Poll: What would it take to leave your current job?

The 3 month saga came to an end today. 

Started the interview process in January as the beginning of this thread described. 

The other company halted talks for about a month while their HR person changed and they were looking for a candidate that didn’t ask for as much as I did (my asking was 10k more than their highest number on their salary range for the position). 

They came back to me in March, 2 more interviews with higher ups to get their “approvals” to get the base salary I asked for originally before any interview in January with the recruiter approved.  

They went through 2 weeks of an approval process just to be told no by someone even higher up. They offered the top end of their salary range but not the number they knew from January that I said it would take.  

For reference the number I said it would take was 23% bump in base salary. (Admittedly their benefits were a little better as I stated before). 

I had told them that if they offered that I would take it and not go back to my current company to see if they would match. 

Well they didn’t. What they offered was about 14% higher in base. So I had 2 different 2 hour conversations one with my boss and one with his boss (VP of our group) about my grievances with where things are culture wise and that I had an offer that I was seriously considering taking. 

Today they matched the offer I actually received as well as the understanding that I have a short list of things to accomplish in the next 12-18 months that would lead to two different promotions (combined like another 12-15% increase). 

So in other words, stayed where I was enjoying my job with a 14% raise to add to the crappy 3.5% COLA we got a couple weeks ago. 

Been a long 2 months but worked out. 

My wife said she is just happy that I won’t be stressing over it anymore as I am never stressed about anything typically but I have been the last few weeks, according to her (I thought I was keeping it inside well enough, apparently not). 

I don’t think I would have asked for the match if not for Justin’s comments about how it went for him. 

Only thing I am truly giving up is the other company tried to give a $10k signing bonus since they couldn’t get to the salary I requested. The comfort of staying where I know/like my boss as well as the path to 2 promotions going forward well made up for $10k now. 

posted by justincredible

The offer wasn’t necessarily intended for leverage. I was almost certainly planning on leaving when I initially told them about the offer. In the end I chose to stay, partly due to the weird tech stack of the new company, partly due to strong feelings for the people I currently work with on a daily basis. 

Similarly for my story, if new company had came right out with what they knew I wanted I would have just said yes.

Once they gave an offer that was lower than I asked for but still a little higher than where I was at, I took the fact that I had an offer to my boss. Took the weekend and our VP going to bat with HR, but they matched (salary anyway).