Name: How To (Professionally) Quit Your Job
Uploaded: 2026-01-27T13:24:12.000Z
Duration: 10 min 27 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

I'm a filmmaker and career educator living in New York.

And today we're talking about how to professionally quit your job.

Okay, so first of all, right off the bat, I just want to say that this is country dependent.

I know some other countries have laws around quitting.

So I just wanted to say keep that in mind.

If you aren't working in the US this video might not be relevant for you.

But if you're looking to quit your job in the U.S. this video is for you.

First of all, quitting can be kind of a stressful and surprisingly emotional thing.

If you're living a toxic workplace or coworkers you love, or you finally got that dream job, it can come with a lot of mixed emotions.

Some people feel guilty, some people feel relieved, some people feel stressed.

I've decided to step down from my post and spend more time with my family.

I just want you to know it's completely normal.

We spend most of our waking hours working.

So when you change what you're doing at work, it can feel really monumental.

And a lot of our identities tend to be wrapped up in what we do.

So any type of shift in that can feel really big.

So just know it's totally fine to have weird emotions around this.

But it's important to keep in mind that this is professional, it's not personal.

Okay, now we're going to talk about order of operations.

It's really important that you follow this process in order to best advocate for yourself.

Quitting can get messy fast and we definitely don't want you to get the short end of the stick.

Okay, so step one, you need to have the new offer with the company.

Company signed, sealed, delivered, everything has to be signed.

You have to have your start date and salary.

Because the last thing you want to do is quit this job and then have your new job be like, oh, well, we weren't sure about it yet.

And you're like, great, now I don't have any job.

Step two, you have to pick your last day at work.

Now, in the US it's customary to give a two weeks notice.

That way you can spend time wrapping up projects, training others, delegating tasks, and

you give the company a little bit of time to find somebody to replace you.

You do not legally have to give two weeks.

It is a customary professional courtesy and it's what most people do.

If it's a toxic workplace, you can get up and walk out and never see any of them again.

Michael, you have no idea how high I can fly.

But again, it is customary to give this like two week buffer even though the company can just lay you off the same day, which is a topic for another video.

And something else that's important to keep in mind is that when you do quit and you do have that conversation and put in your two weeks, they can tell you, just leave now.

Like, they can not accept your two week courtesy.

So it's really about like just knowing if your boss is like a normal boss and they'll just like do the two week thing and be professional and mature or if they're just like going to be a jerk about it.

It's in your best interest to leave the company in good standing.

I know it can feel tempting to throw a tantrum or rant or finally get things off your chest.

But it is not only the immature thing to do, it's unprofessional.

And it's not a good way to advocate for yourself.

A lot of people don't realize how small the world is and how quickly your reputation can get damaged.

Now, if you would like to give feedback about a toxic or abusive or just plain bad manager, there are ways you can do that that are way more effective than you putting your reputation on the line.

You want to leave your job with as much grace as possible, and

If you want, you can ask for an exit interview where you give the company feedback as to why you're leaving.

The ironic thing is that good companies usually offer exit interviews because they want feedback and it's the bad companies who usually don't, so it doesn't always work.

And then you can always ask your manager if they would like to receive feedback from you.

But don't just go around ranting and yelling and venting at them.

Save that for glassdoor.com, fishbowl, your therapist and your friends.

It's usually a Friday, but it doesn't have to be.

So message them and just say, you know, hey, do you have a few minutes to chat?

Or pull them aside after a meeting and just say, hey, can I put 10 minutes on your calendar on Friday?

They'll probably know what this meeting is about.

I know quitting can feel kind of awkward.

And if you're a people pleaser, it can feel even painful to disappoint somebody or to break bad news to them.

But it's important to remember that if your boss has been managing for any amount of time, this is not their first quitting meeting, okay?

Onboarding and offboarding people is literally part of their job description.

Having this conversation is literally part of their job.

They aren't your family, despite what they might tell you.

When you find a new job, you go to the new job.

Subtitles ListPlay Video

How To (Professionally) Quit Your Job

literally

subscribe

relevant

process