It’s Friday morning. You have the offer letter from your new employer in hand. It is now time to resign. You make an appointment to speak with your boss. Right after lunch, the two of you sit down, as you have many times before. This time feels different.
“Boss, I’m submitting my resignation. Here’s the letter. My last day will be two weeks from now.”
You watch the wave of emotion wash over her face. Confusion, concern, anger…and then you see her calm down.
“Let’s talk about this. Two weeks is a short amount of time to fill a job as important as yours. Would you consider giving us four weeks? You know your clients love you and this is going to be disruptive to our business. You haven’t told your team yet, have you?”
“No, I haven’t told anyone. I wanted you to be the first to know”
“Tell about your new job. What’s the company? What’s the job? What’s the offer?”
She’s your boss. You’ve worked well with her for five years. Without giving it more thought, you get excited and start sharing details about your new job and the increased compensation.
“That sounds interesting. Give me two hours to put together a plan.”
Two hours later, your boss asks you to join her in a meeting with her boss. Now, you are nervous. You’ve never had a meeting with Mr. Big Boss before.
“Welcome. Good to see you,” Mr. Big Boss says as he asks his assistant to get you a cup of coffee. “We should have had this conversation some time ago, but now is as good a time as any. Ms. Boss tells me you are thinking of resigning. Let’s talk about the future we have planned for you here at XYZ Company. Here’s the new job we have designed for you, and the increased compensation.”
You are a bit stunned. It’s the same job you were offered at the new company, and with additional compensation above the new offer. Had you known this was your future at XYZ Company, you never would have interviewed for your new job.
“Let’s tear up that resignation letter. Let’s call the new company and tell them you have reconsidered. Then let’s go grab a drink and celebrate your promotion.” Mr. Big Boss just asked you out for a drink. You are impressed. You pull out your phone to call and withdraw your acceptance. But should you?
This should not be a decision that you’re just now considering for the first time. Instead, you should prepare yourself for a counteroffer before you resign. Know what you want to do in case a counteroffer is made so you aren’t taken by surprise. In theory, counteroffers seem great. In practice, they seldom are. Here are three thoughts on counteroffers.
1. Counteroffers solve the employer’s problem, but not necessarily yours.
Resignations are disruptive. Your boss had a plan for how the work would get done, and you just threw a monkey wrench into it. Keeping you prevents an emergency. Keeping you is an immediate solution to an unplanned situation.
Before you accept a counteroffer, ask yourself these questions: Would your boss be offering you a promotion/raise if you hadn’t resigned? Are there hidden strings attached? Will your new position be implemented immediately, or are they asking for time to figure out who will do your old job? Did they really change your position, or did they just layer more work on top of your old job? Did they immediately increase your pay or did they defer it?
2. Counteroffers seldom address the reasons you searched for a new job.
You sought a new job for a reason. Remind yourself of what it was. Chances are the issues that concerned you still exist. Promoting you doesn’t magically solve any of those problems. If your primary motivation was compensation, then you should ask for a raise before you accept the new position. If compensation was not your greatest concern, then you must ask yourself if the additional compensation is worth staying for. Particularly, if your job exhausts you physically and/or emotionally, you will still be exhausted after the initial thrill of a larger paycheck wears off.
3. Counteroffers erode trust.
You managed to interview and land a new job without your boss knowing about it. Your resignation surprised her. As much as you have a right to look for your next opportunity and a responsibility to plan your career growth, you ambushed your boss. Your trusted relationship will never be the same.
There are many statistics floating around about how counteroffers don’t stick. Some articles say 70%, others say 85%, but either way, the consensus is most people who accept a counteroffer do not stay in the job much longer.
Raises or promotions given through counteroffers were delivered under duress. A company planning to promote you isn’t planning to surprise you. You will know when you are being groomed for promotion.
Your boss will not be more inclined to address your concerns once you accept the counteroffer. Your boss will grow to resent you for continuing to raise issues, for disrupting their plan, for delaying their bonus (that raise had to come from somewhere in the budget) or for causing resentment among other employees who thought they should have been considered for promotion.
Once your boss solves her immediate problem, the next step is to make certain the short term solution doesn’t upset long term plans. When she considers the increased compensation, the impact on other team members, and the possibility that they in turn will threaten to leave, her best option may be to restructure quickly by eliminating your job and laying you off.
If the counteroffer doesn’t address your concerns, erodes your relationship with your boss and coworkers and may lead to you leaving the job shortly anyway, why accept it?
Cheryl Bedard represents the best interests of candidates and clients. She identifies opportunities for success for talented executives and companies and reconciles hopes and dreams with reality.
