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I'm an relatively new attorney working at a federal agency - I started roughly six months ago. I ended up strongly disliking the job after finishing my training period, and after submitting a hail mary application to a nearby prestigious state government office that does work in my desired area of law, I got an offer. Suffice to say that I'm aware that leaving six months in looks bad, but I'm chalking it up to making a mistake by leaving my original field of law for something I find mind-numbingly boring and professionally stifling.

What's the deal with resigning from federal service? Is the norm to give two weeks, or is it expected/acceptable to give more/less? If I give more notice (new job starts in about a month), is there gonna be a likelihood that they'll ask me to leave sooner or do weird stuff with my workload and pending assignments?

Thanks for the help!

I can't imagine a federal agency would ask you to leave sooner than you've requested; the fedgov employment relationship is carefully constrained by policies and procedures. Nobody wants to do anything that appears retaliatory.

Be aware, though, that you may have signed some documents requiring you to take certain steps before you leave (e.g., close files, return government property, etc.). The need for an orderly transition / closing procedures might counsel against taking off at the last minute.

Anonymous User wrote:I'm an relatively new attorney working at a federal agency - I started roughly six months ago. I ended up strongly disliking the job after finishing my training period, and after submitting a hail mary application to a nearby prestigious state government office that does work in my desired area of law, I got an offer. Suffice to say that I'm aware that leaving six months in looks bad, but I'm chalking it up to making a mistake by leaving my original field of law for something I find mind-numbingly boring and professionally stifling.

What's the deal with resigning from federal service? Is the norm to give two weeks, or is it expected/acceptable to give more/less? If I give more notice (new job starts in about a month), is there gonna be a likelihood that they'll ask me to leave sooner or do weird stuff with my workload and pending assignments?

Thanks for the help!

It's probably in your employee manual (assuming your office has one). How much notice that's required to leave on good terms depends on the organization/office. Both my first job after clerking and my current job require at least a month's notice. I was caught off-guard by that, but it was definetely in our employee manual thing (but, luckily, they let me be on annual leave for my last two weeks lol). I mean obviously you can always just take-off sooner but it's never good to leave a job on bad terms (there's a difference between leaving after six-months because you didn't enjoy the job and taking off without giving sufficient notice). I agree with the previous poster that it's unlike a fed employer will ask you to leave sooner.

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