How to resign professionally and write a resignation letter

Resigning is a short conversation and a shorter letter, and yet people get it wrong in ways that follow them for years. They tell a colleague before their manager. They send a two-page letter explaining everything that was wrong with the company. They give notice before the new offer is actually confirmed, and then the new offer falls through. Or they leave a handover so thin that the last thing anyone remembers about them is the mess.

The good version is not complicated. Confirm the new job properly, tell your manager first and in person, hand over a letter that says almost nothing, work your notice like a professional, and leave people with a reason to hire you again. This guide walks through each step, with a template for the letter, what notice periods look like in the four countries most of our readers work in, and how to handle the exit interview and the counter-offer without damaging anything.

Before you say a word

Do not resign on a verbal offer. Wait until you have the written offer, you have signed it, and any conditions that could sink it (background check, references, right-to-work checks, a drug test in some US industries) have cleared or are clearly formalities. Offers do get withdrawn, rarely but not never, and being unemployed because you resigned a week early is a miserable, avoidable outcome. If the new employer is pressing for a start date before the checks clear, tell them you will give notice the day the offer is unconditional.

Check your own paperwork before you decide on a date:

• Your contract or offer letter, for the notice period you owe and any clauses on garden leave, non-compete or non-solicitation. Our guide to reading an employment contract explains what those clauses mean in practice.
• The staff handbook, for how resignation must be given (some require it in writing to a specific person), and for rules on unused vacation, bonus eligibility and repayment of training costs or relocation.
• Bonus and equity dates. If your annual bonus pays on the 15th and you resign on the 10th, many companies will not pay it. Vesting cliffs work the same way. A week’s delay in resigning can be worth a great deal of money; the new employer will usually accommodate a start date that reflects this if you ask.
• Your personal files. Collect anything that is yours (reviews, payslips, training certificates) before you resign, because access can be cut the same day. Take nothing that belongs to the company.

Then work out your last day. Count forward from the day you will give notice, add the notice period, and check it against the new start date. Give yourself at least a few days off in between if you can.

Tell your manager first, and tell them in person

Your manager must hear it from you before anyone else. Not from a colleague, not from a LinkedIn update, not from the letter landing in their inbox while they are in a meeting. If you are remote, a video call is fine; a phone call is acceptable; a message is not, unless your manager is genuinely unreachable and time is short.

Book a short one-to-one, or use an existing one. Say it in the first thirty seconds. People who try to warm up to it end up having a strange conversation about the weather.

“I wanted to tell you in person that I’ve accepted another role and I’m resigning. My last day will be [date], which gives [X weeks’] notice as per my contract. I’ve valued working here and I want to make the handover as smooth as I can. I’ll follow up with the letter today.”

Then stop talking and let them react. You do not need to justify the decision, name the new company, or disclose the salary, though there is no harm in saying where you are going if you are comfortable and it is not a direct competitor. If they ask why, give one honest, forward-looking reason (“it’s a step up in scope,” “it’s closer to home,” “it’s a field I’ve wanted to move into”) and leave the grievances out. The time for feedback is the exit interview, and even then, carefully.

The letter: short, and nothing more

The resignation letter is a record, not a message. It exists so that HR has a dated document confirming you resigned voluntarily and when your last day is. It is not the place for feedback, thanks to individuals, complaints, or explanations. Every sentence you add is a sentence that could be quoted back at you.

Here is the whole thing:

[Your name] [Date]

Dear [Manager’s name],

Please accept this letter as formal notice of my resignation from my position as [job title] at [Company]. In line with my contract, my last working day will be [date].

I’m grateful for the opportunities I’ve had here and I’ll do everything I can to ensure a smooth handover before I leave.

Kind regards, [Your name]

That is it. Send it as an email to your manager, copying HR if your company has one, on the same day as the conversation, with a subject line that says “Resignation” and your name. If your handbook requires a signed hard copy, provide one as well, but the email establishes the date.

What not to include: a conditional resignation (“unless you can match my new offer”), which is a negotiation and not a resignation; anything about why you are leaving; anything about anyone else.

Notice periods by country, in general terms

Rules differ by country, by state or province, and above all by contract, so check yours. What follows is the general shape.

