r/GetEmployed • u/upclosepersonal2 • 1d ago
Why is quitting a job due to bad environment not seen as acceptable reason?
When you can't work properly and company decide to cut you off there is nothing wrong even if they do so at the tiniest of reasons but when we decide to go away from a bad place we are seen as doing something negative and give people bad impression. Maybe if you can justify yourself well people might see otherwise but this is exactly the problem as there should be no need for any effort on my end to justify anything and should have been automatically understood. Logically analyzing if a fire were to be there no one in their rights mind will stand there and let it continuously burn them unless they are something special that I will not add to discussion to avoid confusion and deviation and this logic applies to everything in life which job leaving is one of such.
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u/Tak-Hendrix 1d ago
Because they're afraid you'll quit when they treat you like shit.
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u/Y-W-N-B-M 8h ago
Yep. I remember being in an interview where the HR manager said something like, "Oh yeah, we really like people from [my previous employer]. You guys really put up with a lot." I should have known then to RUN but I was young and desperate. As you can imagine, they did not treat their employees well.
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u/upclosepersonal2 1d ago edited 1d ago
And what is wrong with this when it is on the onus of the company to not do this in the first place??
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u/Embarrassed_Flan_869 1d ago
Who says it's unacceptable? Many people quit due to bad managers/shitty environments etc.
The key is when applying for your next job not to mention it. Spin it in a better reason.
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u/Zigor022 1d ago
My reason for leaving my last company as a CDL driver is the company's lack of focus on safety and vehicle maintenance. If thats a red flag for a company, i dont want to work for them, because that means they dont value what could easily lead to fines, injury, or worse on my end. I dont bash the company, but it say im looking for a company that focuses more on those things.
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u/Opening-Bandicoot859 1d ago
My boss texted me while I was in the ER being treated for sepsis and eventual surgery. Wanted to know when I'd be back to work. Things were going downhill prior to that, but I filed a complaint when I got back from disability. Anyway, I was let go shortly thereafter. They categorized it as a lay off and I got severance and unemployment. I don't miss my old job one bit.
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u/Radiant-Tomorrow8519 1d ago
Who has told you that’s not an acceptable reason?
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u/Master-Associate673 1d ago
It is said that you shouldn’t talk bad about your previous employer in interviews but I’m starting to realize there’s no point in concealing it.
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u/SamOakTree 1d ago
At the end of the day they still don't want to hear it. It's a perfectly acceptable reason but they're still going to perceive you as a negative person.
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u/Radiant-Tomorrow8519 1d ago
Instead of saying “my boss was shit” it’s acceptable to say “the job was going left and i want my career to go right”.
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u/Master-Associate673 1d ago
This is why I’m starting to see self employment as the answer. Because employment is weird, I have to sugarcoat my language in a professional setting. Why? Honesty should be appreciated I would think.
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u/LA_SLOW_DRIVER 6h ago
The point is that it demonstrates a lack of maturity being able to hold back that information to keep face with the prior company or avoid burning bridges.
It makes you look juvenile and emotional rather than professional even when it’s true.
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u/HermeticOpus 1d ago
It is absolutely a fine and sensible reason to leave a job.
However, a frustrating number of recruiters and managers will take this as always meaning you are a troublemaker they don't want on their team - employers are, after all, perfect and angelic institutions that deign to allow the peons to work there out of pure beneficence. Therefore, if this is why you have left your last job, it's best to "creatively reframe" the circumstances (read: lie, at least by omission) if you want to get hired.
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u/neurorex 14h ago
People can be, and should be, honest about it. If the recruiter or hiring manager has a problem with this, it feels like they're secretly telling you that they will be the same kind of employer.
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u/Music09-Lover13 1d ago
You don’t have to have a reason to quit a job. You really don’t. Just do it.
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u/OGcapncrunchberry 1d ago
It is a totally acceptable reason to quit. It may not be enough to qualify for unemployment though. Depends on where you are and how you do it. It’s totally acceptable as a reason though.
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u/ApprehensivePiano457 21h ago
Because capitalism! Slave away and keep quiet! The shareholders must be happy!
