serving notice

[ExConstance]

Does anyone actually serve notice anymore? I've been managing a department for a charity for over 10 years now. We have admin staff and some people in hybrid type roles based in our office and from time to time they move on. A few years back they would always serve their notice and generally be keen to give the right amount of time. More recently I've noticed a swift departure because a new job "can't wait" or for the more cowardly the notice period is spent on sick leave with stress, which suddenly comes on the day after their reference goes out. Apart from declining to give a reference until a couple of days before they leave there isn't much I can do really is there? I feel if you have made a contractual obligation to give notice you should actually work it, it makes me very sad when people who have been good colleagues do this.

ExC, contractually yes, you are meant to serve your notice period, and equally the employer should pay you up to your final day. That's the deal. I think it is wrong that people are offered a new job and try to orchestrate it so they can jump ship quicker. They shouldn't commit an earlier start, its a breach of their contract, but employers very rarely pursue it.

The ins and outs are quite opaque to the average co-worker team about what is going on behind the scenes. HR know and probably the line manager, that's it.

It seems we are moving to a US mIndset of 1-2 weeks notice - one minute it's announced the employee is leaving the company and they are gone within days, just enough to clear their desk and hand over a status report on their work. No overlap, the poor new recruit often has to muddle along finding their own way. Which should be prevented if the notice period is honoured.

I will be forever grateful to my predecessor who not only served his full notice, but also gave me a 10 page document for everything I needed to get started. I'll never take that for granted!

All this amounts to a culture of people as "disposable" resources and not much loyalty any more.

Of course a mutual renegotiation of notice is a different matter entirely.

There wouldn't be an overlap would there?

Employees gives 4 weeks notice - job advertised and offered references etc plus only then the new employee hands in 4 weeks notice .....

It depends. I have had an overlap in several roles. It depends what people's individual contracts say. In my current role my predecessor overlapped with me, it was an internal transfer.

I suppose the pressure is often put on the new recruit for that reason because an overlap is helpful esp if the job is complex. And the ability to overlap is only possible if they bugger off sooner from the old job!

We have fairly long notice periods (2 months) and everyone I know who has left has served their notice (except one who was fired but that's a different matter).

but then you have an employee who doesnt want to be there for two months, this can be really disruptive (and its not always the employee being disputive) .

the only time I served two months notice, the boss ,who I had previously had a good relationship just stopped giving me work , or including me in team meetings once i had tidied up my projects in hand , I just had to go in and sat at desk for the rest of the two months.. in the end we were both really pleased to see the back of each other!

perhaps it was alsobecause they couldnt actually recruit until after my leaving date ( It was a university job )

I worked in a place where it was 3 months notice, and when I left, they graciously allowed me to reduce it to 11 weeks! Mind you, one poor sod, who was going to a competitor, was made to sit out the 3 months in an office in his own with nothing to do - how petty!

Everyone gives notice and always has done, everywhere I've worked, perhaps the very exceptional exception.... if people are going off with stress to avoid notice routinely uhhhh.. it sounds like you might have a bigger problem somewhere