17 ms·

Ask HN: How do you decide on when to leave/switch job?

80 points by palerdot 9y ago

Please elaborate on your reasons rather than one liners like boredom, pay hike, own business/consultancy, co-worker problem

neversorry 9y ago
For me these have been the reasons in the past: - New job offers me a significant improvement in my standard of living. Twice, it's been the offer to move to a different country. It gives me a chance to experience different places and have better living conditions. - I stop learning or feel like I am not adding any more value to my role. I start feeling stagnant and worry about future.
ainiriand 9y ago
When I am bored with what I do. Let me explain a bit more. Currently I work in php but I feel that what I do is not a challenge anymore. I've been doing php for 8 years now and I get the same problems over and over. I want to switch to something that challenges me.
Insanity 9y ago
Not learning anymore. The previous job I was at was a rather boring one after a few months. The company had already encountered most of the customizations clients requested and most of the new projects ended up being solely copy-paste work from older projects. This meant writing no new code but just applying older patch files and tweaking some config like the header and footer of the website. Since I was not learning anything new anymore at this job it felt like a drag going to work. I started interviewing for some other companies and one thing I wanted to be sure of was to have a job where I would actually write code instead of tweaking some config files all day long. I have enjoyed every day at work since I decided to leave that company.
- tombert 9y ago
  +1 to this. The most important part of any job for me is "do I feel like I'm smarter at the end of the day because of this job?" I had a job at an advertising agency, which, by most objective measures was a pretty decent job. However, I felt like about 95% of my work was "copy-paste, tweak-slightly". Eventually it got to a point where I wrote a script that could generate most of my work, and I realized that it was time to move on.
- gargravarr 9y ago
  Agreed. A job needs to be mutually beneficial or you'll wind up hating every day of it. I'm at a stage where I have learned a lot, but I find a lot of resistance to implementing my ideas for political reasons - e.g. in replacing our ticketing system, I drew up a proposal for something we already had licenses for, would integrate with our systems and provided features our developers would want. An unrelated team in America had been trialling some expensive software in isolation. I learned the software I was proposing, taught colleagues how to use the prototype, got positive feedback, got licensing sorted (free)... and my idea was swept aside because it wasn't the expensive software the guy in charge (who had approved my prototype) had already decided to go with. Figured then there was little point in me learning stuff that would benefit this company because decisions have already been made, so I'm moving on.
sunasra 9y ago
1) When I dont allowed to contribute in innovation or my inputs are being ignore by Manager/Leaders. 2) People leave managers not companies
gregoriol 9y ago
Best thing I have on this is a quote from Steve Jobs : "When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: "If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you'll most certainly be right." It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: "If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?" And whenever the answer has been "No" for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.""
- stult 9y ago
  On a related note, I hate how that Aurelius quote is always cut off. The full quotation is, "Live every day as if it were your last: without frenzy, without apathy, without pretense." The point isn't that you should go party and have fun and not plan for the future, which the additional "without" clauses clarify. Aurelius meant that you should adopt an emotional state of peace and firm dedication. Because most people really would not party on their last day, if they knew. They would go about their business calmly, taking care of the most important priorities, making amends and sharing time with loved ones, ensuring that their affairs were in order and their conscience clean, and appreciating every detail of every moment as if it were infinitely precious. Nothing would upset them unduly because they would know nothing will affect them anymore soon. Similarly, you probably wouldn't want to wake up and go to an awful job. If doing your job makes the world a better place, you can justify going because you know you are building a legacy, even with your final moments. If you're passionate about it, you can justify it. If the job allows you to provide for your loved ones, you would go even on your last day. So Jobs like many others misunderstood the quote out of context but reached the conclusion Aurelius intended anyway. And that conclusion is good advice! If you're just doing the minimum to skate by, not really thriving, you're probably selling yourself short. Unless you have some other reason for working that gives meaning to your life (e.g. kids, funding a passion project/hobby, religion), it's just not worth going to a shitty job just for the paycheck.
  - mxuribe 9y ago
    These are some great comments; thanks for these!
Pica_soO 9y ago
When office politics become more important then the product and the customer. If somebody comes in, lifts his leg to mark territory, you know the territory has just become worthless and its time to move on.