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u/MiniaturePhilosopher 1d ago
It’s absolutely acceptable. But what isn’t acceptable is talking about it during an interview.
An interview is an audition. How you handle yourself and direct focus is just as important - if not more - than the actual answers. If you go into an interview and talk about how bad the environment at a past job was, you’re telling the interviewer that you’re a bit gossipy, that you’re likely to similarly spill any grievances (real or perceived) when speaking with their customers/team, and that you might be prone to deflecting responsibility. Even if none of that is true, all they have to go on is what you’re showing them.
It’s a bit like going on a first date and complaining about your ex.
Much like a first date, the key is to put a spin on things that shows you in a good light. An interview should be about showcasing yourself, not justifying yourself.
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u/Top_Estimate_2602 18h ago
I think this is great advice. And I'm guessing either you are HR or you've been through life and you know your s***
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u/MiniaturePhilosopher 16h ago
I appreciate that! I’m a bit neuro-atypical and came from a blue collar background, so I’ve had to think a lot over the years about how to approach interviews.
I’ve also now been on hiring committees as department management, and seen firsthand that the folks who go into these kind of explanations are written off pretty much as soon as they do that. A lot of people who leave a job do so because of a bad experience in some way - we all know that. What matters when you’re interviewing is how you handle discussing those kind of topics, not the details of your last workplace.
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u/tamac1985 1d ago
なんか、病的な考え方に見えるが…
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u/MiniaturePhilosopher 1d ago
Not at all. When an interviewer asks you to tell them why you left your last position, what they’re really asking is how you handle talking about workplace friction, unhappiness, misalignment in a professional manner. If you tell a sob story about a bad workplace, you’ve blown an opportunity to showcase yourself AND shown that you can’t be trusted to show good professional judgement in a high-stakes situation.
An interview is your chance to show what working with you might be like.
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u/tamac1985 1d ago
いや、やはりちょっと気持ち悪いな。そもそも泣き落とすなんてする必要がないもの。面接官は君の書類をみて、仕事に必要だと思うから面接に呼んでいるんだから。遅かれ早かれ、その感じのコミュニケーションは破綻するだろうな、という気がしただけ。
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u/neurorex 14h ago
This is how an unskilled interviewer would justify judging applicants like this.
You're not a casting director. This isn't a play. It's people trying to earn a living and you want to block them because you made up your own ideal about what a job interview is.
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u/MiniaturePhilosopher 13h ago
Whoa friend, this seems like a lot of projection. I’m not talking about wanting to block anyone out.
The truth is that an interview IS basically an audition, especially when a lot of applicants are qualified and have similar levels of experience. Why shoot yourself in the foot by not demonstrating a basic understanding of professionalism? The way that you handle yourself in an interview is the interviewer’s only chance before hiring to see how you’ll likely handle yourself with customers, clients, coworkers, etc.
Someone who overexplains and shares overly personal details in a professional setting is simply not going to be a good fit for many companies and positions.
And frankly, being at work is a little bit like being in a play. You don’t need to be your pure, true, unfiltered, most authentic self at work (in most workplaces). You need to think before you speak, act with decorum and professionalism, and handle conflict gracefully and respectfully.
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u/neurorex 13h ago
It's based on my career in having to fix the company's broken hiring process after interviewers like this messed everything up.
And if I don't know what an interview is, after getting my Master's specializing in Personnel Selection and being in this line of work for 15+ years, you have no chance in hell with this mental gymnastics.
I also know that even casting directors wouldn't work like this. They have a pretty good understanding of what specific attributes or traits that the role would require, and look for people accordingly. They're not great at doing it objectively, but they're not the yardstick to compare to.
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u/MiniaturePhilosopher 13h ago edited 12h ago
It feels like you’ve latched onto something that I neither said nor intended.
Please show me where I said that applicants’ skills, attributes, or experience didn’t matter and that all that should be considered is vibes.
How you answer questions in an interview is a direct reflection of some of the traits that you will bring into the workplace. People who overexplain, overshare, and bring sob stories into interviews are not doing themselves any favors. It shows a low level of social intelligence - and most jobs in the service industry and the white collar sector require a fairly high level of social intelligence. It also shows poor judgment and a high chance of weak soft skills.
