When You Get a Job Counteroffer: Should You Stay or Should You Go?

http://blog.smartbear.com/careers/when-you-get-a-job-counteroffer-should-you-stay-or-should-you-go/

by ohjeez • 13 years ago

43 47 13 years ago

blog.smartbear.com

philip1209• 13 years ago

The scary part about this is the change it makes in the dynamic with the original employer - they know that you have once before sought other opportunities and decided to quit. It wasn't a purely economic decision - there had to be a lack of excitement to justify the uprooting of your career.

Perhaps the counteroffer is a guise as they hire somebody to replace you, then you'll be let go as soon as they hire somebody.

The relationship can never be as "warm and fuzzy" as before you tried to quit.

Domenic_S3• 13 years ago

Good way to put it, the "relationship".

Two people are dating, one is an alcoholic. The other says, "I'm leaving, we've talked about your drinking 100 times and nothing changes so I'm leaving you. Bye." The drunk says, "oh no, stay with me and I'll stop drinking!"

Does that situation ever turn out well?

fennecfoxen• 13 years ago

Well. In this case, the company could offer money, and maybe even contractual guarantees of continued employment. If structured properly these may be worth more than empty promises.

elviejo• 13 years ago

Precisely...

I would say never accept a counter offer. If you decided to leave there must be other things that bother you besides money.

Those reasons aren't going to change. So if you accept more money you would be happier for about 6 months and then reality will settle in... and would still be unhappy and planning to leave anyway.

Even if you are happy with your current job and the only reason to leave is to have a pay increase, when you receive a counter offer with more money you shouldn't stay either. Because a raise by means of counter offer, means that salary at your current employer aren't fair and are based just on negotiation skills alone.

Domenic_S3• 13 years ago

Article was a little unfocused, jumping from here to there, but the advice is sound. If you're so unhappy where you are that you're interviewing around, negotiating pay & benefits, etc, then you need to go. Your current place has proven that they are not a right fit -- which could mean as little as that you don't feel comfortable bringing up concerns to your manager.

Any way you slice it, you've shown your hand: you're out the door. A company where it takes a resignation letter to spur them on to pay attention to you is not the right place for you.

stevehawk• 13 years ago

If it's a large organization - get out.

If it's a small organization - stay if you actually like it.

The difference is that small organizations understand people, the risks, the sacrifices, etc, because they're still human. Large organizations only care about their bottom line. They will hire your replacement, probably a junior level person, train him up, replace you, and then do the same thing to him years later when he realizes he hates it for the same reason you do.

Besides, life is about growing and doing new things. Not the same shit forever for a 2.5% raise (if you even get that)

a3n2• 13 years ago

Best answer.

Most of our jobs don't mean shit. It doesn't matter.

Nutella4• 13 years ago

If you ask your current company for higher salary/responsibility/etc and don't get it until you quit to take another offer, you have learned that your current company is reactive and only responds to threats. In other words, your current company is not a good place to work.

zeidrich• 13 years ago

I think that an important step is to pre-empt the counter-offer.

When you even start to consider another opportunity, think about why you actually want to move to the new opportunity. Is it that you need more money? Is it that you want to work on a different kind of project? Is it that you need more stimulation?

Then go to your employer, and without bringing up the other opportunity, see if they are willing to make the change that you want. Don't be angry that they haven't already done it for you, until this point you didn't even necessarily know you wanted it, you can't expect them to.

If they accept, then you are in an environment where you're happy, and your employer is probably happy that you are motivated and taking steps to make things happen. If they reject your offer, then pursue the better opportunity.

In that case, if they do give you a counter-offer, it's either going to be less than you need, which makes it easy enough to say no to. Or they will be offering you the same thing you've already asked for and declined to provide, which means they are doing it out of desperation and you can expect they will to an extent resent it if they feel it's something they can't afford, or they will have been actively trying to take advantage of you by denying you fair treatment when you asked for it directly.

I think first decide what it is you need, then give your employer the opportunity to provide what it is you need of their own accord, then accept an offer with another employer who can provide what it is you need. Then you don't have to worry about the counter-offer. You've already gone through it once on your terms.

If you don't make your employer aware that you want a change prior to your resignation, and they would have been willing to offer it to you all along if they knew, you're both in an awkward position. If the counter offer is exactly what you want and you take it, there will be some soreness and a passive-aggressive attitude that will persist. If you ask for what you want and get it prior to saying "Or else I quit" it's much smoother sailing for everyone.

sockgrant• 13 years ago

Absolutely the right approach.

