A while back, in the course of one week, I had two different people from two different companies come to my office and talk about how challenging and frustrating their jobs were. Their comments were almost identical. They talked about how the company president was not doing this and not doing that. There were unfulfilled promises. Morale was down. Quality of work was suffering. There was tension within the executive team.
Both said they had just had enough and they were ready to quit.
I asked both of these individuals if they had said anything to their company’s leadership team. They told me that they had tried in the past, and their comments were dismissed. I challenged them to give it another try. I told them that they owed it to themselves.
Plus, I said, they owed it to the company where they worked. Both of these people had been given a job and an opportunity, and before just quitting the firm, abandoning the executive team and throwing in the towel, they owed it to everyone involved to give it another real, authentic try.
They pushed back at first, like so many people do when I give this advice. It’s only natural, after all, to not want to offer more feedback when you didn’t have a positive reception the first time you tried. It is intuitive to want to just stay silent and move on rather than risk another uncomfortable conversation. But sometimes in life our paths are not easy. It’s important to remember that anything really worthwhile is worth your while—it’s worth a second (or a third) try.
Quitting is the easy thing to do. It’s not necessarily the right thing to do.
I suggested to both of these people that they give it another try, that they attempt to make things better—for themselves and for their company. If another attempt to call attention to problems falls on deaf ears, then they might consider moving on. I encouraged them to give it, at least, one more try.
I told them that it was selfish to not try to make things better before leaving.
Simply quitting would mean turning their backs on a company and a leadership team that believed in them enough to take them on board. State your valid concerns, I told them, and give the company’s leadership a chance to defend themselves and, hopefully, attend to the problems at hand. Try to help them make things right and make things better.
I think the bottom line is that none of us would want someone to simply give up on us and quit. We’d all want a second chance to put things right. And since no one is perfect, a legitimate second chance is very much in order. If things still don’t change, I told them, then—and only then—should they decide to leave.
Consider this advice for yourself. When things aren’t going well at work or in other areas of your life, don’t give up easily. Get uncomfortable instead. Have the hard conversations. Be authentic. Work at making things better. Dig in, and get scrappy! Give it your very best shot, and then decide what to do next.
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