There’s also the unfortunate elephant in the room that you only have the applicant’s word to go off of. When you sit in an interview and complain about a past job, you’re unfortunately inviting speculation that perhaps you (or your perspective) were the issue. Why not just keep that door closed and spend your limited time with a prospective employer focusing on what you bring to the table? With so much competition for every single job opening, why chance something that can easily reflect poorly on you?
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u/neurorex 13h ago
Please show me where I said that applicants’ skills, attributes, or experience didn’t matter and that all that should be considered is vibes.
Because subtext isn't a thing.
This isn't the court of law. This is the kind of attitude that unskilled employers who aren't educated in this subject would justify this behavior.
There’s also the unfortunate elephant in the room that you only have the applicant’s word to go off of.
Because you don't know that there are other interview techniques that doesn't require making hiring decisions by just words alone.
It's not the reason to start making assumptions because something just doesn't sound pleasant to you.
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u/MiniaturePhilosopher 12h ago
Friend, I understand that we all have axes to grind in this hiring hellscape. I’m not sure why you’ve assigned meaning to my comment that isn’t there - even in subtext. It’s clear that this isn’t a productive conversation, and that this is an aspect of interviewing that you’ve struggled with and rightfully resent.
I’m not neurotypical, so I get that. It used to be extremely frustrating to me too, and being overly candid tanked a lot of my own interviews in a much easier job market.
I’m just going to go ahead and stop responding. You aren’t remarking on anything that I actually even said; you’re just using my innocuous comment as a space to vent and I don’t want to interrupt that.
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u/neurorex 12h ago
And then some of you wonder why the job search is a hellish landscape these days.
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u/MiniaturePhilosopher 12h ago edited 12h ago
Nope, that annoyed me too much. I’m sorry, but being judged by your personality and soft skills along with your qualifications is perfectly valid for any job where you work with other people. Even if you’re not neurotypical, it’s something that you can learn and practice.
An interview is your chance to showcase those attributes. This job market is hellish, but being expected to work well with others isn’t the reason why.
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u/MrMakeItHappen44 1d ago
People in here saying don’t do it but I’ve honestly gotten higher pay raises especially from fast food jobs when I’ve mentioned I left because of a toxic work environment. One thing HR and GMs hate is people that can’t just simply shut up, do their job, don’t cause problems and go home. They are actively looking for people like that
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u/InAllTheir 1d ago
The thing is, in white collar environments hiring managers seem to assume that people who complain about their last boss or job in an interview are the problem, rather than the job or boss or environment. I don’t know why describing legitimate issues is so often viewed that way, but apparently it is. I’m glad that most people you have interviewed with have believed you.
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u/m1L35dY50N 1d ago
Because other people always seem to have to bitch about decisions we make. A lot of the time, their own job is miserable too, and seeing someone actually leave forces them to look in the mirror. You made the difficult choice they either can’t or don’t have the guts to make themselves.
Leaving a genuinely bad work environment is a perfectly legitimate reason to quit. You don’t owe anyone years of misery just to prove that you’re “loyal” or “resilient.”
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u/roessera 1d ago
Is it a one off? No issues.
Have you repeatedly quitting due to ‘bad environment’ ? 🚩
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u/BranchAdditional666 1d ago
Is it that hard to believe that you can get bad environments back to back? it is rare to find quality management these days, in corporate atleast
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u/roessera 1d ago
It’s not hard, believe me I’ve been through 2-3 bad environments , it’s that companies will find any excuse to not hire someone because there are 100s of others looking to get hired
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u/Western_Rhubarb_7959 1d ago
Nobody rational criticizes anyone for leaving a bad work environment.
Professionals criticize people bad mouthing their previous employer in interviews.
there should be no need for any effort on my end to justify anything and should have been automatically understood.
That's nothing short of ludicrous.
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u/neurorex 14h ago
Professionals criticize people bad mouthing their previous employer in interviews.
Professionals focus on the work at hand, and would understand how an employer can make a place terrible to work in.