You owe it to yourself and to your employer to be honest with them. If you think you deserve more money, a new manager, a better project, etc. then ask. You shouldn't say you'll leave if you don't get it. You just lay out your reasons and make a simple request.

Also, it's important to start these conversations early. If you want more money and are ready to quit within 1 month if you don't get it, you are asking too late. If you can't stand working for your manager for 1 more day and you haven't told anyone, you're too late.

When you start having these wants, it's important to bring them up. "I'd like to be on track to be promoted within 1 year, how can I do this?" Stay on top of this subject with your manager. If you have problems with your manager, amicably let him know how you two could work better together. Make a few efforts at it. If it doesn't work then you let a higher-up(s) know and leave it to them.

If you're proactive early about what you want from your job then you'll either get what you want or save time finding out that you won't get it. It will also lead to a very easy decision to stay/leave a job.

jonnathanson• 13 years ago

This is good, solid advice.

In general, taking your manager or company by surprise -- for good or bad -- is never a great strategy. If you're angling for a raise or a promotion, make your intentions known well in advance. Don't assume your boss can read your mind. Have a plan, get input from your manager, follow up on it, and show progress. Don't expect something to happen overnight, even if your boss wants to make it happen. He or she might have several layers of red tape to work through, or might be unable to give spot promotions and raises outside of a given cycle. (This is especially true at large companies, whose managers have less discretionary power than commonly believed.)

Protip: rather than asking for a raise at an arbitrary number, try to find out the pay-band structure at your company. Know what the bands are, where you fall within them, and accordingly, how much room you've got to negotiate within reason. This information isn't always public knowledge, but chances are, somebody at your company has it. Reducing information asymmetry is key to a successful negotiation.

YZF• 13 years ago

I don't think it's that easy. If you ask for what you want and are refused you are now in a worse position. This is why people don't do this. Even in situations where you won't be worse off people (esp. introverts) wouldn't normally ask for what they want.

The company has already lost when the employee is contemplating whether they should go look for a new job. Any outcome of this, whether the employee moves around in the company, leaves the company, takes a counter offer is all in the too little too late camp.

That's why a good manager and a good company needs to actively invest effort in making sure their employees are happy and productive. How does the saying go, people don't leave companies, they leave their bosses...

EDIT: It also depends on the company. In a large company like Microsoft you can make moves that are almost like moving to a different company and have advantages (seniority) over changing companies. My experience is those companies have a better chance of retaining employees because of that advantage as long as they make those moves reasonably easy.

aidenn0• 13 years ago

From the point of view of the manager, I agree (you need to proactively make sure the people you want to keep are happy).

From the point of view of an employee, I disagree. If you are contemplating looking for a new job, then you are unhappy. If you are unhappy with your job, you should at least try talking to your manager. Either:

A: They want to keep you and are reasonable and capable of making the adjustments you desire

B: They don't want to keep you

C: They aren't reasonable

D: They are not capable of making the adjustments you desire

In the event of B they don't want you to be working there any more, so look for a better job. In the event of C or D, you probably don't want to be working there anymore, so look for a better job.

That makes it really easy to reject a potential counter-offer; if they won't give you what you need without you threatening to leave, you probably don't want to work there.

zendev• 13 years ago

If it does come down to a counter offer, I'd advise telling your current employer that your desires (salary, benefits, etc...) aren't up for negotiation. Give them concrete details of what you want and make sure they know you aren't opening the field for a lower offer. Way better for everybody this way.

Buttons840• 13 years ago

One advantage of this approach is your current employer will only give you what they're comfortable with when there is no threat of you leaving. Which is better than them offering you way more than they're comfortable with in the heat of the moment ("Oh noes, we HAVE to keep this guy.") and then later deciding they're unhappy with your compensations ("Wait, we're paying this guy too much.").

vladimirralev2• 13 years ago

Well, that's one way to always keep your salary at the absolute minimum as an employee. This is the equivalent of the employee asking the employer to "Keep me posted when you can pay more, right buddy?". It's an unethical demand to keep yourself at disadvantage in negotiations. And those other jobs that pay more out of the box are more likely to give you a better career path with more benefits without having to confront them. Accounting for all the associated risks and stress in doing so..

vladimirralev2• 13 years ago

You are assuming some sort of ideal case where both parties act in good faith.

