday.

In the past several years, a movement has risen urging company leaders to see employees as whole people, not just cogs in a wheel. Companies have created perks that help employees become healthier and happier outside work and facilitate opportunities for people to build lasting relationships with their colleagues. Many leaders have also begun to address burnout concerns and improve transparency. 

However, up to this point, this same movement has not changed the way people leave companies. That’s a massive gap that needs to be addressed.

It’s remarkable that organizations invest so much in employee onboarding, well-being, and growth, only to forfeit all that goodwill when the relationship comes to an end. The same is true for employees who, in their rush to jump to what’s next, too often shortsightedly or inadvertently tarnish their legacy and relationships.

There really is a better way to manage employee departures, as a small group of leaders and companies have started to discover.

So many things about the way we work have changed for the better, so it’s a shame that the two weeks’ notice paradigm has stubbornly persisted. If you are frustrated by how people leave your business today and want to try something new—and you want the playbook for making the change—check out Rethinking Two Weeks’ Notice. You can read the first few chapters for free on Substack and see if you’d like to learn more.

Quote of The Week

"If you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always got.” - Henry Ford

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