Short answer: yes. It’s always okay to do what you’ve thoughtfully decided is best for you and your family. But “thoughtfully” is doing a lot of work in that sentence — so before you decide, here are a few things worth sitting with. Not to talk you out of leaving. To make sure that whatever you choose, you chose it on a full night’s sleep instead of on your worst Tuesday.
It’s 6:47 on a Tuesday. You’re two people down. There’s a resignation letter half-written in a browser tab you keep flipping back to.
If that’s where you are, take a breath. You’re not a bad teammate for asking this question. You’re a tired one. Let’s think it through together.
(Jenny — this opener works as-is, but your signature move is a real moment. If you’ve got a true one — a specific evening, a specific tab open — drop it in here and it’ll hit even harder.)
First, notice what you’ve built.
Everyone is replaceable. That’s true, and it’s oddly freeing — your organization would survive without you, which means you’re allowed to leave without the sky falling.
But here’s what’s not replaceable: the relationships you’ve built inside that building.
When we’re running on fumes, we sometimes daydream about the dramatic exit — the honest exit interview, the mic drop. It’s a very human fantasy. But it’s worth being clear-eyed about where a sudden departure actually lands. It rarely reaches leadership the way we imagine. More often, it lands on the peers standing next to you — the ones who’ll quietly absorb your work, often without extra support or pay, the same way you’ve probably picked up slack for someone before.
That’s not a reason to stay. It’s a reason to leave well, if you leave. The bridges to your colleagues are the ones worth protecting — they’re your references, your future collaborators, your community long after this job is a line on a resume. In a lot of fields, the professional world is smaller than it looks. Those relationships are an asset you’ve already earned. Leave in a way that keeps them intact.
Then, consider holding on for one more day.
Notice when this question tends to arrive: usually mid-burnout. So it’s worth asking honestly — would you be asking it if you weren’t overworked, tired, and feeling undervalued right now?
Were you satisfied a few months ago, when the team was whole? Is there a project you’d actually be excited to pick back up once reinforcements arrive?
If the answer is yes, the enemy might not be the job. It might be this stretch of the job.
And this stretch has an underrated escape hatch: saying something. Not complaining — partnering. There’s a real difference, and it’s the difference between airing grievances and solving a problem out loud.
Try naming it plainly to your team and your manager: being down a person or two is taking a toll, and you want to figure out together how to carry the load without dropping the important things. Ask to de-prioritize the low-impact work. Decide, as a team, what actually matters most this quarter so no one’s ping-ponging between half-finished tasks. Set fair boundaries — and make room for your teammates’ boundaries too. Ask leadership to let you weigh in on the restaffing plan, so you help shape the future team and get a rough sense of when help is coming.
This is where Amy Edmondson’s work on psychological safety earns its keep: on teams where people can say “I’m underwater” without it counting against them, problems get solved before they become resignations. Muscling through silently just gets you more tired. Speaking up might get you one more good day — or one more good week — or all the way to whole again.
Finally, look at the system that got you here.
Now the part some leaders won’t love — said with respect, because I think most leaders genuinely want to get this right:
A short-staffed stretch shouldn’t be this painful. And when it is, that usually points to the system, not the people gutting it out inside it.
Peter Senge taught us to see organizations as systems, and a healthy one is built to flex. Leaders can — and I’d argue should — make short-staffing survivable before it happens: build redundancy into the tasks that matter, treat documentation as a gift to the next person, keep the team focused on the vital few priorities, and grow a culture where people talk openly instead of white-knuckling in silence. Do that, and when someone inevitably moves on, the people who remain can lean on good notes, reshuffle the work together, and calmly decide what waits. Barring a true crisis, a temporary gap should sting a little, not break the team.
Healthy systems also lose people less often, and with less shock. When leaders reward the right behaviors, pay people fairly, and deal with problems instead of sweeping them under the rug, departures become normal transitions rather than emergencies. On psychologically safe teams, people don’t hold their goals so close to the vest — even the goals that lead them elsewhere — so leaders see it coming and can plan.
Here’s the reframe worth holding onto: if this moment is agony, that’s information. It may be telling you less about your loyalty and more about the health of the system you’re spending your one wild professional life inside.
A gut check before you decide
When you’re this tired, the decision feels binary and urgent. It’s usually neither. Before you send anything, sit with four questions:
- Season or system? Is this a hard stretch, or a pattern that predates the staffing gap?
- Have I actually asked? Have I named the strain and invited my team to solve it with me — or have I been quietly absorbing it?
- What’s still working? What about this role, team, or mission did I genuinely value when things were whole?
- Are my bridges intact? If I leave, can I do it in a way that protects the relationships I’ve built?
If you work through those and conclude you’re spending the majority of your waking hours inside an unhealthy system — and you can go with your important bridges intact — then go. With a clear conscience, and a full night’s sleep behind the decision.
Even if others are already overboard.
