Haven’t heard back from Europe job since final interview on Friday. They knew I had a competing offer, so I suspect that they have decided to make an offer to the other candidate. I will probably send a note tonight to ask them to confirm status.
Have gone back and forth on the start up offer letter. Didn’t realize until yesterday that they ask me to sign a 1 year non-compete. It’s tailored to 10 specific companies, many of which are very small companies today - 8/10 or 9/10 are probably smaller than the prospective employer.
It’s a niche of a broader industry I’ve worked in for years, so I’m not sure if I want to bother fighting it. (It’s like if I worked for the NFL and MLB and the Red Sox for 15 years, and went to join an e-sports company, and they asked me to sign a non-compete for some other e-sports companies, but I’d be free to go back to traditional sports leagues and teams). It applies even if terminated without cause, which I think is the one point I would see if I could strike. It seems generally illogical to me that you would impose a non-compete for somebody you laid off, unless there was additional consideration in a severance agreement.
Emailed hiring manager at Europe job last night for an update on where I stand. Got an auto reply that they’re on PTO until Monday. Sigh.
Having heard nothing from them since Friday, after telling them early last week I had another offer, is not a good sign, IMO, and I think I need to finally accept the start up offer today.
I got my counter offer from the president of my current company this afternoon. 18% more than the other offer with a match of the $50k bonus that will be cliff vested at 36 months (I think this just means I get nothing until then but I can invest it? The career plan is exactly what I’m looking for to expand my skills and get out of my niche specialty. God damnit I don’t know what the hell to do now.
Did they explain why they had overlooked you till now?
Will the new job also allow you to get out of your niche?
I think cliff vested just means you get it all at once rather than partially over time (e.g. 1/3 every year). Don’t think you can do anything with the money until it vests.
They put the blame on my boss which is only partially true. They also stated that they grew from $600m to $2b in revenue in that time and even though it’s not a good excuse it’s just what happened.
New job would have pretty limited growth opportunities. It’s the position I’m trying to get out of.
Are you still going to be working with/for current boss? If so, it could be fairly awkward. Either he had some (bad) reason for not providing you more opportunities or he was just a bad boss. Either way, I think it would be weird still working with him.
I’m always of the opinion that you should never accept your current employers counter offer. If they thought you were worth it, they would already be paying it.
Take the counter offer to the new place and use it to negotiate, but take the new job.
Yeah but only until we find my replacement. It won’t be awkward - he’s powerless and a coward. I’ll still be working from home 3-4 days a week anyway so I’ll rarely see him.
I get it but in my current role im definitely not worth what they would be paying me. Im definitely overpaid. They are paying for me figuring out some other shit so I’ll be worth it in the future. The biggest thing is expanding my career to other avenues. I do not want to be doing what I’m doing now for the next 25 years.
Only you can decide what’s best. Personally, I would probably leave because 1) you already accepted an offer and 2) you gave them the chance to do this before, they didn’t, and that’s a bad sign.
However; it sounds like the rare case where your long term prospects may be better staying put. But I’ve seen this situation create a lot of resentment and backfire a number of times.
Good luck - at least you’re getting a raise either way.
I don’t always agree with the typical blanket advice to never take a counteroffer (maybe because I’ve taken one?). The feeling of reneging on an acceptance is terrible but it goes away. I also think if some place or person is truly going to black list you for it, then I don’t know if that’s a place I want to be. I think reasonable people would be hurt, frustrated, etc, but realize it’s competitive out there and people have to do what’s best for their families.
Also, didn’t you once before take a counter to stay at current employer? My bad if I am misremembering that. If so, I think there’s favorable history of you doing that and things not being weird or them looking to jettison you.
At the end of the day, if I was generally happy with an existing employer, I’d probably lean towards staying. Particularly if you really think growth is limited at the new place. I just wanted to say that because I think people almost always say not to.
Agree with Jonny - I assume it means either you get $50K 3 years from now, or you get it now but have to repay it all if you leave before 3 years.
I know it’s not the same, but let’s say you’re pitching a client for business. They say sorry, got a better deal at your competitor, I’m going with them. You counter and say you’ll go 10% lower. IME, unless the client already asked you to do that and you said no, the client is saying “yes, great deal, let’s do this” and not “sorry, but if my business was really worth it you would’ve offered that already”. And even if you previously said no, can’t do it, they still might go with you. It’s just negotiation.
Yes I did 2.5 years ago. It wasn’t awkward at all and it was like it never happened. I didn’t care the slightest about burning the first bridge since it was just a consultant gig.
I think the career growth aspect is the key. I’ll also be 100% remote at the new job which would probably have limitations on growth whether I would like to admit it or not. I’ve built up a lot of “career equity” here that is hard to ignore the value of.
There is no reason my current company is going out of there way to do this if they are not all in. I’m seriously not that important and my job could get filled pretty easily if they wanted to.
The plan shows that I would resume my normal duties for the first month until someone new is hired. Months 2-6 would be me training and continuing my current job 3-4 days a week with the remainder being mentorship days for the new role. Months 6-9 would be a full transition to the new role and a lot of figuring it out.
This honestly sounds pretty slow to me. I wouldn’t be surprised if they don’t deliver. There is no way they’re getting through a recruiting process and bringing in a new hire replacement in a month. It’ll take them a month to get the job posting up.
As noted above, only you can decide. If I were you, given that you like the career advancement plan, I would just take that plan to the new place and try to get them interested in laying out a similar plan for you.
The job I’ve been in for a year is 100% remote, and I’ve come to hate that aspect about it. Maybe I’m a rare bird, but I miss interaction with colleagues, throwing around ideas, quickly getting help, etc. Long before “hybrid” became the thing, I was saying that would be my ideal. A day or 2 in the office every week, rest at home. Basically the freedom to go in as needed/wanted, but not the obligation.
I would imagine it matters a lot the company and WFH dynamic. If you’re one of a few WFH, and most others are office based, I think that’s hard for both the employee and the company. It’s also a lot easier to go WFH after having built up in-office relationships.
Just told my boss I’m leaving. He was good about it - “you have to do what’s best for you”, “I’m happy when people find something they’re happy with”, etc. I suspect he probably agrees it wasn’t working well overall, something hasn’t been in sync. I’ll stay 2 weeks and don’t expect an effort to keep me. Actually feel a lot better after the convo - I get really anxious for a call like that.