Leaving High-Touch Jobs

Leaving any job can be a trying experience, but leaving a job in which you work closely with colleagues, clients, suppliers, or other stakeholders can be especially trying. And leaving one job for another creates additional complications. Because we expect wrinkles and speed bumps when taking on a new set of responsibilities, we're unlikely to experience surprise when we encounter the challenges of a new position. What can be surprising, though, is the other half of the task of changing jobs — leaving the job you had. And among the jobs most likely to present difficulties upon departing are the jobs we call high-touch.

The term high-touch was coined by John Naisbitt in his 1982 book, Megatrends: Ten New Directions Transforming Our Lives. [Naisbitt 1982] An activity is high-touch if it entails interacting with full human beings, as opposed to interacting with a screen or voice. Examples of issues that arise in high-touch interactions include those related to emotion, trust, intuition, inspiration, memory, recall, nostalgia, reputation, legacy, motivation, relationship, engagement, conflict, or, organizational politics, to name just a few.

A high-touch job is one in which high performance requires unconscious competence in high-touch activities. [Adams 2011] View some examples from Zipecruiter.com.

Kinds of departures

Because leaving a high-touch job can disrupt relationships, the departure can be painful and disruptive for everyone involved. The person departing An activity is high-touch if it
entails interacting with full
human beings, rather than
interacting by screen or voicen do much to ease the transition, but the range of possibly mitigating actions depends — possibly strongly — on the factors that precipitate the departure. Here are some examples of categories of departures. Notice how different they are in terms of how the person departing can mitigate the effects of departure. Next time I'll explore tactics for mitigating the effects on colleagues of our departing high-touch jobs.

Career choice

Departures that result from employees making a career choice are those most likely to enable the person departing to mitigate the effects of the departure. Others tend to have high expectations that the person departing will undertake mitigating actions. Usually, expectations are that the departure is permanent.

Employer-driven

Employer-driven departures include buy-outs, layoffs, reductions-in-force, reorganizations, early retirements, and the like. Usually, senior management decides the parameters, but sometimes employees can negotiate timing. Usually, others have a low expectation that the person departing will undertake mitigating actions. Also usually, expectations are that the departure is permanent.

Personal matters

These departures result from unplanned but critical life events or health issues. The person departing rarely has much control of timing, nor reserves of energy to devote to mitigating the effects of the departure.

Maternity or paternity

Although these cases have much in common with personal matters, the date of departure is often better known to others in advance than it would be for other personal matters. This advance knowledge makes possible mitigating actions by the person departing. It also creates an expectation that some mitigating actions will be undertaken. Moreover, there is often an expectation that the person departing will return in the same role.

Last words

Concern for our colleagues keeps some of us in high-touch jobs longer than we would otherwise stay. But there is much we can do to mitigate these effects after we depart. More next time   Next issue in this series   Top  

Love the work but not the job? Bad boss, long commute, troubling ethical questions, hateful colleague? This ebook looks at what we can do to get more out of life at work. It helps you get moving again! Read Go For It! Sometimes It's Easier If You Run, filled with tips and techniques for putting zing into your work life. Order Now!

Footnotes

Your comments are welcome

About Point Lookout

Thank you for reading this article. I hope you enjoyed it and found it useful, and that you'll consider recommending it to a friend.

This article in its entirety was written by a human being. No machine intelligence was involved in any way.

Point Lookout is a free weekly email newsletter. Browse the archive of past issues. Subscribe for free.

Support Point Lookout by joining the Friends of Point Lookout, as an individual or as an organization.

Do you face a complex interpersonal situation? Send it in, anonymously if you like, and I'll give you my two cents.

Related articles

More articles on Personal, Team, and Organizational Effectiveness:

Doorknob Disclosures and Bye-Bye Bombshells

A doorknob disclosure is an uncomfortable, painful, or embarrassing revelation offered at the end of a meeting or conversation, usually by someone who's about to exit. When we learn about bad news in this way, we can feel frustrated and trapped. How can we respond effectively?

Team Thrills

Occasionally we have the experience of belonging to a great team. Thrilling as it is, the experience is rare. How can we make it happen more often?

Bonuses

How we deal with adversity can make the difference between happiness and something else. And how we deal with adversity depends on how we see it.

How to Ruin Meetings

Much has been written about how to conduct meetings effectively. Here are some reliable techniques for doing something else altogether.

Wacky Words of Wisdom

Words of wisdom are so often helpful that many of them have solidified into easily remembered capsules. We do tend to over-generalize them, though, and when we do, trouble follows. Here are a few of the more dangerous ones.

See also Personal, Team, and Organizational Effectiveness for more related articles.

Forthcoming issues of Point Lookout

Coming August 13: Leaving High-Touch Jobs: How

High-touch jobs require that we work closely with colleagues, teammates, clients, or suppliers. Because choosing to leave such a job affects all these people, and the person departing, we would do well find a path that respects all involved. Here are some suggestions. Available here and by RSS on August 13.

And on August 20: Earned Value and Goodhart's Law

Earned Value Management, widely used approach to project management, is most useful in contexts in which estimators are familiar with the Tasks, the Technologies, and the Teams. But even then, it is vulnerable to the tactics of those who game the metrics. Available here and by RSS on August 20.

Coaching services

I offer email and telephone coaching at both corporate and individual rates. Contact Rick for details at rbrenaXXxGCwVgbgLZDuRner@ChacDjdMAATPdDNJnrSwoCanyon.com or (650) 787-6475, or toll-free in the continental US at (866) 378-5470.

Get the ebook!

Past issues of Point Lookout are available in six ebooks:

• Get 2001-2 in Geese Don't Land on Twigs (PDF, )
• Get 2003-4 in Why Dogs Wag (PDF, )
• Get 2005-6 in Loopy Things We Do (PDF, )
• Get 2007-8 in Things We Believe That Maybe Aren't So True (PDF, )
• Get 2009-10 in The Questions Not Asked (PDF, )
• Get all of the first twelve years (2001-2012) in The Collected Issues of Point Lookout (PDF, )

Are you a writer, editor or publisher on deadline? Are you looking for an article that will get people talking and get compliments flying your way? You can have 500-1000 words in your inbox in one hour. License any article from this Web site. More info