First of all, you have to make an educated guess what demands would be acceptable based on how the company presents ifself to you. If you ask for things that are normally considered unacceptable you are just exposing yourself as a person who is unsatisfied with his position and there is huge risk of being denied any further development with this company or even fired.

For example, it might be reasonable to ask for 20-30% raise maximum. But if you have to ask for 200-300% salary raise, in a company that just told you budget is tight and there is not even enough money for legal fees to award shares, then save your breath. Such an extreme case is quite rare, but I've seen it happen.

Most cases wouldn't be as bad, but you have to ask yourself if your demands have a good chance to be accepted before confronting the company, otherwise make sure you have an offer on the table. Nobody is paying you for the risks of asking too many questions.

jtbigwoo• 13 years ago

From my experience, an employer should only counter-offer if they're truly desparate. Just like this article says, the employee has already decided to leave once, it's not going to take alot to get them to decided to leave again. In addition, though, counter-offering one employee signals to others that they can route around the usual process for promotions and raises by coming in with an offer of their own.

I worked at a place where they counter-offered two above average (but not great) developers who were working on an important client project. The two accepted the counter-offers, but still left for good in a few months. Everyone else in the office that wanted a raise or promotion now knew what they had to do to get raises: find another job and bluff. It put a big dent in the company culture.

weixiyen• 13 years ago

Everyone else in the office that wanted a raise or promotion now knew what they had to do to get raises: find another job and bluff.

In this case it sounds like a problem with the company not giving promotions / raises until it's too late.

I think companies and managers must always look introspectively and see what they are doing wrong that is causing people to leave, and how they can improve the situation.

Often times, drastic changes might be necessary to the structure / day-to-day operations of a team if too many people in one department are leaving.

kyllo• 13 years ago

Yeah, some companies have a policy of not making counteroffers at all, for this reason.

Basically, if an employee asks for a raise, that is when a good manager is going to decide whether to retain them or not. Because if you say no to an employee's request for a raise, but then make a counteroffer when they actually have another offer in hand, it is already too late. That is what bad managers do.

As a manager, the second you say "no" to a raise, you need to start to prepare yourself for the probable outcome that that employee will go and get a higher offer, and quit.

Most people don't ask for raises lightly, it is an act that requires a bit of courage. Chances are, if an employee works up the courage to ask you for a raise, it is because they really need it, and they are giving you a chance to retain them, before they start looking around.

darkxanthos• 13 years ago

One of my first bosses told me a story of how he responded to the CTO asking him if he were looking for a new job. He said,

"Yeah! Always. How do either of us know what my market value is if I don't? It's only fair."

I thought that was brilliant. No he was never fired and he stayed there quite some time after that. :)

smacktoward3• 13 years ago

You should go. Accepting a counteroffer is a no-win situation.

If the counteroffer is amazing, it will poison your relationships with everybody in the company: colleagues will resent you for getting what they will see as a golden ticket when they didn't, and managers will resent you for what they will interpret as mercenary tendencies -- i.e. you're just waiting for someone to come along with an even better offer before you sell them out. So you'll have to work with a bunch of people whose opinion of you has just dropped through the floor.

And if the counteroffer isn't amazing, why would you consider taking it in the first place?

nanidin• 13 years ago

If the result of telling coworkers is so undesirable, why not keep it between yourself and your immediate manager?

smacktoward3• 13 years ago

Word of these kinds of things tends to get around, even if you don't spread it. In most cases people won't know exactly how much you got to stay, but that won't stop them from assuming you got something, and that something is something they are not getting.

In fact keeping the amount secret can actually make problems worse, by encouraging people to use their imagination to answer the question; then you end up with a situation where you actually got an extra $5K/year, but everyone you work with thinks you got an oil tanker full of Spanish doubloons and a stable full of ponies.

brechin• 13 years ago

Talk to your current employer before seeking, if that's an option. You shouldn't have to seek another job to get a raise/promotion/change from your current employer. In my opinion, seeking or accepting a counter-offer is unprofessional.

Companies should be proactive about keeping their employees engaged, challenged, and relatively happy.

