You’ve done the hard part. You’ve thought about leaving, updated your CV, applied for jobs, had the interviews, probably spent a few days checking your phone more often than you’d like to admit. Then you get the call. You’ve got the job. You hand in your notice, start thinking about what’s next and then your current employer says: “What if we paid you more to stay?” And suddenly the decision you thought you’d already made isn’t quite so simple. If you’ve found yourself Googling “should I accept a counter offer?”, our first bit of is this…
Don’t answer straight away.
A counter offer is an attempt by your existing employer to persuade you to stay after you’ve told them you’re leaving. And it isn’t always “We’ll give you another £3,000.”
It could be more money, a promotion, different responsibilities, greater flexibility, additional benefits, or a combination of several things.
Sometimes it can be exactly the conversation you needed your employer to have with you. Other times, it’s just a plaster to fix a crack. Working out which one you’re being offered is the important bit.
Go Back To The Reason You Started Looking
Be completely honest with yourself. Was it purely about the money? Or was the money just one thing on a much longer list? Maybe you don’t have the flexibility you now need. You’ve stopped progressing. You don’t feel appreciated. You want more responsibility. The commute is doing your head in. You want to learn something new.
Or you’ve been there for a long time and you’re just ready for a change.
Whatever the reason, has the counter offer actually changed it?
That’s where we’d be careful about allowing a bigger salary to make the decision for you. And extra couple of grand might feel fantastic when you see the new number written down. But if you’re driving into the same workplace three months later, doing the same job, dealing with the same frustrations that made you open the job sites in the first place…
Will the extra money still be enough?
But What If Money WAS The Reason?
This is where we might disagree with some of the blanket advice around counter offers. You’ll often hear “Never accept a counter offer.” We don’t think it’s that simple.
If you genuinely enjoy your job, like the people, like the company, have opportunities ahead of you and the main reason you looked elsewhere was money, then yes, a counter offer deserves serious consideration.
Maybe your salary simply hadn’t kept pace with the market. Or your employer didn’t realise how strongly you felt about it. Maybe losing you has prompted a conversation that should probably have happened six months ago. People and businesses aren’t perfect. Sometimes it takes someone handing in their notice for a problem to finally get addressed.
But we’d still ask: “Why did it take your resignation for this offer to appear?”
Not as a ‘Gotcha’ question. But something worth understanding. If you’ve asked for a pay review several times and repeatedly been told there’s no budget, only for another £5,000 to materialise when you resign, it’s reasonable to ask what’s changed.
Don’t Compare Salary With Salary
We see this mistake too! Your new job offers £35,000. Your counter offer £37,000. Easy Stay where you are. Except… is it?
Compare the actual jobs.
Look at:
- Basic salary and realistic overtime
- Shift pattern and working hours
- Travel time and cost
- Holiday entitlement and benefits
- Training and qualifications
- Progression
- Job security
- Working environment
- Responsibilities
- Management and team
- What you’ll actually be doing every day
And then there’s another question we’d add to this.
Which job would you choose if they both paid exactly the same?
Take the money out of the equation for a minute, and see which opportunity you’re naturally drawn towards. Then put the money back in.
Remember, The New Company Chose You Too
There’s another side to this you might forget when a counter offer is given. You’ve probably been through the application, the phone conversation, the interview, maybe a second interview. The new employer has met you, considered other candidates and decided, “We want this person.” That’s worth something to think about.
You’ve also presumably seen something in them that made you say ‘yeah, i could work here.’
So before turning down the new opportunity because your current employer has put more money on the table, remember what made you excited enough to accept it in the first place.
Were you looking forward to learning something new? Starting somewhere different? Was it a better environment? A step up? Better hours? A company you really liked? A technology or machine you’ve wanted experience on?
Don’t let the familiarity of your current job erase everything that attracted you to the new one.
“But staying feels safer.”
Of course it does! You know the people, where you park, how the place works. There’s comfort in knowing what each day looks like.
A new job has a lot of unknowns attached to it. And when you’ve got a mortgage, rent, children, bills or anyone else relying on your income, those unknowns can feel considerably bigger.
We’d never tell a candidate to ignore that. But, don’t confuse familiarity with security.
You’ve already gone through the process of finding another opportunity for a reason.
Don’t let nerves about starting somewhere new make the decision for you either.
Ask What The Counter offer Actually Promises
Ask what that progression looks like.
If you’re being promised “We’ll get you onto more training.”
Ask what training and when.
If responsibilities are changing, understand exactly what’s changing, and what’s expected. If they’ve agreed different hours or flexibility, clarify how that will work.
And if those things are important to your decision, we’d want them properly confirmed rather than relying on a vague conversation on the shop floor.
Our View On Counter Offers?
We’re recruiters. You could probably guess which answer would financially benefit us!
But that’s exactly why we’re going to say this…
Sometimes staying is the right decision.
If your current employer has genuinely addressed the reason you wanted to leave and, after properly comparing both opportunities, staying is still what you want, then we’d rather you make that decision now than start a new job you never really wanted.
But equally…
Don’t let a counter offer make you forget why you wanted to leave.
That’s the bit we’d really want you to think about.
Go back to the version of you who hadn’t been offered the extra money yet.
The one updating the CV. Scrolling through the jobs. Sitting in the interview. The one who felt excited when they were offered something new.
What were you looking for?
Has your current employer genuinely given you that.
So, Should I Accept A Counter Offer?
There isn’t a universal yes or no. If you’re deciding should I accept a counter offer, ask yourself:
Why did I start looking for another job? Has that actually changed? If both jobs paid exactly the same, which would I choose? Am I staying because I want to, or because leaving suddenly feels scary? What will my career look like in each company a year from now? Would I have been happy with this counter offer if it had been made before I resigned?
And finally. If i stay, am I likely to start looking again in six months?
Sit with that one. Accepting a counter offer isn’t about choosing between £X here and £Y there.
You’re choosing where you’re going to spend a very large chunk of your life.
If you’re caught between a new offer and a counter offer and genuinely don’t know which way to go, talk it though with your recruiter. A decent recruiter shouldn’t make the decision for you. They should help you ask the questions that make the decision clearer.