Ntro’s Official Opinion

Friday is my last day with my current employer, and an interesting phenomenon is taking place. I turned in my resignation the Friday before last, and since then there has not been an official announcement of my departure. Instead, the news has traveled through the grapevine.

This has made my final days uncomfortable for a few reasons. It’s obvious that everyone knows by now, but very few people have actually congratulated me or affectionately called me a “short-timer” in passing. So, when I stop in the kitchen for coffee, I end up having conversations like this:

Guy in the kitchen: Hey, how’s it going?
Ntro: I’m doing alright, how are you?
Guy: I’m fine.
[ more than a few seconds of silence ]
Ntro: So, did you hear my news?
Guy: No, what news?
Ntro: I’m leaving in two weeks.
Guy: Oh, yea, that. I heard about that, but I wasn’t going to say anything.
Ntro: . . .
Guy: Well, you’ve got to do what you’ve got to do.
* Guy leaves.
* Ntro leaves.

That was it. I asked another person the same question over IM, and his response was “;)“. I’m still not really sure what that means.

If I were in charge, and someone like me resigned, I would have immediately sent out an email like this:

All,

Ntro has decided to part ways with our company.
He is leaving on good terms, so there’s no reason
to tip-toe around this. If you pass him in the hall,
wish him luck in the future.

That would have avoided any ambiguity about the motivations behind my resignation, whether or not I was “asked to leave” (I wasn’t) and, most importantly, make the subject approachable and eliminate the awkwardness that inevitably arises when your major source of information is the rumor mill. Instead, what we have is a situation in which everyone knows, but they all think they are not supposed to know, and therefore it is treated like secret information.

Normally, I’m not bothered by awkward silence. In fact, most of the time I would rather be left alone. However, recently I’ve discovered that I don’t have an aversion to conversation, I just don’t like small talk. If I have news to share, I like talking about it with almost anyone. That’s why these last few days have been so miserable– I have big news, and everybody knows about it, and therefore I am accosted in order to discuss it. But, therein lies the conflict. No one received an official announcement, and no one is willing to admit that they were discussing my news behind my back, so I either have to bring it up or it is not discussed. I don’t, of course, and then the small talk starts.

Are you beginning to see how this might be uncomfortable?

Who knows. Maybe on Friday we’ll have a party in the kitchen with nachos and cheap chicken wings. That would make up for everything.