<p>I’ve just started my non-profit in 2007 & am astounded at how much “stuff” I have accummulated! It’s so easy to just take in more & more paper!</p>
<p>Congrats edad; you & your wife are going to love the new, simplified life! It will be fun to be able to pick up & go when whims take you. Enjoy!</p>
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<p>My sister and I enjoyed sorting through the stuff – especially old papers and photos – after our parents died. We learned a lot of things about our family that we had never known. As for the other stuff, we sold it, donated it, or threw it out. It took only a few days’ work to accomplish this in each instance. (And it would have taken even less time if my sister hadn’t insisted on donating the useful stuff to charities that could benefit from it. I was all for hiring a guy with a truck and saying “OK. Haul it all away, and I’ll write you a check.”)</p>
<p>Of course, it helped that our parents were divorced, and each lived alone at the time of his/her death. There was no spouse to object to us getting rid of whatever we didn’t want.</p>
<p>edad: Four weeks is a long time, but now that you’ve given notice, it will be an entirely different experience. </p>
<p>How long have you been there?</p>
<p>And, edad, no counteroffer??</p>
<p>No counter offer. When I said I sold my house, I think it was clear that I was finished. I really did not have any idea how my resignation discussion would be taken. It went well. I think my boss was just a bit envious and counting the few years before he can quit. We had a fairly brief discussion and my guess was correct. I do expect the company will create two new positions. For one position they will recruit for a high level individual with a national reputation and then they will still need a more junior level individual to handle all the day to day work. Anyway that is likely to take a long time. I just need to try to clean up the loose ends.</p>
<p>You were extraordinarily honest. I might have wanted to “play” them for a bit and just told them that I had another opportunity (which you do – selling your house!) that was too good to pass up. </p>
<p>I really really really hope I can follow in your footsteps soon.</p>
<p>There have been many, many times when things were not going well at work and I dreamed of being able to quit. In dreams it is easy to create some great scenarios. If I had enough time, I guess I could have waited for one of those perfect times. Instead having the resignation discussion with my boss was just a chore I had to do. I really don’t hate my boss. He is just another smuck caught up in a crazy system. Selling the house, retiring, and taking off full time in a small RV are exciting but also very stressful. I am going for the low stress approach and that was my goal in quitting. I will be there another month. It is nice to know that my boss is not going to be vengeful and hard to work for. I can tell you it was very enjoyable to talk with coworkers and subordinates. No one saw this coming inspite of lots and lots of prep work. I did not make a single slip in over a year of downsizing, listing the house and buying and outfitting a camper. Most people are envious especially those with another few years to go. Almost no one can look at the picture of our truck camper and believe two adults and two cats will live in it full time. Some of the more citified New Yorkers are just downright amazed.</p>
<p>It really is amazing how much junk one person can come up with over a few years, yet alone a married couple and if you add kids in there it gets crazy! My BF and I were talking the other day about how it might be nice some day to build a house and merge the two of ours together. We were counting up our belongings and we decided we would need two living rooms, one finished basement, seven bedrooms plus two kitchens and two dining rooms to hold all of our stuff. LOL. Talk about a possible need to downsize!!!</p>
<p>Read this thread back when it was just one page and really had nothing to contribute that wasn’t already being said.</p>
<p>Well now I do. Was on the phone last night with a friend who was let go last week after 35 years at the same bank. She was telling me how horrible the morale was there.</p>
<p>Then, my own job. Maybe a handful of times in the last seven years have I come close to quitting (one time I even walked in with all my electronic gear, etc. to turn in and was talked into staying). Next week might be the real deal. </p>
<p>As I was thinking about this thread, the sad part is that I know next to no one who is not tremendously stressed out by their job right now. Of course a lot of people I know work in health care, and it’s just a horrible place to be.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, I cannot think of a single person at the agency I work at right now that is happy with their job. We’re talking well over 100 people. We are having a all-staff meeting next Tuesday where supposedly there will be some new roll-outs, and if what I’ve heard is true, I will absolutely not continue to work for this company. What they are asking us to do is unethical and makes me sick to my stomach. Some of my co-workers have been there for well over ten years and have never seen morale so bad. Employee attrition is high and absolutely everyone is complaining. </p>
<p>Working part-time, my income does not warrant the stress I am going through and the anger I’m feeling. I think my time has come. And I might just go join the unemployed and liking it thread. </p>
<p>So yea, my experience and observation is that yes, people are generally more unhappy with their jobs.</p>
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<p>Just curious, teriwtt: Will you say that at the all-staff meeting?</p>
<p>I have been in the same profession since 1976. Only in the last few years has it become extremely unpleasant. This has been largely due to bosses, not co-workers. I can hopefully stand it until 6/14. The morale is extremely low.</p>
<p>VeryHappy - at this point, after stewing last night, I don’t even know if I’ll make it to the all-staff meeting. I am going to spend today formulating my resignation letter.</p>
<p>What they are basically asking us to do is the equivalent of ambulance chasing. I went to seminary to learn pastoral care, and our social workers went to grad school to learn social work. It is not our job to try to talk people into a service that they’re not ready for (I’m more specifically talking about the palliative care aspect of my work right now), and I think what I realized last night is that it has come to the breaking point when I feel I would no longer feel comfortable referring our agency to someone I know. Yet, here I am working for them. There’s something so wrong with this picture.</p>
<p>However, as I think I mentioned earlier, I suspect the morale is like this in every agency of our kind, and probably most non-for profit health-related agencies out there. </p>
<p>If I make it to the meeting, I will probably ask something along the effect, “What will you say to people who parallel this new model to ambulance chasing?” That way the question will be clear that I am not the only person who feels this way, but it is how it is being perceived.</p>
<p>Our agency used to do employee satisfaction surveys almost annually. Right before the new CEO, the rate was really high. Hasn’t been done in over two years now. All I can say is we have one helluva naive, ignorant board of directors.</p>
<p>Teriwtt,
So sorry that things have come to such a state at your workplace. It does sound quite miserable and I’m so sorry you have had to work in such an environment. It makes me wonder about my own medical insurer, as I have had two different employees quit while I’ve gotten to know them. The third one is now the supervisor and needs the job and is pretty young, so I think that may be one of the reason he remains. </p>
<p>They do some things that I find pretty unpleasant myself and one thing that gets people very upset is the 7 figure salary they pay the CEO of this non-profit insurer as well as $250+ they pay others of of his top execs while providing very poor reimbursement for providers and barely over minimum wage for the tons of clerical employees they have. 