- tonyedgecombe 9y ago
  It's very hard to avoid in anything but the smallest companies.
  - Pica_soO 9y ago
    Its the signal of a dying creature. Once office politics are waged and won, hierarchy's are established- suddenly, communicating ideas openly for people only interested in the product and the customer - and by doing that jumping over hierarchy's is a criminal offense - the last terminal stage is reached. The duration of the process may vary- the outcome does not.
    - lostcolony 9y ago
      The vast majority of corporate america is a dying creature then. The problem is that the vast majority of the upstarts who will eat them will also die, -and- even the winners may not usurp anything for 20+ years. At which point they, too, will likely start 'dying'. I think you exaggerate the diagnosis. As with a patient with a disease, you have to modify treatment. The reality is that learning to deal with office politics is an important skill to have. It's really easy to say "politics" with a look of scorn on your face...and then turn around and read about 'influencers' and 'how to win friends and influence people' and '7 habits of highly effective people' and etc, and think "oh, hey, figuring out how to learn what people are thinking and appeal to people's needs is super important". They're the same thing. 'Jumping over hierarchy is a criminal offense' - sometimes yes, sometimes no. The point you miss is that with enough people, hierarchy can be necessary. If you've ever been in a position where you have to make strategic decisions, you -have- to delegate. In fact, many of the things that make me feel good as a developer, such as being empowered to make decisions (beyond just the code, but in terms of features and things), require someone else to trust me to make those decisions (i.e., delegation). "Well, our whole team makes the decisions"; fine, are there other teams working on other things? Do you all make your own decisions? Because if so, you have delegated responsibilities to those other teams, just as they have with you. If not, then people who are less informed than you are getting a voice, and that's just unnecessary noise. As soon as delegation occurs, I don't -want- people crossing over unless it's incredibly important. Same situation, of multiple teams; do you want someone on another team coming to you to complain about issues on their team? Of course not; that's for their team to fix. Unless the issue is something so bad it threatens you and your team, you don't want to hear about it. In a hierarchy, the same thing happens. I delegate to someone and entrust them with seeing it to its success; I do not WANT someone re-burdening me with that problem, -unless- it's vital I be informed, and that person knows I am not being informed. Yes, this can break. People can start valuing the hierarchy more than what it's attempting to achieve, I grant you. But as often as not what I've seen are people jumping up the hierarchy to complain about things that are not sufficiently urgent. And part of that is perspective; what is going to bother someone higher in the hierarchy is not necessarily what bothers someone lower down. And yes, understanding that, and knowing what to do about it, is "politics", but also, alternatively, it's "empathy and influence". Or, put another way, what's the difference between 'manipulating' and 'influencing'? That's the difference between 'politics' and 'organizational intellect'. It's trying to achieve one's goals dealing with a single person, vs trying to achieve one's goals while dealing with multiple. Because when dealing with multiple people, there are always politics, and you can't merely throw up your hands and decide to never deal with it. I wish you could, I'm not always good enough to win the battles I need to win...but I recognize that it's not something I can just avoid.
richardknop 9y ago
You have listed the most common reasons in your question (pay hike being the number one reason why people switch jobs and it's a correct reason). I would add another possible reason. If you get an option to go work to a different country and the company will take care of your visa and offer you attractive relocation package. I think it can often be worth it to gain some international experience. You can always come back in few years.
simplysh 9y ago
It's when I feel like I'm standing still. If I don't see how I can progress or improve myself then I have nothing left to gain there.
ravigupta 9y ago
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quitteraway 9y ago
I just encountered this 2 days ago. When the company decides to adopt a new (to them) technology stack that is not part of where I see my future self.
- maze-le 9y ago
  New tech stacks can be learned. If it fits the development and product, why not? Even if you have a personal dislike for it, you could still learn from it. I find in-fighting, interpersonal quibbles and ridiculing of co-workers far more insufferable.
  - pier25 9y ago
    What about moving to old stacks like... PHP?
    - zelos 9y ago
      Then start calling recruiters like your life depends on it.
    - thehardsphere 9y ago
