I am currently on maternity leave from my job and scheduled to go back on the 20th of this month. While my job has been pretty wonderful overall they are real sticklers about lateness and PTO. In another thread I asked about whether or not to keep my job and determined that whether or not I wanted to keep working after the baby was born this job was not going to be the place for me.
Now that I’ve given birth and have been at home with the baby I’ve decided that I really do not want to go back to work full time. I have (sort of) started my own business and I wrote a children’s book that I’ve submitted to publishers so it isn’t like I’m not making productive use of my time or bringing in an income. Additionally my husband got hired at a new job and as of Monday he will have passed his first 90 days and have been given a bump in salary so financially we will be just fine if I’m not working full time.
The problem is that because we didn’t know for sure that his job would be permanent (we’d been burned in the past where he was hired for a position that was eliminated just a few weeks later) I didn’t dare officially quit my job until he got notice from his employer that he was truly employed for the long haul. Now that we know this job is sticking I want to go down to my office on Tuesday and tell them not to expect me to come back from maternity leave. My MIL and SIL believe this would be a bad, bad thing and that I should go back and work for at least a few weeks. They think not coming back from maternity leave would be a big mistake but I think it would be much worse to come back and have to give 2 weeks notice a week after I start the job again.
My question is who is right about this? Would it be worse to tell them now that I’m not coming back or to give 2 weeks notice almost immediately upon returning to work?
They’ve been managing without you somehow so I would tell them as soon as possible. If you have to give two weeks notice to retain any pay then wouldn’t your two weeks start as soon as you tell them even if you’re on leave? You’re still employed there.
If they hired a temp they can not send them back. If your coworkers have been picking up the slack they can continue to for a while. OTOH if your work has just been piling up, waiting for your return, you should do whatever you can to help catch up but still tell them right away.
I don’t see any benefit to you to wait until the 20th and telling them on Monday gives them more time to hire someone if you have to work for two weeks after the 20th.
Since you’re quitting, it doesn’t matter to the employer. They don’t have to pay you severance or unemployment or anything. And if they’ve been getting along ok without you, meh.
The slightly classier thing would be to meet with HR and announce your intention to leave immediately, as soon as you had decided, whatever day it was. But since you said Tuesday, which is only a few days away - again, meh. It’s not like you’d be collecting false paychecks while planning to quit or anything.
From how you describe your circumstances, you’re fine. Just tell them you’re leaving as soon as you’re back.
Is this one of those weird US things? Because if you’re not planning on returning, just tell them now you’re not planning on returning.
Or is there a worry they’ll somehow contact every possible future employer and black list you or something?
Really, if they’re going to have to replace you this just gives them a jump start. If they’re paying you no benefits while you’re away, I can’t see what the issue is. Or are they paying benefits and you’re concerned that they will terminate those? If so, in Canada that would be illegal. In the US I assume it’s perfectly fine, 'cus you folks tend to be a bit wacky about these things.
I would tell them and give them the option to have you work for two weeks if they need you, but I doubt they’ll take you up on it. When I had an employee take maternity leave, I always knew there was a good chance she would decide not to return.
But I also doubt it will hurt you in anyway to simply walk away.
Good luck with the book! Do let us know if it gets published.
Eons ago, I had a coworker who went out on maternity leave and we were pretty sure she wasn’t going to come back. Unfortunately, because we worked for the gov’t, we had to hold her job till she returned or officially quit. As we suspected, the day she was due back, she quit. That was the day we could finally advertise her position as available, and we all thought it was pretty crappy of her to mess with us that way. Let me make it clear - it wasn’t that she “changed her mind” about returning, it’s that we knew she didn’t intend to come back and she was just screwing with us. I know that’s not your situation.
If I was in your situation, I’d talk to my boss right away and ask about the possibility of working part time. If the answer is no, that’s that time to give notice, IMHO. It’s not going to hurt to ask and you might get the answer you want. And personally, I think coming back in and announcing that you’re quitting in 2 weeks seems rather classless, so I disagree with your inlaws.
It really depends upon your future goals. It’s not easy for a woman to quit her job and return to the full-time workforce after a gap in employment. If you choose to do so and want to return full-time, you’ll probably have to start at a junior-level position compared to where you were when you left and with less salary. But…working part-time in the same job could help you prevent that.
