You hate your job.
Not "Mondays are rough" hate. The kind where people regret asking how work is going. You've known it for months. Maybe years. And you keep waiting for it to change. For the new manager to make it better. For the promotion to fix it. For Todd to shut the fuck up about adding a new analysis.
Here's the thing: if you truly hate it, that's unlikely to change.
And accepting that reality is actually the first step to thinking clearly about what comes next.
There are exactly three questions that separate the women who leave well from the women who flame out. Most people have never asked themselves even one. I'll walk you through all three before you finish reading this.
Stop Waiting for It to Get Better
Most people spend months, sometimes years, trying to convince themselves their job will improve. They reframe. They focus on gratitude. They tell themselves everyone feels this way sometimes, that it's just a phase, that they're being dramatic.
But if you genuinely hate the work, that feeling isn't going away.
Some jobs are wrong for you. Not wrong because the company is terrible or your manager is incompetent (or maybe exactly because of that). Just wrong. Wrong fit. Wrong work. Wrong use of whatever you're actually good at.
And here's what people don't tell you: companies aren't designed to care about this. They just need the work done. As long as you keep showing up and doing it competently, they're fine. Your happiness? That's your responsibility, not theirs.
So when you realize you hate it, the most useful thing you can do is accept the reality. Not as failure. As clarity. Because once you stop spending energy trying to make yourself like something you hate, you can actually start building toward greatness.
The True Cost of Staying (That No One Mentions)
Most people think staying in a job you hate is the responsible choice. Push through. Be professional. Don't be a quitter.
But staying is expensive. Way more expensive than most people realize.
Props for trying to hide it… but you're not. You mute yourself in meetings to say "are you fucking kidding me" out loud. Your camera has been "broken" for six weeks. You've mastered the blank stare that says "I'm here in body only."
Your colleagues might find your venting amusing. Your manager doesn't. And they're sure as hell not putting you on the next big project. So you're stuck. Hating it, showing that you hate it, and ensuring through your visible misery that you'll never advance far enough to leave on your own terms.
Then there's the exhaustion. Not tired-exhausted. Soul-exhausted. The kind that makes you fantasize about minor car accidents on the way to work. Nothing serious, just enough to legitimately stay home for a week. Vacation doesn't fix this. Nothing fixes this except leaving.
And here's what happens when you stay too long: you don't leave well. You stay until you snap in a meeting about something that doesn't actually matter. Until you send the email you absolutely should not send. Until you're so obviously checked out that when you finally resign, your manager's main emotion is relief.
Compare that to leaving six months earlier, when you first knew. You could have left with strong references. With a network that wanted to help. With bridges you didn't burn on your way out.
Every month you stay in a job you hate is a month you're not building toward what's actually right for you. And in the worst cases, you lose more than time. You lose the part of yourself that believed work could be something other than something to endure.
That's the real cost of staying. Not the missed raises. The slow erosion of everything you need to build something better.
If you don't believe you deserve better than this, no one else will.
The 3-Question Exit Strategy
So if you're staying, even for a few more months, you need to be ruthlessly clear on three things:
1. What are you still here to extract?
Not "experience" in some vague sense. Be specific. Are you building a skill you need for your next move? Getting access to systems, clients, or knowledge you can't get elsewhere? Working on a project that gives you credibility or a portfolio piece?
If yes, stay long enough to get it. Set a deadline. "I finish this project, then I'm out."
If no, if you're just logging time doing work you hate with no clear strategic benefit, there's nothing left to get. You're staying out of inertia, not strategy.
2. What is your target end date?
Not "someday." Not "when I find something better." A date. Maybe it's three months. Maybe it's six. Maybe it's "as soon as I have another offer." But it's specific. It's written down. You're working backward from it.
And no, "after my bonus" doesn't count if you've been saying it for three years.
Without a deadline, "I'm leaving" turns into "I'm thinking about leaving" turns into another year of misery while you wait for the perfect moment that never comes. Pick the date.
3. What do you actually need next so you don't end up here again?
Not what sounds impressive. What you actually need. Is it the work itself? Autonomy? Scope? The mission? The culture? Get specific. Because if you leave this job for another version of the same problem, you've learned nothing.
Once you're clear on these three things (what you're extracting, when you're leaving, what you need next) you can stop pretending this is your long-term home and start treating it like what it is: a place you're strategically exiting.
So pick your end date. Extract what you need. Get out before you forget you were capable of more.
Invest in you. Build your exit.
You just read 1,200 words about why you should leave. Now do something about it.
If you haven’t already, sign up to download the "Should You Stay or Go?" Job Exit Framework, the exact questions to ask yourself before you waste another month.
P.S. Thousands of women have already pulled up a chair at The High Table. Your seat's waiting.
The High Table. We don't wait to be seated.