United States. There is no federal or general state law requiring an employee to give notice; most employment is at-will in both directions. Two weeks is the professional convention and the amount most employers expect. Your contract, an employment agreement for senior roles, or a collective agreement may require more. Some companies pay out unused vacation on departure and some do not; whether they must depends on the state and on written policy. A few employers will accept your resignation and walk you out the same day, particularly in sales and finance, so do not give notice on a Monday assuming you have two weeks of pay coming if your handbook says otherwise.

United Kingdom. The statutory minimum notice an employee must give is one week once they have worked for a month or more, but almost every employment contract sets a longer period, commonly one month for most roles and three months or more for senior positions. The contract governs. Employers can place you on garden leave (paid, at home, not working, still bound by your contract) if the contract allows, and some will offer to shorten the notice by agreement. Accrued but untaken holiday must be paid on leaving. Leaving before the contractual notice ends is a breach, and while employers rarely sue over it, they can withhold a reference or, more rarely, claim losses.

Canada. Employment standards vary by province. Several provinces set a short statutory minimum notice for employees who have passed a few months’ service (typically one or two weeks); others set none. On top of that, the common law expects “reasonable” notice from an employee, and contracts often specify it. In practice two weeks is standard for most roles and longer for senior ones. Quebec’s civil code has its own rules. Accrued vacation pay is generally owed on departure.

Australia. Minimum notice for employees usually comes from the relevant modern award or enterprise agreement, or from the contract, rather than from the Fair Work Act directly (the Act’s notice provisions mainly bind employers). Many awards set employee notice on a sliding scale by length of service, often one to four weeks, and some allow the employer to deduct from final pay if the required notice is not given. Untaken annual leave must be paid out. The Fair Work Ombudsman website has a tool for checking your award.

Work your notice properly

How you behave in the notice period is what people remember, and it is what your reference will be based on. Two mistakes are common: coasting, and the opposite, trying to finish everything at the cost of the handover.

Write a handover document in the first week of notice. Keep it to a page or two per major area:

• What you are responsible for, listed plainly, including the recurring tasks nobody else knows about (the monthly report, the supplier who only deals with you, the login for the tool).
• The status of every live project: where it is, what is next, who the contacts are, where the files live.
• Deadlines and dates in the next three months.
• Known problems and things you would do if you were staying.
• Where you have documented processes, and where you have not.

Walk your replacement or your manager through it, and offer to be available for questions for a short, defined period after you leave (a couple of weeks of occasional emails is reasonable; being on call for the next quarter is not). Return equipment, clear your expenses, and say goodbye to the people who mattered individually.

Do not let your standards slip, do not start the new job’s work on the old job’s laptop, and do not take client lists, templates, code or documents. The ex-employee who took the customer spreadsheet is a story every HR department has, and it ends badly.

The exit interview

Most companies with an HR function will ask for an exit interview. Treat it as optional and as on the record.

The useful posture is honest, specific and mild. If you leave because of your manager, the exit interview is not where that gets fixed; HR is unlikely to act on one departing employee’s account, and the account may reach the manager. Instead, give feedback that would help the next person: “The onboarding could use a written guide to the systems,” “the on-call rota needs more people,” “compensation reviews are less frequent than the market.”

If there is something serious, harassment, discrimination, safety, fraud, raise it formally and in writing, not as a throwaway line in an exit interview. Those are grievances, and they have a process.

The counter-offer

Somewhere between the conversation and your last day, your manager may come back with more money, a promotion, or both. It is flattering and it is sometimes worth taking. It is also often a way of solving the manager’s problem this quarter rather than yours. Before you accept anything, read our guide to negotiating a counter-offer when you resign, which covers when they work, when they backfire, and how to handle the new employer if you change your mind.

Keeping the door open

The best outcome of a resignation is that everyone involved would hire you again. Concretely:

• Ask your manager, before you leave, whether they would be willing to act as a reference, and note their personal contact details if they agree.
• Connect with the colleagues you respect on LinkedIn while you still share an employer; it is easier and less strange than doing it in six months.
• Send a short, personal thank-you to two or three people who genuinely helped you.

So: confirm the offer in writing, pick a date that protects your bonus, tell your manager in person and first, send the four-sentence letter the same day, write the handover in week one, and spend the rest of the notice period being the colleague you want to be remembered as.