It isn't unprofessional to abruptly walk out on the job
if giving notice was never in the requirements.
Given the behavior of my current company towards all of its employees, I am looking to go elsewhere, and when I do, I won't worry overly much about burning those bridges behind me. The at-will sword is two-edged, so let the other guy feel the backswing occasionally.
If such practices are widespread in a particular industry than that industry in practice doesn't provide severance. In those circumstances, it makes sense to withdraw the corresponding practice of giving notice. Or perhaps instead substituting a practice of conditional notice.
I disagree. One of the things that distinguishes professional behavior for me is having professional standards. That is, no matter what your clients or employers do, there are certain ways you plan to behave. For me that would definitely include a good handover.
Of course, my professional standards also include refusing to build things that are obviously dumb, dangerous, or destructive. But a disturbing number of developers feel that they should just do whatever their bosses tell them, no matter the disaster that they set in motion. So one could argue that a lot of IT-related jobs are more trades than professions, in which case a "take this job and shove it" exit could be more acceptable. Not because it isn't unprofessional behavior, but because professional behavior isn't expected.
We have no union or professional association to protect our interests in my labor category. We have only the willingness to be faithful and courteous to those who treat us well, and to be stubborn and vindictive to those who would abuse our good faith. Bite the hand that beats you.
I think that professionals have to be careful in who they choose to work for, but once they start, they should act professionally. That includes leaving professionally.
In game theory simulations, strategies that respond to counterparty behaviors, such as tit-for-tat, always outperform those that do not, such as always-cooperate, always-reneg, and random-choice strategies.
Your strategy is apparently always-cooperate. It's a loser. If you do not penalize bad behavior or unbalanced deals, they will become more prevalent in the environment.
Depends on circumstances and the details of your profession. If you're just a badly-treated wage slave, then definitely: walk out as soon as you find something better.
But I'm an independent contractor/freelancer, and I'm currently working on a project that would probably take about a year. But my contract is always to the end of the quarter and gets extended by a quarter. I could probably refuse such a contract extension, and I considered it, because a previous client where I really, really enjoyed working, asked me if I was available. But I didn't because I felt it would be unprofessional to leave at this stage.
If we're talking about professionalism, at what point did you bring up to the client that their quarterly contracting strategy leaves them extremely vulnerable to losing critical personnel before the work gets finished? I think what happened there is that they leveraged their project management flexibility against your sense of integrity, and you lost.
In any case, I didn't lose anything. As long as I get paid for the hours I work, I'm happy. I'd be totally fine with the contract getting terminated tomorrow. I'm also fine with working here for another half year. But at more than a year, I think I'd get itchy.
I don't think "unprofessional" means what you think it means. It is not, for instance, a synonym for "illegal."
Most offers I see are clear that the letter is not a contract, and no contract can even exist without direct and explicit intervention by the CEO. And that seems to be a left-handed way of saying that if you do try to get an actual contract, you will not be successful, and the offer of employment will be withdrawn. I would very much like to see more at-will workers do same-day resignations when they change jobs, possibly even writing their own severance agreements.
It isn't unprofessional to abruptly walk out on the job if giving notice was never in the requirements. And most of the time, all that you get for the courtesy of making it easier for the employer to replace you is a payout for your accumulated vacation time, if anything.