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Poll: Why are people leaving their jobs?

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301–310 of 773 posts

Re: Poll: Why are people leaving their jobs?

#301

I am looking to leave soon to increase how challenging my work is and gain new skills. Honestly intended to leave my current role 8 months ago, but my leadership suffered a huge wave of departures and I didn't want to leave my employer out to dry with no Director level leadership. Since then I had the opportunity to hire 11 new team members in the "new-normal" era of remote hiring, which I feel has increased my skill…

> I favor iterative approaches that are tightly coupled to customer feedback.

I have the same issue with my current company. My best work has been done without a bunch of layers of management, just give me a user with a problem that needs solving and let us work together on it.

Re: Poll: Why are people leaving their jobs?

#302
post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the old generation really bought into this, but the new generation knows it's a load of bull. The poll makes it pretty obvious that compensation is the biggest reason folks leave, and it's the thinking of the old generation who doesn't know how to retain talent (they do, but they keep throwing pizza parties / sending out merch instead). It's a real "it can't be helped" mentality around retention.

The poll is messing with your way of thinking. Look at the poll and think on this statement: "The majority of people leave a company because they are unsatisfied, not because of compensation." The poll statistically verifies the above statement as true. Its just divided in a way that makes you think compensation is the main reason. Still what the poll does show is that compensation is a significant factor, more than…

To rephrase: Compensation has fewer total than the others combined. E.g. people leave more often for non-compensation reasons.

(Added in case you were being mis-interpreted, e.g. the downvotes. I think its an important and insightful point)

Re: Poll: Why are people leaving their jobs?

#303
post #250
post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Haven't looked at it in years but I remember Getting to Yes as being a great little book on negotiation. Maybe there are better books out there but I found it a good place to start. There are a number of other things in there too. For example, you may not have the same priorities as the person you're negotiating with.

I'd recommend _Never Split The Difference_, by former Chief FBI Hostage Negotiator Chris Voss. Very fun read and widely applicable. Spoiler: His advice is not to strong-arm, but to build trust with your counterpart.

Hostage negotiation is a game played once between parties. Most of daily life situations are repeated games, in which dynamics are different. I found that the author was biased by their experience in one-off games and their suggestions wouldn’t generalize well into repeated games. Unfortunately, there is no acknowledgement of this until the very end of the book. Still a good read though.

Re: Poll: Why are people leaving their jobs?

#304
post #70

My old boss Eric Carlsen used to say, nobody left because of money. They may get more money if they change jobs. But they start looking because they're unhappy. So when somebody asked for more money, he'd start by asking what was bothering them.

That's a pervasive story that lots of people want to be true, but I can tell you firsthand it's not something you should bank on. I've definitely left jobs because money and only money. I've definitely watched co-workers and friends do the same. There's definitely a ratio of job satisfaction / money where more money won't cancel out a toxic work environment (there's no reasonable amount of money that would persuade m…

A thing that has contributed to this is that public company executives are required to disclose their compensation. So it becomes really easy for employees to know if they’re being shafted if execs are being given a ton of rewards while their own salary is frozen.

Re: Poll: Why are people leaving their jobs?

#305

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A good human being would say, "i'm not allowed to say this but...". Which good managers will do. You're on the path to leaving anyway.

If that got out, said manager may be marked by the bosses for opening Pandora's box. When people have dependents and mortgages on the line, "good" has very little to do with it. Sad but true.

A good manager would still make clear that their hands are tied and this is all they can offer at this time. They will have to check with upper mgmt for any further options depending on the response to their current offer.

There are a million legal/safe ways to say that the negotiation is not over just keep pushing.

It could also hint that the manager thought the commenter was one of those social cripples that cannot handle negotiations professionally but it doesn't sound to be the case.

Re: Poll: Why are people leaving their jobs?

#306

Rather than look for another job I retired at 63.5. My job was long hours, high stress, high visibility, continuous deadlines and changes that never ended at a large non FAANG company. Compensation was OK (not FAANG but OK for where I am). Everything I or my team shipped worked great; but lots of things with these challenges never shipped for political/idiotic reasons. So much budget was wasted on Exec whims and fant…

I'm fortunate enough to be paying off my house next year and strongly considering an early retirement. Granted I'm in my 40's, I just yearn to work on something I can poor my heart and soul into even if it fails. My dream is to write a video game and the only thing prohibiting that is lack of time. I've done an IPO, I've worked for FAANG/MAMAA, I've done keynotes at conferences, I've been an IC, Manager, Director. I feel like I've got everything I've ever wanted out my career and I don't know where else there is to go. At this point I just want to take everything I've learned and apply it to something I own, full time. That's the next dream I guess. It's a scary thought, but working for other people for another 20 years seems just as scary.

Re: Poll: Why are people leaving their jobs?

#307
post #250
post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Haven't looked at it in years but I remember Getting to Yes as being a great little book on negotiation. Maybe there are better books out there but I found it a good place to start. There are a number of other things in there too. For example, you may not have the same priorities as the person you're negotiating with.

I'd recommend _Never Split The Difference_, by former Chief FBI Hostage Negotiator Chris Voss. Very fun read and widely applicable. Spoiler: His advice is not to strong-arm, but to build trust with your counterpart.

Also, I saw a lot of parallels with Playing to Win by David Sirlin [0], about competitive gaming.

One of Sirlin's points is that the most common reason casual players lose is because they restrict themselves to a subset of legal moves. I.e. they play the game they think exists, or they think is "fair", rather than the rules as written.

Transposed into negotiation, Voss feels very similar to me. Whereas most people get distracted with the minutiae, or their feelings about the negotiation, or 1,000 other non-rule parts... he treats negotiation as game.

Not in the sense of "fun" or "lighthearted" (he worked for the FBI!), but in the sense of understanding all the actual rules, and using those rules to win.

[0] https://www.sirlin.net/ptw

Re: Poll: Why are people leaving their jobs?

#310

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ha. I've heard that for 20 years. And as an employer I don't see it ending soon. There's a boom right now, for sure, and wages are up, but I heard that in 2000 too. There was a slightly drop for a year or 2, but it's been steady upwards movement since then.

Steady growth is fine. The growth is not steady as of late, things have spiked in short order.

Tech companies are making record profits, more and more of the economy is being digitized and automated… there’s been a tech gold rush in the pandemic, giving tech companies the ability to compensate better than they did before.
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