Mercury Hampton | Counter offers and reasons for leaving – How they interlink.

This blog is for both candidates and clients of Mercury Hampton.

Candidates;-

So you’ve just completed three rounds of interviews for what initially looked like your ‘perfect’ job. After negotiating to get the best possible package you finally pluck up the courage to resign. To your surprise your current employer wants to make you a counter offer. Is this happening to you? Are you considering the counter offer? Here’s some reasons why you should strongly reconsider.

57% of employees accept counter offers made to them, in most cases this doesn’t resolve their initial reasons for wanting to move positions.
Data shows that 80% of candidates who accept a counter offer from their current employer end up leaving within 6 months.
Only 38% of hiring managers reported not making counter offers at all.

Reasons for leaving a position is key and will ultimately determine your resistance to a counter offer. Is it worth putting up with that boss you dislike for 6 months extra pay before you decide you’ve made a mistake?

No matter where you are in your professional journey, leaving your current job to climb the ranks can be a minefield and receiving a counter offered by your current employer can sometimes be tempting. However, please consider the statistics above and always remember your ‘true’ reason for wanting to leave, you will find that in most cases a counter offer will not solve your issue and likely make matters worse!

Clients;-

We cannot stress the importance of understanding a candidate’s true motivations for leaving their position. It provides a chance to assess the integrity of the candidate! It can determine lots of outcomes such as fit within your culture, attitude, behaviour, their values and many more. Gaining a true understanding can also help you determine the candidate’s likelihood of accepting a counter offer. The most common reasons for leaving a job are;

Lack of job satisfaction
Management’s recognition of employee job performance
Micromanagement, lack of guidance or autonomy
Company culture misalignment
Lack of training and development
Progression opportunities
Commute, travel time or working hours or very little flexibility.
Opportunities to use their skills and abilities
Company performance and instability
Salary and benefits

On some occasions you can take the candidate through a vigorous recruitment process covering all the bases above yet still find something has been missed.

For example, Susanna Dinnage was offered a job to be the next Chief Executive of the Premier League, this would appear to millions to be the dream job with a seven figure package. However, after long negotiations it was released in the press that she was no longer going to take up the position and Susanna would rather stay in her current role at Discovery.

This demonstrates that no matter how successful your company is, reasons for leaving are absolutely quintessential. When recruiting, a candidates reasons for leaving is a key factor in assessing overall alignment to the position that you are hiring. Get this wrong and your counter offer risk will spiral out of control!

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(Sources www.thebalancecareers.com and www.recruitment-software.co.uk)