Restraint in the face of temptation is an important skill for professionals: 10+ employees share why it is important not to burn bridges through their own experiences

Employees shared their personal experiences with burning bridges, both their own and those of others, sparking discussion.

Restraint in the face of temptation and provocation is an important skill. And especially when it comes to professionalism, moderation, and restraint are extremely valuable.

The fantasy of quitting in dramatic fashion feels so good when you imagine it in the shower, with warm water, shampoo, and satisfying thoughts of getting even streaming down the drain. But, although it might seem tempting thought and in the moment to go out in a blaze of glory, you will almost always live to regret it. Whether it is that hindsight and perspective make you realize that it wasn't worth burning that bridge, or even realizing that you weren't quite as squarely in the "right" of it all as you thought you were.

Networking plays such an important role in skill progression. Connections are, quite literally, everything, and if they're not connections that are helping you, they're hurting you instead. There's being remembered for all the right reasons, and then there's being remembered for the wrong ones. You have no idea when someone with whom you worked previously might be asked about what you were like to work with, and a single detracting, or even neutral comment, will be enough to edge you out of the hiring race through someone deciding that it's simply not worth hiring you in favor of a candidate with no known detractors. 

The very act of "burning bridges" or going "full scorched earth" derives from military strategies in which important infrastructure and resources are destroyed to ensure tactical advantage. But the modern workplace is not a battle, though it might sometimes feel like one when your central nervous system triggers a fight-or-flight response upon seeing a notification from your boss. And, there is, as such, no tactical advantage to "scoreced earth" policies, seldom is remaining on good or neutral terms with an ex-employer going to reflect poorly on you, if they are known to be difficult to work with it will simply make you appear to be "easy going", a "team player," and skilled at "conflict resolution."

The reality is, good or bad, you want to maintain all and any connections that you have created. If it's not just through word of mouth, then the direct references that you are able to provide will have a strong determining element in your hiring, both in showing that the skillset you claim to possess is accurate and that you are, indeed, easy to work with.

For all of these reasons, it's best not to burn bridges. The topic became a hot topic in this employment community, where employees shared their experiences with one another and discussed the costs of getting even.

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