      PHP's problem isn't its age, but that it was intended to do a very specific task in a very specific context, and people who came to it later lack a fundamental understanding of this. If, somehow through magic, PHP was invented today, it would still have this problem, which is the root of most of the other problems with PHP. I only mention this because some "old stacks" are good, in the sense that they are heavily battle tested, and people still use them because they've been successful over a number of years. You have to be able to use your judgement as a professional to determine whether the move to the "old stack" stems from a good reason or not before deciding to jump. (I personally would jump if I someone said "let's use PHP instead," but I don't think I would be in a job where PHP could be considered an alternative in the first place. Your situation could be different.)
  - copperx 9y ago
    I've found that learning new tech is orders of magnitude simpler than whiners on the internet make it seem. I put off learning Rails years ago because post after post talked about how hard it was to get it right, how the person behind CDBaby totally failed to make Rails work for him, etc., etc. Then I sat down to learn it, imagining it would be a long month, but I learned the basics in 2 days. The exact same thing happened with React. I put it off for so long, thinking it was so hard after reading so many posts. It turns out that it's pretty straightforward. There's still an element of fear before approaching anything new. A voice in my head says "maybe I'm not smart enough anymore to understand this new tech, which looks like it was engineered by aliens." I need to remind myself that I have been able to understand and master everything I have attempted. But the posts out there make it seem learning something new is very hard.
mattbgates 9y ago
I've written a few articles on it.. one included a tyrant boss I had to escape and the other was simply outgrowing your company. Check those articles out here: http://www.confessionsoftheprofessions.com/the-opportunity/ http://www.confessionsoftheprofessions.com/the-opportunity/ http://www.confessionsoftheprofessions.com/outgrowing-company/ http://www.confessionsoftheprofessions.com/outgrowing-compan...
smkellat 9y ago
When your co-workers start getting routinely carted out by emergency workers for cardiac distress, seizures, and other problems developed since they started the job. A job can grind you down and I'm watching my current one eat some co-workers alive. There are limits to how much stress you can put a person through routinely.
- revmoo 9y ago
  Good good, where the fuck do you work?
mattchamb 9y ago
I am currently in this situation. The company ran out of money and cant afford to pay us. That is a good indicator to find something else.
- charsifood 9y ago
  This is equivalent to looking for the exit when the ceiling has already collapsed.
pjc50 9y ago
I'm reminded of a former co-worker that said he could write down the reasons why he'd eventually leave a job after two months, even if he stayed for years longer. Not always true and sometimes change is forced on us, but a useful insight. Moving has a cost, in time and effort, and a risk. You can look at the benefits of the new job (and likely downsides!), and weigh them against the current one plus the cost of searching and moving.
nstart 9y ago
Life stability. Happiness. In that order. The balance between these two is something I need to maintain in order for me to say whether or not it's time to switch the job. Happiness is a lot of things. This is a personal compass. For me it's a combination of doing work that's interesting, working with a company whose mission I believe in personally, while having a good life balance. If I say I'm signing out and saying bye at a particular reasonable time on any regular(!) day, and that's respected, that's good enough for me. Life stability means do I have the means to support myself and those around me reasonably well. This is actually the primary point Sometimes the jobs that make me happy might not pay me all that great, but if I'm at a point in life where maybe other investments are paying off well, or I just don't need to have that much money, I can take the job. On the other hand I can have a job that pays me lots of money but I'm really really not happy with it. But sometimes it's necessary to suck it up until another opportunity comes to me. I can't just flip the bird to life's responsibilities and quit because I'm not happy. Sure maybe I readjust my needs to make stability to look cheaper, but the point is that all basics MUST be covered at all times. Real world examples: Second job of mine. The company vision had changed considerably since I joined it. After a merger it became less about innovation and while I don't say it's bad, I definitely didn't agree with it. At the time it was just my wife and I living in a not so expensive apartment and we had very few other responsibilities. So I quit. Admittedly to a slightly better paying job but the priority at that time was happiness since I had achieves baseline life stability (and a bit more too). Didn't like the new job at all. Burnt me out and after 6 months I left to a new job. This was paying me less than my second job so quite a dip in earnings at the time. But it was exciting, and I loved so much of it. Again I was just about fine with stability since my wife was also working so the primary balancing factor was happiness. 6 months later though, my wife and I were expecting our son. This flipped the equation completely. My wife really was hoping she could exit the workplace so she could spend time with our baby when he was born and this meant a big change in stability requirements for me. I actually went back to the same business I had my third job with. It was a new product they were building so I expected it to be different this time around. That turned out to be wrong. I won't lie. I hated it. But I sucked it up to the point of near depression. Since the balance was starting to fall out of place, I hunted another job and I hope I've found my perfect place at Buffer. Right now it's everything I could ask for and has all my guiding principles in place. Hope that lengthy exposition of my career helped out :D Side note - Leaving the company I worked at twice was a hard one and led to a lot of tension. I felt horrible about bits of it, but I couldn't let my personal mental health deteriorate any further. I regret that I had to put the company through that as it almost felt exploitative (that was never my intention though). We parted on lukewarm terms but now have better relationships which mended slowly (not fully) over time.
