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Not with a whimper, but with a bang

The Reformed Broker discusses the merits of making a dramatic final exit from your workplace. Whether you jump down your airplane's emergency slide, or send out a scathing memo, revenge is a dish best served by the newly unemployed.

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Richard Drew/AP
Traders work in the Goldman Sachs booth on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange in this March 2012 file photo. Greg Smith, an executive director at Goldman Sachs, resigned with a blistering public essay that accused the bank of losing its "moral fiber," putting profits ahead of customers' interests and dismissing customers as "muppets."

This Sunday I was featured in a piece at the New York Times about the new trend of making a high profile exit from one's former employer or industry. Like that flight attendant who cursed everyone out on the PA system, gulped down a beer and then triggered the inflatable slide to make his escape. Or Greg Smith at Goldman or the entire editorial staff at TechCrunch.

Social media is behind a lot of this; people have a pretty big platform to talk about why they've walked from something and if they're disgruntled, they're probably going to use it.

Here's my little slice:

Joshua Brown has some advice for disgruntled Wall Streeters on his blog The Reformed Broker: “Deal with it or leave and open an Etsy store.” Mr. Brown spent about a dozen years as a retail stockbroker, only to conclude: “The business is one giant conflict. Even someone who wanted to do right by his clients couldn’t.”

He is now a registered financial adviser, and his blog, as the name implies, is devoted to illuminating the public about the booby traps of investing. He cheerfully acknowledges the appeal of social media to express regret, disappointment or anger about a former employer.

“Social media is inherently me-centric to begin with — all about me, where am I going,” Mr. Brown said. “But not everyone has to be Jerry Maguire on the way out the door.” And social-media ranting begets social consequences. “There are people in my former industry who won’t even make eye contact with me,” he said.

Head over for the rest, lots of notable people's stories in here, a fun piece:

Parting Is Such Sweet Revenge (New York Times)

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