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<p>Hope things work out OK for you. Sounds pretty bad if all 100+ at your workplace are unhappy & they’ve stopped doing satisfaction surveys!</p>
<p>Saw this on cnn today and thought i’d post it.</p>
<p>[For</a> mental health, bad job worse than no job - CNN.com](<a href=“http://www.cnn.com/2011/HEALTH/03/14/unemployment.health/index.html?hpt=T2]For”>http://www.cnn.com/2011/HEALTH/03/14/unemployment.health/index.html?hpt=T2)</p>
<p>fendergirl, glad you bumped this thread up.</p>
<p>Teriwtt: Did you quit??</p>
<p>I had planned to give two weeks’ notice on Monday, April 4. Then I realized I’d have no income if I did that (Duh --) so I’ve been reconsidering. I was just told yesterday, in passing, that the management change they told me would be effective no later than last December is “still on track” and that there should be news this week. </p>
<p>So I don’t know what I’m going to do, but I don’t have to know that right now. There’s no deadline. It will be interesting to see what “management change” they’ve come up with. The only other person I can imagine they’d have me report to has been helping me by giving my name to headhunters.</p>
<p>VeryHappy - well, I quit that job, and have surprisingly found tons more… around my house. I have undertaken so many projects that I can’t keep them straight sometimes: major untaking of reorganizing my kitchen recipes, genealogy, minor redo of the bathroom, taxes, working outside to lop off a bunch of bushes (when the weather allows), travel planning, closet reorganizing, etc. I will be out of town quite a few times between now and mid-May so I have no desire to look for anything else immediately. Oh, and there’s also the issues of a senior dog that are requiring more and more attention (and, well, clean up). And I’m sure there are other jobs I’m forgetting, but yes, I’ve not been in want of things to do. </p>
<p>Two weeks after quitting (at my exit interview I told them that a major lack of communication from upper management/senior leadership was one of the reasons I’d had enough) I was at home one late afternoon when my phone rang and privacy manager showed up. Usually when it’s privacy manager it would have been someone from work calling, as all of our cell phone numbers are blocked. Sure enough, it was one of the managers (I’m now thinking has called to say they just found out I quit and wanted to wish me well). But the call took a different direction, “Hi teriwtt, this is Kathy; I really apologize for bothering you at home and I wouldn’t if I weren’t desperate, but is there any small chance you could work for a couple of hours tonight?” I laughed to myself and told her I’d quit two weeks ago, and told her that poor communication was one of the reasons I gave for quitting. She replied, “Ya think???” She apologized profusely and wished me a nice evening, then I’m sure was off to make more calls to find someone to fill in the time she needed.</p>
<p>Also, the week after I quit, one of my former worker’s (who retired almost a year ago) mother died, so I went to the wake. I ran into a couple of current employee there who were anxious to tell me how they found out I had quit. One of our nurses found out from one of our patients, who called her to request a female chaplain (they had been reassigned a male chaplain), and when the nurse asked why they were requesting a new chaplain, she was told, “Oh, teriwtt quit.” And one of the social workers found out when she was called a few days after I quit, asking if she’d take an on-call. She later figured out she was being asked because it was one that I’d been assigned to prior to quitting. But no one actually came out and told her. </p>
<p>So the phone calls definitely confirmed my decision! That was the frustration of my job.</p>
<p>Oh, I ended being up one of five people that quit that week alone!</p>
<p>teriwtt, it’s nice to make a decision for which you have no regrets, no second thoughts. </p>
<p>When you’re done with all the projects in your house, come on over to mine!</p>