Reader Survey Results: Why I Left My Last Job

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I asked readers: what specific event crystallized your decision to leave your last job?

I was asked if I’d be willing to relocate after 3 years at one office. Said yes so my manager started the process. He never even told me what the HR package was, as it was so insulting. Knew then that it was time to leave the (slowly) sinking ship.

The PE firm that bought our company had little interest in the actual work we were doing. The CEO they put in place fell asleep in the first customer meeting I took him to and then after the meeting told me the customers in the meeting were idiots and he would rather get a needle stuck in his eye than attend another meeting like that.

Was notified by McKesson in fall 2016 my job would end March 31, 2017. Two months later was told I would need to train offshore resources how to utilize and quality test a large piece of clinical software. Given my training and years of front line experience in hospitals, my principles were on the line and no amount of severance was going to compensate me for principles. I turned in my two-week notice in early 2017 with several irons in the fire, but no offers. On my last day at McKesson, I got a call at noon offering me the job I was hoping for.

I took an early retirement package equaling a year’s pay, easing the way into lucrative consultancy for the next few years. However, the event that crystallized my decision was the concurrent layoff of valued colleagues who did not qualify for the package. It was the right choice.

To start a new company and see an idea turned into reality. Hopefully, hah.

Micromanaging leadership and leaders out for self-promotion over the company’s goals.

I was working 60-70 hours per week, seven days a week. My boss assigned me another project, and when I told him I couldn’t, he said something about digging deeper and that I could do just a little more. I already knew I was going to quit, but was trying to hold off one more month. That sealed me. They distributed my work among nine people.

I was a founding but minority partner in a consulting firm. After Having several disagreements with our managing partner about the future direction of the firm, I reached out to our board chair for advice. He made it clear that the managing partner was the majority owner and he would run the firm as he pleases. Great advice. I left and and subsequently founded a very successful and highly regarded consulting firm.

When the company that had acquired our niche software provider changed my network username from a name-based alpha to a nine-digit number.

Cruel management.

Realizing they owed me nothing, and I was simply in the way.

Missing a concert of one of my favorite performers to finish up something “critical” at work then driving home from the office so late that the sun was rising.

Promoted the worst director to be the new CIO.

Realization that in five years with an HIT consulting firm, we never once talked about “the patient.” Our mission statement was embarrassing to read.

Promoting and doctor to be the head of all IT clinical applications, over 100 people, when this doctor had NO experience being in charge of any size of team before, as he told all of us when he announced his promotion. No experience leading any organization whatsoever, no business or HR training, nothing. Talk about promoting someone to his level of incompetence. How often does leadership in healthcare think that just because someone is a doctor they can do anything?

A VP valuing contracts over business ethics and being completely detached from the realities of the marketplace, both in terms of realistic revenue targets and competitive compensation for our top talent, combined with a failing new product that was doomed from the start. The final acceptance of the fact that none of this was ever going to change was the “event.”

I left my last job because it was acquired by another company that was based in the South and I didn’t want to move from the SF Bay Area. Turns out to be the best decision.

A wholesale reduction of the middle management positions in the organization, making communication with manager more difficult (had too many direct reports to effectively manage); pushing many of our previous manager’s duties down on my team with no acknowledgement, support, or consideration of any type; and finally, removing almost any chance for future career advancement in this organization.

The CEO was corrupt (the controller quit rather than approve the yearly numbers), misused federal funds (set policy to have healthcare navigators sign up patients for ACA who were illegal using made up SSNs), racist (but because he was pro-Hispanic, it was not considered racism), did not support his leaders, required the implementation of the EHR when the environment was not stable and had not been thoroughly tested, and put blame on anyone who did not agree with him. The only reason I stayed as long as I did was due to the poor economy. It was a horrible situation to be in. The CIO was the only bright spot and he left soon after I did.

I am in sales and in a previous job sold well over $XXM and as deployment of the promised technology continued to fail, we were at a point with these clients of moving into Phase 2 of the project which would have netted the company another $XXM+ and the clients stopped everything. Lawsuits quickly began to fly. It was at this point I realized my leadership at this company was simply lying. They had done the Wolf of Wall Street. Created imaginary software that was incapable of supporting the demonstration they had put together with bubble bum and duct tape. I lost over half a million in commissions on Phase 2 because they had also conned me into believing they could make it work.

It is a train wreck in healthcare and amazingly complex. The demo experience worked flawlessly on their perfect data, but drop that bad boy vision into the reality of healthcare data and KABOOM. “Mr/s. Customer, you have to give us perfect data or this won’t work. Sorry, no refunds.” Plus, their contracts were unreal with one of the customers saying they were longer and more complex than the ones they worked through with their EMR vendor.

Unbelievable. Investors should have gone after that executive team with guns blazing in a lawsuit. They even made sales pump up pipeline numbers by telling us if anyone even picks up the phone, it is a 20 percent opportunity. Then post-acquisition, if you deleted those inflated opportunities, the same executive team (CEO) would literally email you within five minutes demanding an explanation.

When the going got tough, the C-suite exec refused to take responsibility for any of the struggles being dealt with by the staff that reported to him. In fact, he was quite adept at not listening and throwing people under the bus. Finally got to the point where I got on the bus and rode off to another job.

My company was purchased and I did not believe in the management or strategy of the acquiring company.

I found termination for cause suasive.

Toxic medical director, toxic culture , being treated like three year olds .

My director seemed to be semi-sabotaging our market install. At core team meetings, she would ask leaders whether they were on schedule, and upon hearing they weren’t, she would only say OK before moving to the next person. We were months and about a million over. She knew I thought we should ask people what the hold-up was, if they needed help, more training, etc. We had a planned core team meeting with the market CFO to give a status and tell him whether we felt on track and could make our live date. My manager came in to my office right before the meeting and told me to keep my mouth shut at the meeting. I sent my resume out the next week.

When my boss left, and HIS boss left within a day of each other. This was just after a new CEO took over.

My division was sold. The buyer offered a voluntary severance package within two weeks of the sale being final.

My company was acquired by a competitor. That’s probably the most obvious sign that’s it’s time to move on.

Our company was acquired. Marketing and accounting are the first to go.

Continually getting new “managers” who kept asking me how they should do their job.

When I realize the culture and the legacy leadership was never going to change.

My boss, the CIO of a large, multi-state IDN, falling asleep in my annual performance review.

New CEO hired through board member good-old-boy network was threatened by my skills and influence over the organization. Good thing my employment contract had a decent severance clause. CEO actually offered to extend the severance for signing a draconian non-compete agreement that went far beyond original employment contract. I turned him down. CEO was fired by the board a few months later after running the company into the ground with extravagant spending on a flawed strategy.

I decided to leave my job when I was told the CFO wouldn’t support me to be named the director of the business unit I was already leading. She would have to sign off on the position even though it didn’t report up through her. We had brought in $5m of unbudgeted money into the organization. It was a political mess and I am so glad that I left for a similar director position.