I forgot to mention that it doesn’t sound silly because it’s wrong: it’s not. It’s just not the idiom, so sounds sorta klunky.
If you’re going to do it that way, you should spell out the number, and since you’re creating a compound adjective, it should be “two-week notice.” There is nothing wrong with “two weeks’ notice,” however.
Back to the question, though, it’s all a matter of courtesy. You want your current employer to be nice to you (letter of recommendation, overlap of benefits, positive referrals, getting re-hired if the new employer goes belly-up, etc.), so you should be nice to your employer. Give notice in person. Walk into your manager’s office with a formal (but short) letter of resignation, stating the exact dates. Hand the letter to your manager with a brief explanation, (e.g., “I got an offer I just can’t refuse and I’m going to have to leave.”)
If they don’t need two more weeks of your time to wrap things up, they’ll tell you.
If your manager is not in the same location as you and/or is a person you have never met, a phone call vs. a personal visit is fine. Just an email would not be good.
Up north you do it wrongly 
. The number two (2) in this case has nothing to do with whether the word “week” is plural. You are giving 1 notice, the phrase “2 week” merely describes the type of notice. You are giving a two week notice (see an example of this phrasing at this legal help site). Another example would be “a two day sale”, which would never be correctly rendered as “a two days’ sale”.
And I would write or speak that as “The destruction of the city”. It’s much less ambiguous that way.
Johanna, I do apologize for the highjack.
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- I have read articles elsewhere that say that while many people feel that giving adcance notice of quitting is just being considerate, -nowadays (in the US) if you put in any pre-notice of quitting and your job concerns anything involving security rights or confidential info, they immediately lock you out of all that and send you home for the duration. So if you have any work that you really wish to finish, you should consider doing that before making any announcement of quitting.
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- I have read articles elsewhere that say that while many people feel that giving adcance notice of quitting is just being considerate, -nowadays (in the US) if you put in any pre-notice of quitting and your job concerns anything involving security rights or confidential info, they immediately lock you out of all that and send you home for the duration. So if you have any work that you really wish to finish, you should consider doing that before making any announcement of quitting.
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Doctor Jackson, the notice belongs to the weeks. Johanna was correct in the first instance. First educational cite I could find.
As a serial resigner, I second the face-to-face personal explanation, followed by hard-copy follow-up.
I called first to see whom to address the letter to. (See the accusative case of “whom”? I’m on my best grammatical behavior in this thread.) I was told my old manager was no longer there. The receptionist was a temp and they didn’t give her an org chart, so she couldn’t tell me who my new manager was. All the people who could know that information were out.
It’s like one of those nightmares of decay and emptiness, where you try to go back to your former situation, but it disintegrates in front of you, and no one cares any longer. But this is real life!
I thought “screw it,” and asked for who was in charge there now. She told me the new honcho’s name. I googled and it was some corporate drone sent from HQ to pick over the corpse of my old company. So I put his name on it, drove there, handed it to the temp receptionist, and left immediately with a pleasant smile.
If this were a normal employment situation, I would follow all the good advice to say on good terms. But I have been so neglected and ignored by them that I doubt they will even notice whether I observe any such traditional niceties. What can I say, I guess virtue is its own reward.
Note: The link provided by inkleberry won’t produce a letter until you cough up details of your name and address, your former employer’s name and address, former job title AND salary range :eek: a drastic breach of usual internet privacy. I guess in Great Britain you’re not supposed to have any privacy. It kind of makes sense George Orwell came from there. The stated purpose is for their company to get a jump on filling your old position. So the compensation you provide in exchange for their little letters is information that would have a substantial dollar amount if priced for sale. Someone using that generator might want to ask themselves first if the exchange is worth it.
Okay, if you don’t even know who your boss is, then the situation is different. That’s one seriously screwed-up company! I think you handled it beautifully.
I don’t know how it is where you are but in NJ if you give an employer notice that the next two weeks will be your last and they fire you at that point you can collect for the two weeks notice you gave but unless you had good cause to leave you will not be paid unemployment after that period.
I know that doesn’t apply to your situation but I thought I’d throw in that trivia tidbit
Huh, according to this site both are correct:
Would Lynne be proud of all of us?
Yet you end the sentence with a preposition… 
The last time I gave two weeks’ notice, it was just before Thanksgiving. The day before Thanksgiving, I was told that I “wasn’t needed anymore” and then my boss told me was because the “big boss” didn’t want to pay me for the holiday because I was leaving. No big deal, really, I went to work for my new Company immediately and they paid me for the holiday.
Quite frankly, I have never seen anyone give two weeks’ notice successfully. Either you get the “check the calendar, oh boy, 3 more days!” syndrome or your boss becomes resentful that you would leave the greatest company ever. Most people are either told “never mind” or don’t make it all the way through their two weeks.
I have never been expected to work the two weeks (company usually waives it for people in marketing). I have only once forfeited it, and that was because I wanted the hell out of there ASAP.
The important thing is if they tell you not to work your two weeks they still owe you the pay (even if they escort you out). If you tell them you are leaving sooner you are forfeiting the pay.
You do know that there’s absolutely nothing wrong with ending a sentence with a preposition in English, right?
Yes, MLS, you are certainly correct (hence the cool smiley). Having said that, the sentence
would have read and sounded better had the preposition not been left dangling at the end. Of course, that is just a IMNSHO, and not indicative of any hard and fast grammar rule.
Cite?
Or did you really mean to say: “you would then qualify for unemployment benefits for the two-week period” instead of “they still owe you the pay”?
What **Poysyn ** said is certainly consistent with anywhere that I’ve ever worked. On resignation you give two weeks’ notice. You then either:
- work out the two weeks and get paid as per normal; or
- walk out straight away, at the request of your employer, and get paid the two weeks’ salary you would otherwise forgo.
I doubt that this is a legal requirement, at least in at-will employment states. The company might have to pay you unemployment if they forbid you from working that two weeks, but why would they have an obligation to pay? I would find this particularly puzzling for hourly employees.
Obviously this varies from place to place. It will be a legal requirement for many occupations here, depending upon the conditions in the state or federal award. I work under an individual employment contract which includes this provision, except that the notice period is 4, not 2, weeks.
Okay, where I live the hourly employee still gets two weeks pay if they are denied the chance to work it by their employer, it’s an average of their normal weekly pay (this is for full time, not part time employees).