menckenjr 9y ago
When the calendar becomes more important than the quality.
gargravarr 9y ago
What I call the Dilbert-o-meter. When you start noticing too many Dilbert comics acted out in real life, it's time to leave.
- le-mark 9y ago
  The Gervais principle illuminates a lot of what happens in large organizations. If you ever feel like what you do matters less than how you're perceived, then you're absolutely correct [1]. So far as when to leave, I try to keep track of the health of the division (in a Big Dumb Corp) or company (smaller companies). If the business area I'm in is no longer a focus for the company (opex vs capex) or not meeting targets (whatever they maybe; sales goals, customer retention, etc) then that's a strong signal to start looking. A few other warning signs: churn in leadership, senior people leaving. When you see the organizational knowledge base packing up and leaving that's a bad sign. Currently, I've chosen to work in a Dilbert wonderland. This Big Dumb Corp is so dumb it's astounding. I'm here and staying (for now) because the division I'm in is a growth area, my manager is cool, I have one semi interesting long term project to work on, and since they are so big and dumb, they're paying 10-15% above market rate on salary and benefits. [1] https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2009/10/07/the-gervais-principle-or-the-office-according-to-the-office/ https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2009/10/07/the-gervais-principle-...
- mrweasel 9y ago
  That's a pretty good rule. I worked at a telco and a co-worker pointed out that the seemed very likely that Scott Adams had hidden cameras and microphones in our offices. When Dilbert-like rules and decisions start showing up to frequently, it's time to leave. Generally speaking I don't think you should go work for companies with more that 50 - 100 employees. After that stupidity start showing up way too frequently.
  - gargravarr 9y ago
    Before I started my first job, the summer I left uni, I read the entire archive from 1989 to 2012 and laughed at it. When my job started a few months later, I was absolutely floored when some of the stuff I saw there played out exactly as the comic. I quit after 3 months. I could not get a single thing done in less than 3 weeks there.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
Nursie 9y ago
When there's not a "project" in sight and I have little control over the direction of my work. But then I'm a contractor, and I change up to every few months. Or weeks.
gbajson 9y ago
When I see that smarter guys are leaving.
- lllr_finger 9y ago
  As long as you're aware that this may not happen if your org is experiencing Dead Sea Effect. Having just gone through this situation, it can be challenging to understand when you're bitter and when you really are surrounded by less-than-ideal developers. Imposter Syndrome complicates this, as well.
kelsiq1 9y ago
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polote 9y ago
When I feel like I can't bring as much to the company as I would like, and either coworkers, managers, company's culture prevents me to so or that I don't feel rewarded for my skills
34090doood9 9y ago
What I'd like to know is how to decide when to leave/switch careers.
ulfw 9y ago
When a company starts focusing the majority of its energy inwards: politics, favoritism, infighting, thinking of how to look good internally, bullshit stats and presentations, you name it - but very little time spend on the customer or the product.
- gargravarr 9y ago
  One of my reasons for leaving is that I'm watching our internal systems dissolve - some of the stuff I have responsibility for is hosted on rickety old systems that are long due for replacement, but management refuses to spend any money (or allocate time to rebuild them) because they're not customer-facing. Painful underinvestment for political reasons will be the death of this company. The IT team are fighting fires on a daily basis, and a major outage would probably have the 4 of them walking out (yes, 4 people supporting a global company). I've wisely decided to move on before it all melts.
eru 9y ago
You always keep looking, and when something sufficiently better comes up, you switch. Get offers in time, so you have some on hand in need.
zavulon 9y ago
If on a Sunday afternoon you get a sinking feeling of despair about having to go to work tomorrow, it's time to leave.
thehardsphere 9y ago
If you're having bourbon for breakfast to cope with the current death march, you should have left months ago.
alkonaut 9y ago
Just switch often until you are sufficiently paid and found one that doesn't suffer from dysfunctions like employee/manager churn. Then use the capital you built up to work less, focusing on other things in life than work. Every time you switch you have to prove yourself again, you'll have to prove you are worthy the perks (working from home etc). My recipe was switching around and then back to my first employer later in my career. A place I knew had good climate where I could stay 5-10 years with ease.
