I had a meeting today with my manager and informed her of my plans to leave the company. For a couple hours prior, I was a little jittery, not knowing what to expect. I had a feeling that it would be an uncomfortable encounter, with me expressing various displeasures with my employment, and her verbally “rolling her eyes” at me. It’s become a regular thing between us. This, however, was not to be a regular meeting.

I entered her office, sat down, and said “I’m leaving the company.” Not two seconds went by before her response leapt out, which was a simple and unquestionably genuine “Oh Jason, I’m so happy for you!” Over the course of the next hour or so, we chatted about career and life changes, parenting and children, the state of our nation and government, and the requisite exit dates and other business points. Throughout, she repeatedly expressed her belief that I was doing a great thing, and that she was envious of the opportunities before me. It bordered on something similar to her being proud of me, strange as that may sound. Overall it was an oddly pleasant interaction, my first with her.

My exit date is set for December 9th, which I just learned has now been officially entered into the personnel database. There’s no turning back now. Payroll will begin processing my last check, including my roughly 275 hours of unused vacation time, to be paid on the 15th. There are a few minor details to be worked out with HR regarding stocks, 401k, my cardkey, etc. Aside from these details, I’m effectively on my way out the door.

Prior to leaving the company, my plan was to meet with the appropriate managers and HR representatives and outline, in gruesome detail, my experiences with some of my currently-unnamed coworkers. After today’s meeting, I’m just not sure anymore. One of the people I had been considering a nemesis turns out to be, well, not so bad after all. Not only did it take the wind out of my angst-ridden sails, it made me realize that I’m not all that fond of sailing.

If nothing else, I’ll say that I was reminded of a couple things today. People still surprise me, and that’s not a common occurrence. More importantly, though, is that people can even impress me, and that’s rarer still. I’m not yet ready to say that I was completely wrong about her, but I’m certainly not interested in jumping on the manager-bashing train quite so easily anymore.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 16th, 2005 at 11:53 pm and is filed under Work. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.