Job hunting – tell my boss or keep schtum?

I am in a dull desk job, that is steady enough, but no prospects of progressing.

I have started looking for other jobs, and started applying for some this week.

Do I front up to my manager and be straight with them or keep it quiet?

There’s certainly no obligation to tell your manager. But I don’t think it does any harm to be honest and let them know you’re concerned that there’s no prospect of progressing. Best case they surprise you find you something more interesting. And it’ll make the conversation easier if you do find another job and hand your notice in.

I would not advise you say anything.

Historically I would of said keep quiet until you have a job offer. However my last move (internal) I told my boss about out of courtesy. He said he would be sad to see me go, but knew I had bigger aspirations and also the hiring manager personally and would put in a good word for me…

I ended up getting a pretty tidy promotion, partly on the back of my incumbent manager.

You need to gauge it yourself though; Some managers want to see their staff progress and move about, some just want an easy life and keep their staff suppressed.

Keep it to yourself until time to hand in your notice. What benefit is there to you letting them know you are looking elsewhere? If you do then they could start looking for your replacement, keep you out of the loop in terms of whats happening, start to blame you for things going wrong, anything. What if you then change your mind? You’ll be in an awkward position. All the benefits of telling them are with them, not you. If you want to leverage a better deal then do it when you have a firm offer not before.

hmm, yep, can see both points of view.

Just think it might start looking obvious if I get asked to go for interviews and I have to book leave at short notice.

would they tell you if they were going to make you redundant ir they were thinking off it

I cannot really see any advantage to telling them unless you think they will give you a better job

Then start dropping hints now that you are starting to feel ill. A few GP appointments here and there to get blood tests etc will cover you. Be creative.

It’s one of those mixed bag of opinions.
MrsT is a manager within a ScotGov/NHS dept/quango. She is interviewing for an internal post shortly. If anyone within the department wishes to move on/progress whether within ScotGov or elsewhere she is willing to help/advise/mentor etc. for 2 reasons. 1) to see others progress as she has done. 2) if someone wants to leave then they must have reason and may have become unproductive etc..
Tjnr however left his first job having been an apprentice gaining loads of experience/knowledge from guys who were on the retirement/redundancy schedule and moving from a basically manual system to a computerised system( he replaced 6 people!!) He left to join a construction engineering company(from an electrical background in autocad). Company sent him on a degree course. The company subsequently found themselves in financial difficulties due to the financial “crash” and the downturn in construction.
In the meantime his previous employer were in need of someone with his skills, hence he moved back to his old job. Move on a couple of years and promises made were not forthcoming and he handed in his notice having been successfull in gaining another construction job.
However the new job offer was not quite as per interview and current job upped their anti…he stayed where he was/is and is slowly making his mark.
Could go on to tell the story of MzT……

At my work they nearly didn’t employ any apprentices, nearly all of the last 20 have left fir pastures new. One only needs to pass his medical next week and one only has 2 shifts to go …..

HungryHungryHippo – Member
There’s certainly no obligation to tell your manager. But I don’t think it does any harm to be honest and let them know you’re concerned that there’s no prospect of progressing. Best case they surprise you find you something more interesting. And it’ll make the conversation easier if you do find another job and hand your notice in.

This is why MrsT would rather anyone wishing to move on came to her for assistance, there are no prospects unless people are willing to relocate/commute to Edinburgh from Dumfries 🙄

From the other side, I had a guy last year come into me to tell me that he had another job offer but then to tell me that he would prefer to stay with me. Hard to see if it was a clumsy attempt at negotiating a new salary. But he was a little surprised when I congratulated him and advised him to take the other job! Glad to see the back of him.

But to the question, NO

Depends on whether you’ve talked about progression during your normal reviews; if you’ve drawn a blank with internal roles (or if there’s nothing and you both have talked about it) then tell her/him

However if he/she is an arse and you want out then get a new role and go but be polite on the way out

Depends on whether you’ve talked about progression during your normal reviews; if you’ve drawn a blank with internal roles (or if there’s nothing and you both have talked about it) then tell her/him

However if he/she is an arse and you want out then get a new role
Agree, this is how Tjnr got asked back 😀

Id have a conversation based on the first paragraph but wouldn’t explicitly say you were leaving. A good manager wants to develop stuff and keep them engaged so he may be able to do something with you in your current position.

