I’ve seen my fair share of counteroffers extended to candidates once they’ve told their employers of their intentions to leave.
Spoiler alert: they never work. At least not in the long run.
Don’t want to take my word for it? Here’s some stats:
- 45% of employers agree that counteroffers are not a long-term solution
- 80% of people who accept counteroffers leave or are terminated within 6 to 12 months
- Half of the people who accept counteroffers reinitiate their job search after 90 days
Given these statistics, you would think employers would use another retention strategy to keep their most valuable employees on board. But a lot don’t.
Let’s talk about why.
What is a Counteroffer?
A counteroffer is an offer from an employer to an employee, typically in response to an employee expressing his or her intentions to leave their current position. These offers can take various forms, but are usually salary increases and/or job title changes.
Counteroffers are typically given to employees that play an integral part in a company’s critical projects. In these cases, it’s actually cheaper to increase an employee’s salary by a few thousand dollars than lose hundreds of thousands of dollars due to a failed project.
More than Money
Though money may be part of an employee’s decision to leave their current position, there’s usually more to it than salary alone.
The top reason employees leave their jobs is due to toxic, unsupportive, and unhealthy workplace cultures. Lack of work-life balance and unhappiness with management are also top reasons people decide to leave their jobs.
Disclosing the reasons why one may believe their workplace is toxic, or why work-life balance cannot be achieved, or why one doesn’t like their manager can ultimately cause more workplace problems.
Don’t Accept the Counteroffer
Here at Brightwing, we almost always advise our candidates to turn down counteroffers. The bottom line is that, once you disclose any intentions to leave a company, your relationships with your boss, coworkers, and position will never be the same again.
I’ve worked with employers who have extended a counteroffer in response to an employee disclosing their intentions to leave, only to look for a replacement for that employee no less than 30 seconds after their office door has closed. Trust is hard to rebuild.
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