What is a Notice Period?

Notice period is the time when the company actually starts noticing you. (after submitting your resignation) :) :) :) :) :)

I posted this on my LinkedIn profile and got 5000 likes and 250 odd comments on these two lines which seem to be a joke. Well, it may sound like a joke with the smileys at the end but it is also a reflection of the harsh reality which most of us tend to simply accept as a way of corporate life.

An employee resigns and suddenly everyone wakes up to retain her. All efforts are made to ensure she stays back. The management is suddenly interested in her career growth and also agreeable to give her a substantial hike in salary just to keep her on board. This is precisely what happens in most companies that do not have strong people practices.

It is time that companies and managements take stock of things and take conscious efforts to avoid such scenarios. We need to ensure that the deserving employees are given a fair deal in terms of career progression and compensation without having to resign first.

Companies need to drive meritocracy as the only differentiating factor towards earning any rewards or recognition – both, monetary and non-monetary. We need to stop waiting for year-end appraisals to promote someone. We should revise salaries of good employees according to the market value of their job, even when they are not asking for it. Today’s employees want it ‘Right Here Right Now’.

Let’s create policies and processes which encourage cross skill and cross functional training and job rotations. This will in turn help to create backups for all positions and do succession planning for critical ones. Let's develop an individual career plan for each employee and make all managers responsible by way of a mandatory KRA to help their team members achieve this plan.

If you have done all the above correctly, you will be able to let go of a person who has resigned after serving notice period as required to give a handover. Since we all know that a replacement candidate rarely joins on time, it is only fair to allow a resigned associate be relieved post the handover and not the entire notice period as per contract.

Let’s all ensure together that the company notices each employee for their talent at the right time without having to serve a notice of resignation first!!!

Leave me a comment to let me know what your experience around notice periods and best practices around the same. 

Vishal Nagda

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Author Summary:

The author combines skills acquired by him while graduating as an Engineer and mastering in HR to give a logical touch to HR. He is a Certified HR Analytics and Metrics Professional, Certified HR Business Professional and also the Founder of HR Professionals - LinkedIn Group (https://bit.ly/hrprofessionals) having more than 350,000 members worldwide. Leading and moderating global discussions on HR related topics gives him a rich and varied perspective of HR trends all over the world