borplk 9y ago
If we collect all the reasons in this thread together it rules out a significant majority of companies. Just saying.
bb88 9y ago
I have a simple rule. If you're already seriously contemplating leaving, then it's time to leave. Because typically, it's only going to get worse from there. Chris Dixon once posted something along the lines of this: "If you think you're going to fire someone six months from now, you should fire them now." I believe that if you think things will get worse 6 months from now, then leave now.
- cardosof 9y ago
  +1. My father always says "when you're thinking about getting out of the boat, you're already out". Meaning, if you were 'in the boat', you would be thinking of fixing it.
dano 9y ago
If you find yourself doing maintenance work, move on. There is nothing wrong with maintenance work, it is valuable and gives the company the ability to service its clients. However, if you are no longer able to improve the process and that is what you were doing before, move along. Maintenance work is a big signal, don't ignore it.
lmilcin 9y ago
When either of these is true, I quit my job: - I can't benefit the company I work for anymore, - I feel I have stopped learning/advancing in my current position, - I have stopped feeling satisfaction from my accomplishments.
nunez 9y ago
TL;DR: The first few job changes I've made were, in large part, due to two things: 1. me trying to find a job in NYC that would allow for a seamless transition to TX while preserving my compensation and job responsibilities, and 2. Finding a job that will accelerate my transition into a senior management or technical sales role. It took me a few years to find a job that met goal (1) (I'm actually making more now than I did in NYC by a healthy margin), and I have a strong feeling that my current job will really put the gas on goal (2). Longer: There were also minor reasons behind me switching roles: * Job 1 -> Job 2: Lots of micromanaging and process that made it difficult to do real engineering. Job 2 was much more fun and provided free food and a wear-what-you-want policy. Also, $20k pay increase, which was a deciding factor. * Job 2 -> Job 3: Potential of moving to Houston at Job 3. Job 2 was amazing but I felt like there was no way of growing my career vertically unless I wanted to become a Linux admin (which I, ironically, became anyway, at least of sorts) or quant (a very high bar to hit, at least at the time). $5k pay increase was not a factor. * Job 3 -> Job 4: No opportunities in Houston outside of tech support with Job 3. Also, Google was Job 4; no way I was turning that down. They also had an office in Austin. $30k salary cut front loaded by a sign-on bonus and RSUs; opportunity to work at Google outweighed this. * Job 4 -> Job 5: No relo opportunities available on the short-term (and very unlikely long term). The $35,000 pay cut also hurt over time despite sign-on and peer bonuses. I didn't stay long enough to vest my RSUs, which would have made up for most of the loss. Also didn't feel like I fit with the team well. Very different working/communication style that wasn't for me (it felt very isolated). I kind-of like being in a party atmosphere; open space, lots of noise, events all of the time, etc. My team didn't have any of that; very nice, but quiet, bunch of folks. Also didn't like how far I was from the money and how arguably meaningless the work felt, despite the work being really good engineering overall. (Google makes its money on Ads. I was in Corp Eng maintaining non-prod app servers.) I also ALSO didn't like how you effectively HAD to move to Mountain View or stay in NYC to advance (most of the senior folks are in MTV) and how it took many many years to make it into management at a salary that's slightly below market (even though RSU reloads effectively offset that). Also, Job 5 restored most of my lost salary ($30k pay increase, was a deciding factor). * Job 5 -> Job 6: LOVED that place, but it was time to move to TX (couldn't take NYC anymore) and Job 5 wouldn't allow it despite having a sales office in Austin. (My boss and I tried to make an extended eng team there; CTO wasn't having it. She was nice, though.) ($10k pay cut but slightly over $10k gained from not having to pay income or state/city taxes. It was a minor factor. I would've seen more of that had I not fucked up my withholding that year!) * Job 6 -> Job 7 (current): Really enjoyed working there too. Learned that I LOVE LOVE LOVE to travel. Wanted more of a sales-like position. Tried really hard to get myself plugged into sales pursuits; I networked with damn nearly every sales person in the US org and offered to effectively be their PowerPoint person lol. Did a lot of blogging and solo pursuits alongside my engineering work. Was VERY vocal about work that me and my teams have accomplished. Getting to where I wanted wasn't happening quickly enough; also, company outlook was shaky. Also turns out that I was dramatically underpaid (despite it being a lateral salary move). $25k pay increase was a factor.
uberdru 9y ago
There's one simple rule. When all the executives start reading the same book, and try to get everyone in the company to read that book, run! If they announce the construction of a new HQ, you've already been there way too long.
- eru 9y ago
  Never work for a Christian (or Muslim etc) company?

