You haven’t stopped showing up or changed the way you work, but somehow, everything around you has — management is reassigning your projects without warning, meetings happen without your name on the invite and conversations that used to include you now leave you out.
You are still on the payroll, but you are no longer in the loop, and no one is saying why. If that sounds familiar, you are not imagining it — it does not feel accidental because it isn’t; it’s strategic, it’s deliberate and legally, it has a name: constructive discharge.
What constructive discharge looks like
At its core, constructive discharge means your employer has made your working conditions so intolerable that, for any reasonable person in your position, quitting feels like the only option left.
It doesn’t happen overnight, and it rarely involves one explosive event. Instead, it builds slowly — in withheld information, in responsibilities quietly taken away and in public criticism that feels more like performance than feedback. And over time, that turns into something heavier: the sense that you are not being heard anymore, just managed.
Under the law, discomfort alone is not enough — there has to be a clear pattern, a push to make you leave without ever having to say it out loud. And in Indiana, as under federal law, that pattern matters. Courts look at the full context, especially when it becomes clear that the goal was to force you out through pressure, not policy.
Why companies use this tactic
It’s cheaper. That’s really the answer. Terminating a long-time employee means risk like severance, potential lawsuits and the possibility of making headlines if the firing does not sit right with others inside the company. But when they make you quit, they avoid the paperwork, the confrontation and the accountability.
This tactic lets them control the outcome without ever having to say out loud what they are doing, but under the law, that silence does not shield them. If your employer is actively making your job unbearable in the hopes that you’ll remove yourself, that is not a business strategy — that’s a legal problem.
What to do before you walk away
If the signs are piling up, your instinct might be to cut your losses and resign — but timing matters. Before making any move that feels final, start keeping track of what changed: the projects they quietly reassigned, the sudden tone shifts in meetings, the conversations that now happen without you.
And before you go, talk to someone who knows how these situations play out. A quick consultation with an employment attorney can help you see your options clearly. Because once you resign, the story shifts, and it is not always in your favor.
You deserve better than a quiet exit
If you’ve worked your way into a role where your contributions once mattered, you don’t deserve to be erased quietly because someone decided your presence was inconvenient. Constructive discharge isn’t always loud, but its impact is. And if this feels personal, that’s because it is.
Before you make your next move, make sure it is one that protects you, not just your dignity, but your legal rights, too. Because being pushed out without cause doesn’t mean walking away without answers.
