Thinking about Giving Up and Quitting? Ask Yogesh Sood
Dear Yogesh,
I have worked at a multinational company for over 10 years now and was pretty much happy with my stable job with constant growth. About a year ago, our company was acquired by a group of investors who brought their own CEO. At first, he said all the good things about the work environment and advancements, which seemed perfect. However, not long after he got his position gripped, he steered off of what he used to claim. It has become very clear that his goal is to squeeze as much short-term profit out of the company as he can.
He has demanded major cutbacks, especially in the HR department. This has made our work more tiresome and doubled the working hours. We went from having well-structured onboarding, management training, and leadership development programs to essentially doing the bare minimum for compliance, compensation, and benefits.
It is demotivating. Our department has made a number of presentations explaining how the systems can give better ROI, but the CEO never listens and rather laughs it off and insults our work. My plans were to retire from this job at the right time, but now it seems like I will have to find a new job which is a whole new burden for me. Please suggest something!
Regards,
Amit
Dear Amit,
It seems like you’ve been going through some really tough times. When you have to face the harsh truth and give up on your dream, it can take a toll on your mental as well as physical health. It looks like your heart and soul were into this job, and you were hooked on what you did. But now, with all the friction and problems, it is more like you are attached to a negative environment.
This might seem like a tough job to do, but unhooking yourself and detaching from something that was real for over a decade can be a task worth a million.
All negative situations, the ones in which you find yourself tolerating the intolerable come down to three choices:
- Do nothing.
- Do something.
- Leave the situation.
- The first option is to stay where you are and do the bare minimum so as to sustain yourself in the job that you do. Just like the others who are putting up with all the changes, you can wait it out until it is time to retire. This is what is commonly referred to as “quit and stay”, and people do it all the time. This can be termed as putting up with the problem, but some people work through it this way and are able to sustain themselves.
- Another option is to keep fighting until your CEO understands or is so annoyed with you that you lose your job. Or, you can escalate it to the other board members and wait for them to act upon it or help you by providing some aid. There can be a different plan at the higher levels. The board or the owners may be aware of what is going on and may have plans to use the profit record of the last few years to re-sell the company at a much higher valuation.
- The last and most viable that seems right now is to save yourself from all the misery and quit. As there are so many opportunities out there right now, so much re-shuffling, so much hiring. Go find yourself a new project, a better challenge to work on where you can reach your true potential.
Professional hijacks like these can lead to demotivation, lack of interest in work, and many other related problems. It is best to take the right decision at the right moment.
Regards,
Yogesh Sood
The above is an adaptation of a blog written on MAY 7, 2022, MADELEINE HOMAN BLANCHARD.