80 points by palerdot 9y ago

Please elaborate on your reasons rather than one liners like boredom, pay hike, own business/consultancy, co-worker problem

neversorry 9y ago

For me these have been the reasons in the past: - New job offers me a significant improvement in my standard of living. Twice, it's been the offer to move to a different country. It gives me a chance to experience different places and have better living conditions. - I stop learning or feel like I am not adding any more value to my role. I start feeling stagnant and worry about future.

ainiriand 9y ago

When I am bored with what I do. Let me explain a bit more. Currently I work in php but I feel that what I do is not a challenge anymore. I've been doing php for 8 years now and I get the same problems over and over. I want to switch to something that challenges me.

Insanity 9y ago

Not learning anymore. The previous job I was at was a rather boring one after a few months. The company had already encountered most of the customizations clients requested and most of the new projects ended up being solely copy-paste work from older projects. This meant writing no new code but just applying older patch files and tweaking some config like the header and footer of the website. Since I was not learning anything new anymore at this job it felt like a drag going to work. I started interviewing for some other companies and one thing I wanted to be sure of was to have a job where I would actually write code instead of tweaking some config files all day long. I have enjoyed every day at work since I decided to leave that company.

tombert 9y ago
+1 to this. The most important part of any job for me is "do I feel like I'm smarter at the end of the day because of this job?" I had a job at an advertising agency, which, by most objective measures was a pretty decent job. However, I felt like about 95% of my work was "copy-paste, tweak-slightly". Eventually it got to a point where I wrote a script that could generate most of my work, and I realized that it was time to move on.
gargravarr 9y ago
Agreed. A job needs to be mutually beneficial or you'll wind up hating every day of it. I'm at a stage where I have learned a lot, but I find a lot of resistance to implementing my ideas for political reasons - e.g. in replacing our ticketing system, I drew up a proposal for something we already had licenses for, would integrate with our systems and provided features our developers would want. An unrelated team in America had been trialling some expensive software in isolation. I learned the software I was proposing, taught colleagues how to use the prototype, got positive feedback, got licensing sorted (free)... and my idea was swept aside because it wasn't the expensive software the guy in charge (who had approved my prototype) had already decided to go with. Figured then there was little point in me learning stuff that would benefit this company because decisions have already been made, so I'm moving on.

sunasra 9y ago

1) When I dont allowed to contribute in innovation or my inputs are being ignore by Manager/Leaders. 2) People leave managers not companies

gregoriol 9y ago

Best thing I have on this is a quote from Steve Jobs : "When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: "If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you'll most certainly be right." It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: "If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?" And whenever the answer has been "No" for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.""

stult 9y ago
On a related note, I hate how that Aurelius quote is always cut off. The full quotation is, "Live every day as if it were your last: without frenzy, without apathy, without pretense." The point isn't that you should go party and have fun and not plan for the future, which the additional "without" clauses clarify. Aurelius meant that you should adopt an emotional state of peace and firm dedication. Because most people really would not party on their last day, if they knew. They would go about their business calmly, taking care of the most important priorities, making amends and sharing time with loved ones, ensuring that their affairs were in order and their conscience clean, and appreciating every detail of every moment as if it were infinitely precious. Nothing would upset them unduly because they would know nothing will affect them anymore soon. Similarly, you probably wouldn't want to wake up and go to an awful job. If doing your job makes the world a better place, you can justify going because you know you are building a legacy, even with your final moments. If you're passionate about it, you can justify it. If the job allows you to provide for your loved ones, you would go even on your last day. So Jobs like many others misunderstood the quote out of context but reached the conclusion Aurelius intended anyway. And that conclusion is good advice! If you're just doing the minimum to skate by, not really thriving, you're probably selling yourself short. Unless you have some other reason for working that gives meaning to your life (e.g. kids, funding a passion project/hobby, religion), it's just not worth going to a shitty job just for the paycheck.
- mxuribe 9y ago
  These are some great comments; thanks for these!

Pica_soO 9y ago

When office politics become more important then the product and the customer. If somebody comes in, lifts his leg to mark territory, you know the territory has just become worthless and its time to move on.