Whatever you do, keep the connections you've made--don't burn bridges. The new opportunity may not be all it's cracked up to be, and it will be nice to have some people to call when you're on the hunt again.

zura2• 13 years ago

You should consider a counter-counter-offer. Actually, any number of counters until they exhaust. Then you choose the better one.

oneeyedpigeon• 13 years ago

If you're willing to treat yourself as a commodity to be auctioned off to the highest bidder, imagine how your eventual employer is going to treat you.

zura2• 13 years ago

If OP is questioning to consider a counter-offer, what's wrong with [questioning] considering a counter-counter-offer?

Your example is not relevant - you can treat yourself as a commodity even with a single offer. Actually, even without any offer at all.

codegeek• 13 years ago

There is no "one size fits all" or binary answer to this. It really depends on the individual case. I have seen both (staying vs going) happen to me/family and in either case, it has been good and/or bad.

If you love working at the current place, you have a great relationship with your boss/team and your only issue is money, then a good counter-offer may not be a bad idea. In fact, many times it is the only way to get a raise unfortunately. Consider the alternative. You might be making ok money but you don't like your team/boss/company at all, then do not take the counter offer even if they offer you more. You never know how it will turn out later on.

jere• 13 years ago

For his part, Hurwitz himself resigned from a job at one point. He turned down a counteroffer from his boss. Six months later, he quit his new job. He got his old job back, in part because of his decision to turn down the counteroffer. “The boss told me it was because I hadn’t played games and had acted ethically,” Hurwitz said.

Wot? His company gave him a counteroffer with the attitude that accepting their offer would be unethical?

jasonwocky• 13 years ago

Well, he could have hemmed and hawed and led them on. Sounds like maybe he didn't do that; perhaps he just gave them a simple "no" and they respected that.

smacktoward3• 13 years ago

Counteroffers are frequently made out of desperation more than anything else. "Holy shit, Bob is leaving?!? I didn't even know he wasn't happy. Quick, put together something that'll keep him around."

The problem with this is that the people making the counteroffer often feel they are doing so, effectively, at gunpoint: give me a bag of cash right now, or lose a key cog in your machine. "Nice company you've got there. Sure would be a shame if something were to... happen to it." So they are often made grudgingly, which leads to bad feelings. And if they are accepted the bad feelings go deeper, because now the people making the counteroffer feel like you put one over on them. So paradoxically, taking their counteroffer can hurt your relationships with those people pretty deeply, while rejecting it can keep them stable or even improve them -- when you walk away, they can interpret it as you choosing not to put one over on them.

None of this makes any logical sense, of course, but we're talking here about emotional decisionmaking, which has very little to do with logic.

dllthomas• 13 years ago

It makes some sense - leaving demonstrates that pushing them for the counteroffer wasn't your intent at the outset.

jrs235• 13 years ago

Perhaps he said he needed a change (not more money) because he was feeling burnt out or lost motivation on the project he was working on and perhaps in an attempt to keep him his employer tried throwing more money at him. Perhaps he turned down the more money offer because it really wasn't about money. Perhaps 6 months later he was rejuvenated and because his boss could see his leaving 6 months earlier wasn't just an attempt to "extort" more money but legitimately about burn out he hired him back on.

Perhaps it would make more sense if it said "because he hadn’t played games and hadn't acted unethically"

rhizome• 13 years ago

No, that him turning it down was ethical according to Hurwitz, that he acted on his own terms.

There is no such thing as "unethical." There is always an ethic involved unless the person is acting completely without reason and randomly, such as when they are insane (and even then there is probably still some kind of reason in their mind). In this way, a person conducting themselves in an "unethical" way is likely on the verge of death or incarceration.

mikemikemike• 13 years ago

I was in this situation four months ago. Frankly, I interviewed for the new job because it came with an attractive salary, but there had also been recent layoffs at my old job and I was interested in moving on anyway.

In the end, I'm glad I turned down the counteroffer and got out - I do think that my relationships would have been poisoned if I had stayed, and some core issues would not have been fixed. That said - I should not have taken the job I did. Chasing money was a rookie move, and I'm now more unhappy than I was at the previous company.

My advice is to think very realistically, perhaps pessimistically, about what life will be like at the new company. If you're not sure, ask questions. Don't take a new job because you want to get out - take a new job because you want out AND because the new job is freaking amazing. I'm now job hunting all over again, and it sucks.

pacaro• 13 years ago

I previously worked at Microsoft. When I told my boss that I was leaving he asked a very polite question (I don't remember the exact wording) asking whether this was open for negotiation, and I told him no, that I had signed an offer and intended to take it. We moved on to discussing how I would close out my existing work items.

