Question:
I’ve held the same job for seven years. There’s no real reason to leave it. Our company made it through the pandemic. My boss is nice enough. I enjoy my coworkers. I can work from home and on the days I spend time in the company’s main offices, don’t bring stress home.
When I mention quitting to my husband, he looks at me as if I’m out of my mind. He’s in a high-stress job that drives him crazy.
The problem? I’m bored out of my mind. It’s the same duties and I interact with the same 5 people every day. When I think ahead to 10 or 20 more years of this, I think they’ll have to carry me out in a straitjacket. I tried talking to my boss about this, and he said in three to five years, I was next in line for his job. The thought made me want to puke.
Am I foolish to want to leave a good job?
Answer:
Answering these seven questions can help you decide whether to stay or leave:
Anywhere but here
When you first started your job, what you learned every workday brought excitement.
What’s true now? Have your job’s walls closed in on you? Does every job posting you run across seem more appealing than your current job? If going into work feels like stepping into a daily bath of unremitting boredom, it’s time you pulled the plug.
What price do you pay if you stay?
Is your current job worth the career opportunity cost? Unless we stay in the same job for our entire working career, every job we take leads us to the next one–or doesn’t. If you stay in your present job, will you be more or less ready to land and succeed in the next job on your career ladder?
Do you bore others?
Your friends may have listened to you the first time you told them the dumb things your boss did or what wasn’t working at your company. Now, their eyes glaze over because they’ve already heard your stories. If your tales of woe have grown old, and you’ve tried hard but can’t fix what’s not working, consider moving on.
Have you lost trust?
Perhaps you’ve seen your manager or management team’s values up close and personal and don’t like what you see — or vice versa. If you no longer trust the person you work for, or he no longer trusts you, you’ve lost the basis for a healthy work relationship. Wouldn’t you rather work for a person or a team you could respect?
You’re headed down a one-way road to burnout
You don’t mind working 45 to 60 hours when you love what you do. Often, you’re investing in yourself even as you work hard because you’re learning so much. But what if you’re working so hard you’re hurting your health or personal life, without payback or any clear end to that dark tunnel?
Co-workers
While you don’t need to become outside-of-work friends with your co-workers, if you look around the table at a staff meeting and don’t see anyone you respect, want to learn from or like enough to enjoy riding in a car for 30 minutes, it’s time to move on.
Is it my job or me?
It’s always a good idea to look in the mirror before you decide to leave one job for another. Anyone who changes jobs too often needs to consider: Is the problem me or my job?
What do your answers tell you–is it time to move on?
Thanks for reading this post. If you enjoyed it, you might enjoy my latest book, Managing for Accountability, https://bit.ly/3CTFTKV or the updated post “Stay or Go”https://workplacecoachblog.com/2021/11/how-you-know-its-time-to-leave-your-job/.
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My feeling is: I envy you that you seem to have a decent job and a decent work environment. This is not to be taken for granted. My advice may sound Ann-Landers-like, but I would say find ways to re-energize yourself and challenge yourself to learn and do new things or to try new ways.
Through out my lifetime I have been working some where since the age of 12. I come from a large Irish Catholic Family with a total of fourteen children, 7 & 7 . My father worked very hard to provide for us and when he got sick my mother went back to work full time at the phone company. I also liked working and making money I always took pride in the way I would do my job. During the course of my life I have gone to college , never graduating or taking IT courses that never panned out. I also take courses on LinkedIn to improve my self any way I can. I have been working in telecommunications-IT since 1990. I am open to learning anything that someone is willing to teach me, and I am willing to share that knowledge to anyone willing to listen. Through years I have had many many different jobs, some were better and some were not but I always learned something about myself and who I am and what I am willing to do. I enjoy helping others the look on their faces is thanks enough. I work hard and smart and always try to stay focused on my future. I have a plan to hopefully work till I’m 75 so I can retire with enough to take care of me and my wife. I hope to god keeps me safe and healthy so I can reach my goal. All in all since I have been 12 years old with 3 paper route I have had close to 32 different jobs in my Lifetime. Stay confident read, take classes it’s a constant effort to keep learning and being positive about everything you accomplish and using that experience to catapult you to next best position for you. Good Luck !!