tonyedgecombe 9y ago
It's very hard to avoid in anything but the smallest companies.
- Pica_soO 9y ago
  Its the signal of a dying creature. Once office politics are waged and won, hierarchy's are established- suddenly, communicating ideas openly for people only interested in the product and the customer - and by doing that jumping over hierarchy's is a criminal offense - the last terminal stage is reached. The duration of the process may vary- the outcome does not.
  - lostcolony 9y ago
    The vast majority of corporate america is a dying creature then. The problem is that the vast majority of the upstarts who will eat them will also die, -and- even the winners may not usurp anything for 20+ years. At which point they, too, will likely start 'dying'. I think you exaggerate the diagnosis. As with a patient with a disease, you have to modify treatment. The reality is that learning to deal with office politics is an important skill to have. It's really easy to say "politics" with a look of scorn on your face...and then turn around and read about 'influencers' and 'how to win friends and influence people' and '7 habits of highly effective people' and etc, and think "oh, hey, figuring out how to learn what people are thinking and appeal to people's needs is super important". They're the same thing. 'Jumping over hierarchy is a criminal offense' - sometimes yes, sometimes no. The point you miss is that with enough people, hierarchy can be necessary. If you've ever been in a position where you have to make strategic decisions, you -have- to delegate. In fact, many of the things that make me feel good as a developer, such as being empowered to make decisions (beyond just the code, but in terms of features and things), require someone else to trust me to make those decisions (i.e., delegation). "Well, our whole team makes the decisions"; fine, are there other teams working on other things? Do you all make your own decisions? Because if so, you have delegated responsibilities to those other teams, just as they have with you. If not, then people who are less informed than you are getting a voice, and that's just unnecessary noise. As soon as delegation occurs, I don't -want- people crossing over unless it's incredibly important. Same situation, of multiple teams; do you want someone on another team coming to you to complain about issues on their team? Of course not; that's for their team to fix. Unless the issue is something so bad it threatens you and your team, you don't want to hear about it. In a hierarchy, the same thing happens. I delegate to someone and entrust them with seeing it to its success; I do not WANT someone re-burdening me with that problem, -unless- it's vital I be informed, and that person knows I am not being informed. Yes, this can break. People can start valuing the hierarchy more than what it's attempting to achieve, I grant you. But as often as not what I've seen are people jumping up the hierarchy to complain about things that are not sufficiently urgent. And part of that is perspective; what is going to bother someone higher in the hierarchy is not necessarily what bothers someone lower down. And yes, understanding that, and knowing what to do about it, is "politics", but also, alternatively, it's "empathy and influence". Or, put another way, what's the difference between 'manipulating' and 'influencing'? That's the difference between 'politics' and 'organizational intellect'. It's trying to achieve one's goals dealing with a single person, vs trying to achieve one's goals while dealing with multiple. Because when dealing with multiple people, there are always politics, and you can't merely throw up your hands and decide to never deal with it. I wish you could, I'm not always good enough to win the battles I need to win...but I recognize that it's not something I can just avoid.

richardknop 9y ago

You have listed the most common reasons in your question (pay hike being the number one reason why people switch jobs and it's a correct reason). I would add another possible reason. If you get an option to go work to a different country and the company will take care of your visa and offer you attractive relocation package. I think it can often be worth it to gain some international experience. You can always come back in few years.

simplysh 9y ago

It's when I feel like I'm standing still. If I don't see how I can progress or improve myself then I have nothing left to gain there.

ravigupta 9y ago

Firstly saw the condition of the market and analyse which is the current scenario of jobs and vacancies.If it is good for you then secondly look for your interest in the area.Have some good quality suggestions from the experienced ones and finally when you want some changes in the growth rate.<a href="http://supportnumbers.net/yahoo-support/" http://supportnumbers.net/yahoo-support/" >yahoo support</a> http://emailsupportnumber.org/yahoo-mail-customer-support-number/ http://emailsupportnumber.org/yahoo-mail-customer-support-nu...

quitteraway 9y ago

I just encountered this 2 days ago. When the company decides to adopt a new (to them) technology stack that is not part of where I see my future self.

maze-le 9y ago
New tech stacks can be learned. If it fits the development and product, why not? Even if you have a personal dislike for it, you could still learn from it. I find in-fighting, interpersonal quibbles and ridiculing of co-workers far more insufferable.
- pier25 9y ago
  What about moving to old stacks like... PHP?
  - zelos 9y ago
    Then start calling recruiters like your life depends on it.
  - thehardsphere 9y ago
    PHP's problem isn't its age, but that it was intended to do a very specific task in a very specific context, and people who came to it later lack a fundamental understanding of this. If, somehow through magic, PHP was invented today, it would still have this problem, which is the root of most of the other problems with PHP. I only mention this because some "old stacks" are good, in the sense that they are heavily battle tested, and people still use them because they've been successful over a number of years. You have to be able to use your judgement as a professional to determine whether the move to the "old stack" stems from a good reason or not before deciding to jump. (I personally would jump if I someone said "let's use PHP instead," but I don't think I would be in a job where PHP could be considered an alternative in the first place. Your situation could be different.)
- copperx 9y ago
  I've found that learning new tech is orders of magnitude simpler than whiners on the internet make it seem. I put off learning Rails years ago because post after post talked about how hard it was to get it right, how the person behind CDBaby totally failed to make Rails work for him, etc., etc. Then I sat down to learn it, imagining it would be a long month, but I learned the basics in 2 days. The exact same thing happened with React. I put it off for so long, thinking it was so hard after reading so many posts. It turns out that it's pretty straightforward. There's still an element of fear before approaching anything new. A voice in my head says "maybe I'm not smart enough anymore to understand this new tech, which looks like it was engineered by aliens." I need to remind myself that I have been able to understand and master everything I have attempted. But the posts out there make it seem learning something new is very hard.

