Dont Quit Your Job Until Youve Accepted a New One

Dont Quit Your Job Until Youve Accepted a New OneDont Quit Your Job Until Youve Accepted a New OneHave you ever been tempted to quit your job even though you dont have another one lined up yet? Maybe youre sure youre about to get an offer, or maybe you just cant stand working for your current boss. It can be tempting to give your notice on the spot, but it can also be an enormous mistake if you dont have another job formally locked in yet. Heres why you should never resign from your job until you have an official job offer one that youve finished negotiating and have accepted.1. It might take you a lot longer than you think to find a new job. If you expect to find another job within a couple of months, think again. Finding another job can take a long time often much longer than job seekers expect. In fact, in this market, its not uncommon for a job search to take a year or more. That means if you quit your job without first securing another, you might end up with a large gap on you r resume, which can make it harder to get hired. It can also drain your savings and leave you in a precarious financial positionone where the pressure to find another job will quickly become greater than ever.2. Its much easier to get another job when youre still employed. Rightly or wrongly, most employers prefer to hire people who are already employed. Many assume that people who quit their jobs without another lined up did so because they were either fired or about to be fired. Or they may think the candidate walked away when things got tough, which worries managers, because every job has challenges. That doesnt mean its an instant deal-breaker, but its highly likely to raise questions from employers and potentially make your job search harder.3. The job offer youre counting on might fall through. Sometimes job seekers are so sure that an offer is forthcoming that they go ahead and give notice to their current employers. Sometimes this works out just fine, but other times it ends badly when the offer falls through. And if youve already given notice, your current employer may have already made plans to replace you, or they might not be willing to let you rescind your notice which can leave you without the old or new job. Because of that risk, you should never resign until you have an official offer in hand from your new employer not a promise that an offer is coming, not very good signs that seem like theyre leading somewherebut an actual, formal offer. Better yet, wait until youve accepted that formal offer, because otherwise its possible that your negotiations could fall apart.4. You might not pass the background check. Sometimes an employer might tell you that a new job is a done deal, but youll notice fine print in the offer letter that says its contingent on you passing a background check or reference check. Even if youre confident both of those will go fine, thats never guaranteed. Sometimes mistakes are made in background checks, or a reference call doesnt go quite the way you assumed it would. Until any contingencies like these are cleared, your offer could still hit a snag, which means you might not want to risk resigning your job at this stage. Perhaps a new employer pressures you to give notice while the offer still has contingencies attached to it. In that case, explain that while you dont expect any problems with references or in the background check, youre not comfortable giving notice until the offer is finalized. You can say something like, As soon as the offer is firm and without contingencies, Ill be able to give my employer two weeks notice. But I cant resign my job until the new one is certain.Are there any times when its OK to resign without a new job? There are a few limited circumstances when it might make sense to quit your job before youve secured a new one if youre being subjected to egregiously abusive or harassing treatment, if your safety is being compromised or if youre being pressured to do anything ill egal, unethical or unsafe. But aside from those limited cases, youre far better off job searching while youre still employed. Alison Greenwrites the popularAsk a Manager blog, where she dispenses advice on career, job search and management issues. Shes the author of How to Get a Job Secrets of a Hiring Manager, co-author of Managing to Change the World The Nonprofit Managers Guide to Getting Results and the former chief of staff of a successful nonprofit organization, where she oversaw day-to-day staff management.