In your exit interview how did you summarise your awful/good time at that place of work?

14 comments

1. Honestly I wouldn’t bother wasting your time, plus you never know when your paths might cross again.

2. I was there to take down 1 person. So I was so complimentary about the company, and then said my boss was an idiot. And kept doing that.

   Nothing will happen. But I like that I at least put a doubt in their minds.

3. Just be thankful for the opportunity. I see too many people go out in a blaze of glory, just like they always imagined, within 12 months they re-apply.
   Dont burn any bridges, it really isn’t worth it. Your words do nothing you expect them to…you never know whats around the corner.

4. [deleted]

5. “it would be hard to call what we’ve been through fun, but I’m sure glad we went through it together.” – Colonel Potter from MASH. Good for a leaving card too.

6. I was factual about the issues, gave specific examples rather than generalising. Felt good to say and get off my chest. And I know the person who was the main problem wasn’t at the company much longer.

7. I’ve always been really honest in exit interviews, but not rude.

   It’s normally HR doing them and they normally want to know about shitty people doing shitty things.

8. I have never had one, as the jobs via employment agencies at different companies. I never know when I cross paths again.

9. I ripped into my manager and the HR person essentially said “Yeah we know, and that’s just the way it is”. Felt it was just a charade.

10. I had one recently, I told them that the reason for me leaving was poor cross team communication and company culture prevents anything changing for the better. I told them that every task is frustratingly inefficient, they’re unable to change and I’m incompatible with their processes so it’s time that we parted ways.

    They took it well but I doubt that any of it was actually heard.

11. I’ve only had one exit interview.

    It was at a job where the people were lovely but it was only a fixed term contract with the potential of being extended.

    When I had applied for it I had also applied to civil service jobs. I was place on a reserve list for a permanent role with good job security.

    A few months later, I was a couple of months into the fixed term job when the civil service offered me a permanent role. Explained the timeline and job security issue in my exit interview. They were understanding. They genuinely seemed like they would miss me. But my direct managers had no influence over giving the team permanent contracts.

12. In my exit interview for Costa, I recommended that the company fire its entire executive board immediately and replace them with cabbages, reasoning that cabbages wouldn’t make any worse decisions than the current directors, and if one tired of them one could always make them into a nourishing soup.

    I was chastised for not taking the exit interview seriously.

    Three years later Costa was bought out by Coca Cola, and Costa’s entire executive board was subsumed, replaced, or fired.

13. I managed not to say the company was a detail obsessed death pit of bureaucracy, and executive indecision with a culture of fear that prevented everyone from doing anything innovative. I avoided saying that my boss was a micromanaging bell end who didn’t know what he was doing. I did catch him out in front of witnesses trying to break employment law, so I got my full gardening leave with no need to return to the office. Did three months ‘gardening’ across Spain, France and Switzerland. Seemed only fair. Honestly though if you are too honest about someone – I’ve seen enough gomers ricochet between employers in my industry that you could find yourself being turned down for a job at a new employer because they got there first.

14. It felt largely empty. Don’t get your hopes up with this. I got some things off my chest – but mostly it feels like this is just something they feel they have to do, and it’s not really about them listening to what you have to say.