I’ve done both. Last job, we were taken over by a larger company and although my boss was great, the culture and the bullying by his boss wasn’t acceptable. So I fronted up to both my boss and HR, and said that I couldn’t see the culture changing and therefore I think it’s better if I seek other employment. It gave my boss chance to try to find me another role, and when that failed to organise some proper planningfor handovers and the like which I think was appreciated.

Current role – not a chance; in fact the job I’m going for (and really really want) has asked for references in advance and I’m going to have to ask them to not take up a current employer reference until job is offered and accepted. Because if it doesn’t come off, I could be here for a while yet and it would be very uncomfortable. Different culture, again.

Couple of other possibilities:

– if you’re in a role where your manager might be able to swing you a job with a client; or

– if you know you’re going to need some flexibility on your notice period. I’ve said “if any suitable CVs pass across your desk, you might want to keep them aside” before now.

🙂

It makes me chuckle that in the school where my wife works, the staff walk up to their managers and demand time off to attend interviews, get references and generally moan about stuff they deserve to keep their career moving.

Yet in the sector I am in, if you are looking for another job, you are obviously not happy where you are and should immediately get out in the world and see what’s there. i.e. you’re out chum.

Horses for courses. I’ve usually made it clear I’m unhappy with the situation. Last time I gave my notice, the boss asked me how long ago I’d made the decision. I said (honestly) that in principle I’d decided about 8 months earlier (had planned things still to do, couldn’t just walk out) but if the situation had improved I’d have stayed.

THink it also depends on our relationship with your manager. The last two times I’ve thought of applying for jobs elsewhere I’ve mentioned it. But then progression in my field is hard and its accepted that you may have to move to progress.

The only reason to say anything would be if you actually wanted to stay in the company you were at and were trying to use it as leverage for a promotion on role change (but that comes with it’s own risks ofc!). If you do just want a new job elsewhere then there’s nothing you can gain from saying anything to your manager.

If you think it’s solvable, tell your boss about your dissatisfaction. However if you need to effectively threaten them, then it’s not the basis of a strong relationship where they want to help you.

Do not tell him you are looking for another job, it changes the whole dynamic. And is nothing to do with him really, as long as you are not expecting interviews etc on company time.

If you think you are doing it to be fair, your notice period is built to be fair – you don’t need to add more to be nice.

If however you just want to get out ASAP, hand in your notice today and get living.

It’s a relationship at the end of the day. If you tell your partner you don’t think its working, you want it to and here’s how to change it – thats an honest relationship, and can be worked on. It might not work out but you tried. If you tell them, it’s not working, but I’ll stay till I find someone better, and if I don’t I’ll probably just settle with you for a bit and always keep my eye out – that probably won’t lead to long term happiness for either party

Depends on my relationship with my mgr and others in company I’m at. I don’t want to cause too much of a shock when resigning from people I like so have in the past mentioned I was considering what to do – does give a chance for them to help improve things if that’s feasible. In my early days I did use it to up my salary once I had a job offer but I was underpaid, wouldn’t do that now.

I have been approached by a company to join them recently so I mentioned that to my boss when we were chatting recently, I played it down but if I get a job offer I may take it and at least it won’t be a complete surprise.

In the majority of cases I would say “keep quiet”.

If you are too brassy about it, it could seem like you’re trying to screw them for a promotion or more money etc.

I recently changed jobs. I told my boss it was a done deal. He asked, sort of off the record, if there was ‘anything we can do to make you stay’. I just said that this was not the kind of game I play. I’d made my mind up to move because it was the right thing for me.

The only time I can see this working out is in a very small place where it really does feel like ‘family’. But in this scenario I would have expected it to be discussed before any job hunting took place.

Each to his own, but I dropped hints to my Falstaff of a boss that I may have an interview and he’s bricking it as his plague of fools that work for him will be lost without me…………….

I kid you not, when I have to compile how to doc’s starting with, turn laptop on…….( allegedly time served technicians)

Last week £3000 pounds of job was cancelled after I tightened up some battery terminals and Fails went to Passes…..

It’s not like its safety critical kit…..oh it is,………

I hate him and the job so much I’m actually relishing watching him squirm.

He has turned me into a bad man.

ALL I want to do is fix things but him and the organisation I work for conspire to stop this.

@Ming.

All very amusing for you in the short term. The problem is that even if you have fun bucking the trend, it will only take you so far. Ultimately, if you work in a tosserish place, run by tossers and with tossers, you’ll go slowly round the bend.

Get out now.