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Comment by Aurornis | Hacker News Reader

How common do you think rescinded offers are?

You’re virtually guaranteed to burn your reputation among your former coworkers and ensure that the one thing they remember you for is taking a new job and giving negative one weeks of notice. Is that really worth avoiding the vanishingly small risk of a rescinded offer? Do you really think the old job wouldn’t let you keep working there if you gave 2 weeks’ notice and then rescinded your notice?

I think you’ve got your risk model backwards. If you optimize too much for rare outcomes, you start missing the bigger picture.

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> You’re virtually guaranteed to burn your reputation among your former coworkers

Well F** that shit. Companies might treat you like shit, but I'd never judge a coworker for making the best decisions for their own life. That said, I've also never been surprised when a coworker puts in notice - pretty sure they typically tell everyone but management.

People, especially white collar employees, don't like to think of it as Employer V Employee but it is. Companies will lay you off without warning when it isn't profitable. You still don't get to say bye or off-board to other coworkers. I won't hold it against my coworkers for doing what they have to. It's just a job, and at 5pm it disappears until morning. A coworker quitting shouldn't impact you so much that you think less of them.

It's gotten increasingly common to see rescinded offers lately. If companies aren't punished for that behavior, then the rare outcomes become common. I've never seen a 2-week notice period on an actual employment contract for either party.

People forget that loyalty is a two way street.

Yes but the side that corporate is on is much wider

Some companies have written policies to pay you for several months after a layoff (my megacorp does, and paid it out after a small layoff round in January). So there's some loyalty at least for existing employees.

> So there's some loyalty at least for existing employees.

There is the calculus that the PR and legal costs are not entirely predictable and could be higher, so why the the risk if we have the cash.

If you are at a megacorp, you are a number, and a variable in a bunch of spreadsheets. Nobody cares about you beyond that.

…this time. Next time maybe not. That written policy is as flexible as your employment.

> You’re virtually guaranteed to burn your reputation among your former coworkers and ensure that the one thing they remember you for is taking a new job and giving negative one weeks of notice.

The good news is that in my experience this simply isn't a thing. Not even a little. The industry is so fucking big you'd have to be incredibly toxic to somehow lock yourself out of it. Burned bridges? Were you really going to go back to the place you were so unhappy you left with zero notice? Folks you have real relationships with will understand. Who gives a shit about the rest?

That's not how this works. People progress through their careers. Some of your coworkers will do really well, some will do ok. Now imagine two universes. You're 45. In Universe A every one of your old coworkers remembers you fondly and would love to work with you again. You've built up ~25 years of good will, and the folks who do really well will keep inviting you to join them. In Universe B they all think "meh" and have forgotten about you. Which of these two universes would you like to be in?

Sure, Universe A — but I can't imagine people who like me really well would start thinking "meh" because I gave less than two weeks of notice.

At least, from my side I couldn't care less about how much notice my coworkers give the company; it's the excellence of the work that they did while they were there that makes up the core of my impressions about them and puts them in Universe A.

Why would I hold it against my coworker for leaving without notice?

My coworkers would probably know beforehand.

So, it's giving a two weeks notice that makes all the difference, and not my entire tenure?

I built up "good will" with several of my former co-workers, it's not really made that big of a difference in my life. As someone approaching 45 I have very much learned that 2 weeks notice doesn't buy you much in this industry. Last job I walked away because the situation was just too toxic, wish I had left sooner.

Give 2 weeks if the situation isn't toxic, but in my experience, notice is completely optional.

This is (or should be) moot, because if you still NEED to work after 25 years in tech, you are doing many things very wrong.

I understand still WANTING to work, of course, but you should be in a position to pick your own colleagues, projects, and schedule.

Not everyone rides the FAANG train.

They're getting more common in tech...

Very few of us have jobs where they need 2 weeks from us, there's usually conversation before. Absolutely no one is going to end up burnt long-term because they gave a week instead of two.

I would never judge a coworker for doing this. Not even a little bit.

I have, on numerous occasions, come in to work to find that a colleague was laid off without anybody giving advance notice to them or anyone on the team. Just, poof they're gone, hey team let's pick up Jimmy's tickets now!

If that person's manager was not my manager, I was not even told after they were laid off -- I found out when emails went unanswered and I had to go looking for them.

I think that's pretty typical, unfortunately.

Anybody who would judge a coworker for leaving without notice shows a pathological lack of empathy. Doing so publicly would be a great way to damage your own reputation.

I had a rescinded offer from both TiVo and Oracle. Same story in both cases. The entire division was eliminated in layoffs right after offer was made! (This was in mid 90s)

Counterpoint: I've quit a job at a big company where my notice was just sending in an email saying "I'm not coming in today or ever again - I have already cleaned out my office." It never came back to hurt me even once and my skip-level even wound up contacting me later asking me to join his team at a new company. My previous manager contacted me, she wound up working at the same company as me next, and she messaged me asking for a recommendation to join my current team.

Getting pretty common recently.

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