politics

Getting staff to leave voluntarily (and thus without severance or unemployment) is an intended feature.

My tech company tried this. And they lost committed people with decades of experience to jobs that offered remote work.

They offered a hybrid schedule to everyone remaining in less than a year, and increased several other benefits. Some still left, but they managed to stave off a mass exodus. Your company can play chicken all they want, but "at will" goes both ways.

Get your new position first. The only FU email to send is they offered me more and work from home. I wish you luck in finding a good replacement and thank you for the opportunities this role gave me. And then stay silent. Any requests for help are met with an IC quote with a ridiculous hourly rate.

Do not send a rude letter nor in fact say anything rude. It is fine to be honest but be professional. You never know where the People that read your note shall end up and in five Years they may be reviewing you for a position and the note may affect their decision.

Burning bridges may seem cathartic at the time but they are unlikely to lead to anything positive.

Quiet quit. Look for a second job. When they fire / lay you off then apply for unemployment and hit their metrics.

This is just a strategy to try and get you to do exactly what you're doing - voluntarily leaving in a way that leaves no stain on their employment records.

Revenge is a dish best served cold

-old Klingon provern

I got to quit an incredibly toxic insurance job without notice. I got a better job and wrote a "fuck you" notice letter, delivered it in person, then got to watch the bosses read it and panic as I packed up my cubicle. Other employees in the department asked why I was quitting and I said that the company sucks and that our department gets paid the least despite doing the most intense work and being under the most pressure. I said I felt like I was working for villains because all management cared about was profit. I went to Denny's afterwards for a job well quit.

One of the other employees ended up being my neighbor when I bought my house, and she told me a bunch of people quit right after I did and that the department I was in is pretty much empty now.

The feeling of quitting like that is incredible. I've never felt that way before or since. I don't go out of my way to fuck over people who have mistreated me, but that job fuckin deserved it. Too bad the company is a nation-wide company, so it can't go out of business easily. At least I was able to mess up one location for a bit lol.

Start small and escalate. Maybe in a month they'll be on strike full time, sticking gum in locks and deflating tires.

No kidding. It's effectively meaningless posturing. At worst the company will dock them half a sick day and tell them to get back to work. There's no risk to them doing this, and there's no incentive for the company to change their policy based on this. They couldn't even do a full day. This is just a long lunch. The only way they could have made it more meaningless is by staggering their strike times to ensure coverage.

The company's just gonna say "Cool. Is that all you've got? Are you done with your tantrum? Great, now come back to the office like we asked."

Newspapers have a very quick turnaround time.

This will get the people above them sweating.

They'll burn through a lot of their "no time limit" news in a day.

But yeah it's good to start small if you're not trying to actively damage the paper.