Quitting jobs: The two-week notice is dying. Maybe it should | Hacker News Reader

Quitting jobs: The two-week notice is dying. Maybe it should

slate.com

12 pointstekdude9 comments

I’ve twice put in my 2 weeks and have been fired on the spot. In one case, I had to ask for permission to work for a couple days for free so I wouldn’t leave my teammate hanging (the situation unfolded rather suddenly).

Knowing what I know now, I’d still put in my 2 weeks, but also be prepared with my new employer that I might start immediately, depending on how old employer takes it.

The 2 week notice isn’t just out of the kindness of your heart. It’s an amount that’s been generally accepted by everyone as “good enough” to not burn bridges. Ultimately, if you don’t need those bridges and you’re good screwing your coworkers (there are rare times this makes sense), you always could give zero notice and quit. Why even quit at that point? Just no-show and see if they keep paying you.

Those bridges can really come in handy though. People always say it’s who you know, not what you know. That’s 100% true in my experience and when I look at the people making the most money around me.

FWIW I like to say I’m giving 3 weeks notice to my new employer, then give 2 weeks notice to my old one, and have a week to breathe :)

> The 2 week notice isn’t just out of the kindness of your heart. It’s an amount that’s been generally accepted by everyone as “good enough” to not burn bridges.

That's the whole issue though. It's all employer-centric. Employers don't worry about burning bridges 95% of the time and will typically terminate "effective immediately". From TFA:

> the firing-vs.-quitting dynamic has always been asymmetrical. Even really wonderful employers almost never cease employment with a kind offer to let you keep working there until you find a new source of income.

and

> A Reddit thread from a few weeks ago recounts someone attempting to leave a job, after four years, with dignity and a standard two weeks’ notice. Twenty minutes after they told their boss about their plan to leave, their boss cut off their access to email and Slack. They felt like “a corporate spy who had just stolen company trade secrets instead of an employee who gave them four years of dedication.” The redditor wrote, “They wouldn’t even let me say goodbye to my team or grab my coffee mug from my desk.”

The 2 weeks notice thing is from a different time. The time when working unpaid overtime and skipping your lunch breaks to meet deadlines got you noticed and promoted. Employers don't give a rip about you in 2026.

It's wrong not to mention that many employers offer severance pay. (When not firing for cause.) The only time I ever got laid off I got 6 months of pay and health insurance. That's better than average, but I think 2 weeks of pay is the standard minimum. Even if the employees are sent home right away.

I think you've been fortunate in your experiences. Some states don't even have protections against baseless termination, employers can just terminate at will. In the states that do, employers often fight all unemployment cases on policy. I've seen 3 companies transition into new owners. In almost every case, the new owners proceeded to terminate almost all department managers and lots of front-line staff without notice or benefits. In the case of the managers, they'd often be shadowed for a while to see the ins and outs of what they did before termination.

> That's the whole issue though. It's all employer-centric. Employers don't worry about burning bridges 95% of the time and will typically terminate "effective immediately".

We might be speaking past each other. I completely get the point of the article. If we're talking in reality vs in theory, the power has always been in the hands of the employers. It shouldn't be that way, I agree! But if I quit today and give zero notice, there's a good chance I can no longer put my employer up as a reference for a job in the future. This matters less and less with age, but especially early in careers, references really do matter to build trust with potential employers.

2 weeks notice is an easy thing to do on my end to secure references. Also, and let's be real, you don't have to let the company suck your soul for the two weeks. It's not like they are going to fire you if you're kind of clocking in and clocking out for those 2 weeks. And if they do? I get a couple weeks to hang out before starting my next role.

Is this just America being broken? Has anyone in Europe seen any of this? This doesn’t resonate at all.

In France and Czech republic, all the workplaces I have been in require a 3-month notice, same for rental contracts.

After covid the masks have fallen. Employees dont care about their companies, they jumped overnight to the highest bidder. Companies don’t care, all of the office theatrics were not needed (remote worked fine). After Trump election they dropped pretending too, all of the corporate responsibility programs were cancelled, and now all of the ceos openly talk about firing their personnel while they have vastly profitable businesses.

It is all going great, we are becoming south Europe. Nobody will be willing to work for any price, and employers will have nobody to sell their products for any price. Enjoy.

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