I'm panicking! Now I can't resign!

[perfexion]

After much soul searching I decided to quit my cushy staff job to pursue travel nursing. I wrote a very thoughtful letter of resignation and slipped it under my boss' door. I read online that it's not thoughtful to resign via email. My last day is October 1st and my first assignment starts on October 7th, (my flight to my assignment leaves on the 4th). I have been waiting for my boss to contact me about something, anything by now! I decided to reach out to her, and after a dozen unreturned phone calls and emails, I just found out she's been out for 3 weeks so she never got my letter (I work night shift so I go weeks without seeing my boss). She's scheduled to return on Monday but by then it'll be too late for a proper notice. What do I do now?

[firstinfamily, RN]

Your manager should have notified staff if she was not going to be available to all shifts, and her assistant should have made herself available. With my last resignation, I hard copied a letter to HR and the DON on the same day. I did not e-mail either of them but in today's world I do not see why an e-mail should suffice. You manager most likely has access to her e-mail outside of the work environment. The worse case would be that if you do not give enough notice you would lose any pay from vacation time and the ability to return to the facility.

[perfexion, ASN, RN]

As long as you have a copy of the letter and it's dated, I don't see why you can't still be done when you need to be. It wasn't your fault that she wasn't in her office for all that time and didn't have anyone going in and checking on things for her. If that is the way that communication is done where you work, then she should have arranged for someone to check it regularly.

I don't think I've ever had a manager who didn't have someone covering her responsibilities while she was away. Must be fun to come back to three weeks worth of stuff!

She had another manager on stand by in case someone needed something signed but that manager had her own unit to run. She was the one who told me my boss was away until next week. She wasn't much help. She said I should write another letter stating I want to go per diem so that l wouldn't be terminated for improper quitting and give it to my boss when she comes back. She said she wouldn't know what to tell me if I was her own staff.

[Guttercat, ASN, RN]

I feel very badly for the OP. But I am wondering why it took three weeks for them to figure out that "something's up."

If I had not heard from the manager after three to five business days of submitting a resignation, I would have been following up.

While I completely agree that it is much more tasteful and professional to submit a hard-copy of a resignation notice (rather than by e-mail), shoving it under a door is by no means a sure-fire way of assuring it will reach the appropriate person(s).

For something this important, it's on your head to ensure it does.

[Been there,done that, ASN, RN]

That's usually how the night shift communicates with the manager. We either tape things to her door or slide something under the door if it's private. And she communicates back by taping a notice to the board or putting a letter in our locker. If I had known she wasn't around I wouldn't have even tried to put anything under her door. My Assignment Is in upstate NY.

The thing is... you didn't "close the loop". You assumed she had received the communication. You did not get YOUR required feed back to confirm she received it.

Travel nursing is TOUGH. You will be communicating in a whole new environment. With a entirely new group of people. I think communicating is probably the hardest part of travel nursing.

I mean this in the kindest possible way. I hope you let us know how it's going. Please PM if I can help.

[livefully]

I also realized that your job is cushy. Where is it haha?

[Nurse SMS, MSN, RN]

What kind of manager is gone for three weeks without informing staff? Something doesn't add up here.

[Mulan]

So what happened????????

[perfexion, ASN, RN]

Nothing yet. Another manager told me today that my manager isn't coming back until Wednesday. That's going to be REALLY too late. That's technically my last day.

[Mulan]

Did you talk to HR?

[perfexion, ASN, RN]

I called HR. They sent me a bunch of exit forms to sign and I have a paper to turn in after I return my uniforms and ID badge. But there are some forms that my supervisor have to sign. That's where I'm stuck. They said another manager can sign them for me but the covering manager refuses.

[Mulan]

What about your manager's boss?

Good luck!

[perfexion, ASN, RN]

So apparently I can totally quit without my boss even knowing. I just have to send in my letter of resignation to HR and have the director of nursing sign some papers. That basically means that my boss will come back to work on Wednesday to find that I'm gone. For some reason that doesn't sit well with me but I guess it has to be done this way.