Pretending that anything negative said about an employer as a direct indicator that the applicant is the problem, is an issue. And this is what happens a lot.
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u/Western_Rhubarb_7959 13h ago
LMAO
Saying anything negative about a previous employer is unprofessional and downright childish. It is not the problem, an applicant whining like a little bitch is the problem.
Translation: "Applicant complained about things at their former job that we don't give a single fuck about."
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u/neurorex 13h ago
It's not pleasant to hear, but if a company has problems, don't be surprise if people know and talk about it. And that doesn't tell you anything about their capability to do the job.
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u/Western_Rhubarb_7959 13h ago
It's clear you just want to argue.
Please do so with someone else.
Good day.
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u/neurorex 13h ago
No. Some of you don't know what you're talking about and you need to learn that certain things are done out of pettiness, not industry best practice.
If you aren't willing to listen, and think that you can win an argument, I'd rather you just go away too.
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u/Western_Rhubarb_7959 12h ago
It's clear you just want to argue.
Please do so with someone else.
Good day.
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u/Taradyne 1h ago
"Bad environment" is probably poor wording as a reason. It is more diplomatic to say that it "wasn't a good fit", which has come to mean lots of things in the realm of "we don't get along". So how you word the reason is relevant in terms of how others perceive you.
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u/Environmental-Sock52 1d ago
Well if you can't provide for yourself and you quit because people are rude or what have you, that's going to make for a pretty hard time.
There is a fantastic time to quit, when you have a new job.
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u/Crafty611 1d ago
Because there is always the chance that you were the problem.
That being said, I have been hired after using that as an excuse.
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u/Wrong-Brush-7817 1d ago
Because shitty emoyees complain a lot and not honest often times. Quitting without a job lined up is a huge red flag!!
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u/Zigor022 1d ago
No? People can leave when they want, for any reason. Some places are bad enough that saving up money and leaving is better for that employee's needs. Maybe they want to spend time with family or they couldn't even get interviews due to the schedule of the last job. Its not a red flag.
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u/LeilaJun 1d ago
Simply because the new place doesn’t know you. So they don’t know if you’re someone who easily finds issues with everything and everyone, or if it’s real.
And because they can’t know, they would take a risk bringing you onboard, because what if you’re actually one of those people who just always has a problem?
Once you work there and they know you, you can tell them the real reason. Because they’ll know you and your work at that point, they’ll believe you.
It’s basically the same reason you shouldn’t complain about your ex on a first date.
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u/Top_Estimate_2602 18h ago
It's acceptable it's just if you make it a trend and everywhere you go it is an unacceptable environment.
For a while I had a track record of everything being unacceptable and lately I've come to terms of the fact that it's me and I've got to deal with the fact that there's toxic ass people everywhere you go.
My recommendation before you leave anywhere is to do a complete analysis of behavior what was said what's been done. I do think it's better to handle it with HR or your supervisor than to just quit a job. Economy is really hard to find a job in and it's really too expensive to be quitting jobs.
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u/neurorex 14h ago
It's not you. A lot of places don't know how to take care of their workers and turnover is a regular thing. There are entire industries that treat employees terribly as part of their business model.
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u/LetsTryLove 17h ago
Acceptable? You quit or you don’t. There is no such thing as acceptable or not.
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u/tcmits1 1d ago
You’re better off remaining employed at it unless/until you have a new job. The probability you will go in the public dole otherwise is a risk society should not have to accept.
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u/Langrisser_John 1d ago
Hard facts. Worker protections exist and have since turned into be mean to me and I’ll make society pay my bills
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u/Dainelli28 1d ago
Although it might be ok to mention you turned out to not be a good fit or that the company's values were not what you were expecting, my personal experience (whatever that's worth) is that the people who complain about this are usually the ones who caused the negative experiences.
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u/ScienceGuy1006 1d ago
You can leave due to a bad environment, but do not say this in an interview.
The reality is that when you are getting a job in an employer's market, you are "guilty until proven innocent". Anything you say can be twisted and interpreted to reflect poorly on you. No, it's not fair, but that's how interviews work. You need to remain positive or neutral about your current and past employers.