How to make a seamless transition to your next job

It’s no secret that us “Gen Yers” have had more than one job since we graduated from college. I’ve technically had five. GAH! Five in five years? That’s embarrassing. But, then you’d look at my history, and people knocking down my door to have me work for them (not really, though) and you’d realize exactly WHY I’ve had five jobs. I won’t get into my work history right now (if you really want to know, ask me), but what I will get into is the fact that we’ll all have to do it. Whether we get laid off (thank you, economy) or just take a different (or better) direction, we are going to have more than one job post-college. We’re not our parents. I would love to work for the same company for 30 years like my dad, but then I think, that sounds boring. Reality is – we’re going to move jobs. And an important yet sometimes overlooked trait for Gen Y is to be great at job transitioning. You may think that’s sad, but it’s absolutely true. So, having  just left my last job for my current job, here are some tips I’ve picked up along the way:
1. Save important stuff
There’s no doubt you probably did incredible work at your last gig. You probably talked to a few incredible people as well. That’s why it’s essential to save stuff. Think of your most important work, then save the documents or links either to Google Docs or a zip drive so you can keep them for your portfolio. Be mindful of confidential documents though, and always know that your work at your last job belongs to that company.
Another important thing to do is save your contacts. I unfortunately could not export my Entourage contacts to a normal excel or CSV file from my last computer, so instead, I manually copied and pasted them all into my own spreadsheet. THAT was a fun Saturday. Fortunately my Yahoo contacts exported just fine, so I combined the two, took out who I didn’t need anymore (or who I couldn’t for the life of me remember who they were) and uploaded them into my new work Entourage contacts. Luckily they sync with my Droid automatically, so here’s hoping I can export the Droid contacts somewhere, and often. This may have been a pain, but I’m glad I have all personal and professional contacts saved into one place. You never know who you’ll need to speak to down the road.
2. Tell important people
So you just spent all that time saving all those people…your next logical step is to tell them about your new job. First of all, you want them to congratulate you and awe at your accomplishments. But really, you want them to have your updated contact information so they aren’t e-mailing your old name and receiving no response. I doubt your old company wants to keep replying to people, or set an out of office with your new stuff. So, be proactive. Tell people indiviidualy or as a group e-mail, or blog about it so you cover all your bases. You’ll be happy you did.
3. Tame your e-mail and clear your computer
One important thing to do is to go through your work computer and clean it out. If you’re like me, you have about 39 56MB PowerPoint decks saved to your desktop. Or, you could have your passwords automatically fill in for you (it makes online shopping a breeze! Oh and don’t worry, I’ve never online shopped at work. NEVER). It’s important to delete (or save to Google Docs then delete) all files, e-mails that are no longer relevant (to your old job, not to you) and clear internet history. That way, nothing is left for anyone that shouldn’t be there, and important things to your old job are saved on their server. Another good rule of thumb? Unsubscribe to e-mail newsletters you never read, and change your settings to your new contact info to the ones you do read. The person oh so lucky to have the job of getting your e-mail forwards will love you for this.
4. Make a killer exit
You know the saying, “Don’t burn your bridges?” Well, in leaving a job, and in life in general, this is 100 percent true. Always has been, always will be. You want to end on the best note possible. Give ample time (two full weeks), and offer to help. After someone leaves a place, it generally sucks until they find your replacement. So, offer to help find the replacement by recommending your contacts or LinkedIn connections. Also, close the loop on as much as possible and hand off projects when appropriate. I was even so kind at my last job to make a document outlining my day-to-day tasks, that way the new person could come on board with a road map. This is also super helpful if you run social media accounts, so you can spell out processes here, or direct them to where the processes are housed. And don’t forget to include log-in information for those channels! Having a smooth exit will leave your old boss and coworkers still thinking highly of you. After all, you never know when you’ll have to interact with those people again. Plus, if you live in a smaller city like Pittsburgh, you are going to interact with them again. No bones about it.
5. Prepare for your new job
This one is probably the hardest (given the short amount of time you have), but really important. You don’t want to walk blindly into your new work place, so try to prepare as much as possible. Ask for a heads-up of what you’ll be working on. Ask as many questions as possible. Meet up with coworkers for happy hour before you start working with them, or at least stalk them out on social channels like Twitter. Having a game plan will make you able to jump right in and impress your new boss.
So, what else would you recommend or have you done for a seamless job transition?