That said, I totally support starting your own business (before I started having kids I had my own and was doing well, though needed insurance once I found I was pregnant). And doing so instead of not working could help you get to a higher level salary-wise than you are now because you’d have credibility on your side if your business does well. You will need child care, though, if you decide to go great guns on your business; if you’re dabbling to see if it takes, that’s different.
So, bottom line: depends on your goals and how you approach it.
Take a hard look at what you want from this - write it out if you can because sometimes that helps - and talk to your boss. You might also find some other moms to talk to who’ve gone through the same thing. They might have some tips you haven’t thought of. If you want to write as a career, think about what you want to write (focus on children’s books, something else?), how much money you want to make from it and where you want to be in a few years. I always thought people who insisted on Franklin Covey-type goal setting were taking themselves a little too seriously, but it’s actually a valuable exercise, even if you’re not planning on changing what you’re doing. And now is a very good time to do it since your situation has changed and possibly your priorities.
Is this your first child? Is he/she about 2-4 months old, since your maternity leave is just running out now? My experience with my daughter, now ten months, has been that there was a sweet spot right in there where I was able to get things done–housework, exercise, crafts, and if I’d been focusing on a business, that. Then they learn to crawl. Then you are SOL for doing pretty much ANYTHING except looking after the baby until they’re old enough to play by themselves for long periods.
This has nothing to do with your question, just… good luck with that have-your-own-business thing. At this age I often think it would be nice to stick my daughter in daycare a couple of afternoons a week, and go work a job.
It sounds like you’ve already made up your mind and are just deciding how to break the news, so in that case I agree with this. If you know you’re quitting then they’ll want to know sooner rather than later, and if you offer to work the requisite 2 weeks then they can’t say you’re totally leaving them high and dry. 2 weeks is what they would get if you just found a better job. They won’t take you up on the offer but at least you made an effort to be flexible.
I work in H/R and seriously every time anyone goes on sick leave, we’re already under the impression that they will not be returning. I’d say 3/4 of the women never come back.
As an H/R director, I say tell them, as a woman, I say do not.
I can’t imagine any H/R manager being so ignorant as to not think about the possibility of you not coming back. I say look after yourself and do what’s best for you.
I would delay as long as possible then see what the situation is with your husband.
Even if you go back, and you then decide you want to leave, tell them your babysitting arrangements fell through and they better start looking for someone else.
Did you have any benefits from the company while on leave, like medical, dental, disability, etc? If you did and did not return those might be cancelled effective your last working day and you may be responsible for COBRA payments, for example. That is the only reason I would advise someone to return.
When my assistant went on maternity leave, I thought there was a good chance she wouldn’t return, so I had steeled myself for it. And she told me that she really wanted to quit because she missed her baby and missed not going to work, but that she would have been making a decision based on an emotional reaction to the idea of going back to work rather than a rational appraisal of what actually made sense for her.
All this to say, if you’re making the decision based on something rational, okay. But if you just are feeling the end of your leave and dread going back to work because going back to work always sucks after some time off, then I’d say maybe you should consider going back and giving yourself some time to assess it as you’re working, rather than assessing it from the standpoint of dreading it.
Classes started back up for me last week after a break in which I had some time off and got married and… wow, I didn’t want to go back! It was just stress and inertia talking, though.
Wait as long as possible to tell them, but I think you should offer to work out the 2 weeks. It might be uncomfortable to go back and offer to work during your 2 weeks’ notice (and even more uncomfortable to work it). They might just escort you out of the building when you provide notice, anyway. But you won’t be burning a bridge if you work out your notice period.
Umm… has your MIL or SIL ever managed anyone? I can tell you as someone who has managed people that without a doubt I would prefer to know as soon as possible if my employee isn’t coming back. So yeah, they are flat-out wrong and you are right.
I’d also like to repeat what other posters have said about a) why not ask about part-time work; even if you know they will say “OF COURSE NOT” at least it shows that you were willing to work with them, which leaves a good impression; also that b) it’s hard to leave one’s baby and go to work, but it’s not so bad either (my reaction after getting over the stress of leaving my darling baby was “Whoa, it’s quiet in this office!”) – although remembering your previous thread I’d say high-stress work might be different than my own flexible job, and c) it’s much harder to get things done once the kid learns to crawl (but of course you can hire part-time babysitters at that point if you need to work; I know several people who have done that).