The Most Important Pause: Why You Never Resign Without a Contract
Hey everyone, Jamie here.
Following on from my last post, I've been really touched by the messages of support and the shared stories about navigating the tech job market. There's a huge amount of excitement that comes with accepting a verbal offer for a new role. It’s the culmination of weeks, sometimes months, of interviews, technical tasks, and conversations. The natural instinct is to rush to your current boss, hand in your notice, and start the countdown to your next chapter.
But I want to talk about the most critical, and often overlooked, step in this entire process: the pause. The deliberate, professional, and absolutely essential moment between the “Yes, I'd love to accept!” and “Dear Boss, please accept this letter as my formal resignation.”
I'm talking about waiting for the signed contract.
A Verbal Agreement is Built on Good Faith. A Contract is Built on Certainty.
Let's be clear: in the vast majority of cases, a verbal offer is made in good faith. The company wants you, you want them, and everyone is excited. But good faith doesn't protect you if things go wrong.
A verbal offer is not a legally binding employment contract. It's a statement of intent. Until you have a written document, signed by both you and an authorized person at the new company, you are in a professional no-man's-land.
Here’s why that’s a risk you should never take:
- Details Get Lost in Translation: Was the salary £X, or was that the “total compensation package” including a potential bonus? Is the start date flexible? What's the exact job title? Details discussed over a phone call can be easily misremembered or misinterpreted by either side. The contract solidifies these details in black and white.
- Internal Situations Change: This is the big one. Between a verbal offer and your start date, anything can happen. Budgets can be unexpectedly frozen, the project you were hired for can be de-prioritized, the hiring manager might leave, or a last-minute internal candidate might emerge. A verbal offer can be rescinded with a difficult phone call. A signed contract makes this significantly more complicated and less likely.
- It's Your Only Safety Net: Imagine resigning from your stable job, only to have the new offer withdrawn a week later. You're left with no job and no recourse. It's a nightmare scenario, and while it's not common, it happens. The contract is your safety net.
What to Check Before You Sign (and Resign)
When that PDF lands in your inbox, don't just skim to the signature line. Read it carefully. You're checking that it matches your discussions.
- The Core Details: Salary, job title, start date, and your primary place of work.
- Notice Period: What's required from you if you leave, and what's required from them? Does this change after a probationary period?
- Restrictive Covenants: Pay close attention to these. Are there non-compete clauses that could limit your future employment? Non-solicitation clauses? Understand what you're agreeing to.
- Benefits: Check that key benefits like holiday entitlement, pension contributions, and any mentioned health or insurance plans are documented.
- Job Description: Does the summary of your role and responsibilities align with what you discussed in the interviews?
If there are any discrepancies, now is the time to raise them politely. It's much easier to clarify a detail before you've signed than to dispute it later.
The Golden Rule
It's so simple, yet so important that it's worth stating plainly:
Never, ever resign from your current position until you have a signed, written employment contract from your new employer.
Chasing for it isn't being pushy; it's being professional. A simple, polite email is all it takes:
“Hi [Hiring Manager/HR Contact], I'm incredibly excited to have accepted the offer and am really looking forward to joining the team. Just checking in on the written contract so I can get that signed and then hand in my notice at my current role. Please let me know if you need anything else from me in the meantime.”
This shows you're organised and diligent—qualities they hired you for in the first place. Any reasonable employer will understand and respect this completely. If they pressure you to resign before providing a contract, that itself is a major red flag.
Taking that small pause to ensure your next step is secure doesn't diminish the excitement of a new role. It protects it. It allows you to hand in your notice not with a leap of faith, but with the confidence and certainty that you deserve.
Cheers,
Jamie C