Photo: Andrea Piacquadio / Pexels
It’s oddly cathartic to read this employee’s passive-aggressive resignation letter.
By Hawthorn Martin — Written on Mar 06, 2023
The working world will chew you up and spit you back out if you don't find ways to push back against demanding bosses and overwhelming workloads.
While professionalism often means knowing when to keep your mouth shut, sometimes we all need to find ways to give our employers a piece of our minds.
A letter shared to Reddit's r/antiwork subreddit — where users vent about frustrating part of the working world — shows how one employee used his resignation to speak his mind.
In a resignation letter, a worker told his employer exactly how he felt about quitting.
The hilarious and passive-aggressive letter was a printed-out resignation template with edits made in pen. Alongside writing in personal information, such as his last day in office, the employee also crossed off some of the more polite language and replaced it with his own true feelings about his workplace.
The employee of ten years crossed out a pre-written comment claiming that he “greatly enjoyed” his time with the company, and he rewrote it to say: “generally tolerated.”
Other alterations include writing over a section to claim that he would “never forget the many things that happened there” — the original text read "never forget the many things I learned."
Photo: Reddit
He also crossed off an entire section promising to train a replacement to simply write “goodbye” instead.
This tongue-in-cheek farewell letter has the internet laughing and praising the man for his honesty. After all, if he’s worked here for ten years and can only claim to have generally tolerated his workplace and “few” talented coworkers, one can only imagine what was happening behind the scenes.
The sheer number of people finding catharsis in this viral resignation letter raises the question, how many people are dissatisfied with their current jobs, and why?
Recent workplace trends show workers are dissatisfied with their jobs.
2021 showed a massive trend in individuals quitting their jobs, with over 8 million people quitting in the months of September and October alone. The trend was dubbed the “Great Resignation,” and left the job market with millions of vacant positions.
According to a study done by Pew Research, the majority of people left their jobs in 2021 due to low pay, feeling disrespected at work, and having no opportunities for growth. Although some employers like to complain that “nobody wants to work these days,” the truth is more realistic that people want to be compensated fairly for their time and energy, especially in a world where inflation is raising prices at every turn.
Hawthorn Martin is a news and entertainment writer living in Texas. They focus on social justice, pop culture, and human interest stories.