When a friend of mine (also at Microsoft) told his boss that he had a job offer from Google, but wasn't explicit about whether he had accepted it yet, they bent over backwards to try and persuade him to stay — offering, among other things, the promotion that he'd been passed over for in the previous two review cycles (so much for no promotion budget), pulling in upper management to spend time with him to persuade him to stay. All this just served to communicate to him how messed up his situation had been, if they can promote you now, why couldn't they before?

As long as you have been clear with your management about your expectations w.r.t. pay/promotion/work etc. then any counteroffer is simply an open display of organizational misanthropy.

w.r.t. Microsoft, one of the unspoken flaws in their review system is/was that by the time a review is delivered to an employee, it is too late to fix anything. If you think you deserved a promotion/bigger bonus/merit increase/whatever it has to wait until the next review cycle (a year) to be corrected (unless your manager is really prepared to fight hard for you and do things out of cycle—possible but hard)

badman_ting• 13 years ago

As long as you have been clear with your management about your expectations w.r.t. pay/promotion/work etc. then any counteroffer is simply an open display of organizational misanthropy.

Ha! I like that.

auctiontheory• 13 years ago

The way companies work in real life, having an offer in hand gives your manager more motivation and leverage (to get more money for you) than he has to help an employee who is not seen as "in play." In other words, to improve your situation at a good but not perfect job, you sometimes need to get an external offer. Maybe that's not how it should be, but it's demonstrably how it is.

You have ongoing relationships with people, including your managers and co-workers - don't burn those. But your "relationship" with your employer [company], at least in Silicon Valley, is transactional.

rch• 13 years ago

I heard an anecdote about a CEO who will happily provide a counter, just so he will have an opportunity to replace you on his terms. Be wary.

jotux• 13 years ago

Bram Cohen had an article about this a few years ago that offers a different perspective: http://bramcohen.com/2011/12/04/never-make-counter-offers

rumblestrut• 13 years ago

I tried to do a little counteroffer Jedi mind trick. It didn't go as planned.

After working almost seven years, I went on an interview that an acquaintance told me about. The interview went very well, and shortly after I left the office, they called and offered me a job. I told them I'd need a few days to think about it.

I went into work the next day and told them, then tried to see if I could get a counteroffer from them. It wouldn't have taken much for me to stay; I was working in town and the new job would be a commute. If they could have matched half of what the new offer was, I would have stayed.

But it was no dice. I took the job.

And you know what? It ended up being the best choice I could have made. The acquaintance who worked there and told me about the job I know call "friend." I moved from a solo environment to a team. My skills have improved, the pay improved, and even the commute has turned out to be a blessing thanks to audiobooks and podcasts.

Just something to think about. Honestly, I think if you think it's time to leave, you should just go. It's time. Don't fight it.

wmt• 13 years ago

I accepted an counter offer at a situation where my manager had been wanting to promote me for 2 years. The worst part was that I had no idea why it was not happening. I was asking at every performance review about areas where I need to grow to get it and my mgr had no idea - he said that I performing at a more senior level in all areas, and that I should be promoted. I did get a nice raise, but not the title. Don't get me wrong here, the title wasn't that important, what bothered me was the totally dysfunctional communication between the management layers where I was left in a limbo where felt that promotions were apparently not based on merit, but something secret.

Limbo wasn't fun, so I was happy to get a +20% offer from a another company. However I ended up accepting the counter offer when I was certain that it was too late to offer me anything to stay. I got a honest (I hope) personal apology from my managers manager, the department head, who said that he had been the one deciding not to promote me, and that he now understands that he was not clearly communicating his expectations to my manager.

That was a bit over a year ago and while it might sound that the situation was beyond repair, I'm actually happy I ended up staying. It actually changed my managers manager behaviour to take a much more visible role in many other areas and start communicating more directly to us instead of just the layer in between.

a3n2• 13 years ago

Leaving a job doesn't matter. You're going to leave eventually anyway. All an offer in hand means is that you're leaving this job on this day, something that would have happened anyway.

Just go, it's a part of life, like taking a shit.

When You Get a Job Counteroffer: Should You Stay or Should You Go?

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