mattbgates 9y ago

I've written a few articles on it.. one included a tyrant boss I had to escape and the other was simply outgrowing your company. Check those articles out here: http://www.confessionsoftheprofessions.com/the-opportunity/ http://www.confessionsoftheprofessions.com/the-opportunity/ http://www.confessionsoftheprofessions.com/outgrowing-company/ http://www.confessionsoftheprofessions.com/outgrowing-compan...

smkellat 9y ago

When your co-workers start getting routinely carted out by emergency workers for cardiac distress, seizures, and other problems developed since they started the job. A job can grind you down and I'm watching my current one eat some co-workers alive. There are limits to how much stress you can put a person through routinely.

revmoo 9y ago
Good good, where the fuck do you work?

mattchamb 9y ago

I am currently in this situation. The company ran out of money and cant afford to pay us. That is a good indicator to find something else.

charsifood 9y ago
This is equivalent to looking for the exit when the ceiling has already collapsed.

pjc50 9y ago

I'm reminded of a former co-worker that said he could write down the reasons why he'd eventually leave a job after two months, even if he stayed for years longer. Not always true and sometimes change is forced on us, but a useful insight. Moving has a cost, in time and effort, and a risk. You can look at the benefits of the new job (and likely downsides!), and weigh them against the current one plus the cost of searching and moving.

nstart 9y ago

Life stability. Happiness. In that order. The balance between these two is something I need to maintain in order for me to say whether or not it's time to switch the job. Happiness is a lot of things. This is a personal compass. For me it's a combination of doing work that's interesting, working with a company whose mission I believe in personally, while having a good life balance. If I say I'm signing out and saying bye at a particular reasonable time on any regular(!) day, and that's respected, that's good enough for me. Life stability means do I have the means to support myself and those around me reasonably well. This is actually the primary point Sometimes the jobs that make me happy might not pay me all that great, but if I'm at a point in life where maybe other investments are paying off well, or I just don't need to have that much money, I can take the job. On the other hand I can have a job that pays me lots of money but I'm really really not happy with it. But sometimes it's necessary to suck it up until another opportunity comes to me. I can't just flip the bird to life's responsibilities and quit because I'm not happy. Sure maybe I readjust my needs to make stability to look cheaper, but the point is that all basics MUST be covered at all times. Real world examples: Second job of mine. The company vision had changed considerably since I joined it. After a merger it became less about innovation and while I don't say it's bad, I definitely didn't agree with it. At the time it was just my wife and I living in a not so expensive apartment and we had very few other responsibilities. So I quit. Admittedly to a slightly better paying job but the priority at that time was happiness since I had achieves baseline life stability (and a bit more too). Didn't like the new job at all. Burnt me out and after 6 months I left to a new job. This was paying me less than my second job so quite a dip in earnings at the time. But it was exciting, and I loved so much of it. Again I was just about fine with stability since my wife was also working so the primary balancing factor was happiness. 6 months later though, my wife and I were expecting our son. This flipped the equation completely. My wife really was hoping she could exit the workplace so she could spend time with our baby when he was born and this meant a big change in stability requirements for me. I actually went back to the same business I had my third job with. It was a new product they were building so I expected it to be different this time around. That turned out to be wrong. I won't lie. I hated it. But I sucked it up to the point of near depression. Since the balance was starting to fall out of place, I hunted another job and I hope I've found my perfect place at Buffer. Right now it's everything I could ask for and has all my guiding principles in place. Hope that lengthy exposition of my career helped out :D Side note - Leaving the company I worked at twice was a hard one and led to a lot of tension. I felt horrible about bits of it, but I couldn't let my personal mental health deteriorate any further. I regret that I had to put the company through that as it almost felt exploitative (that was never my intention though). We parted on lukewarm terms but now have better relationships which mended slowly (not fully) over time.

menckenjr 9y ago

When the calendar becomes more important than the quality.

gargravarr 9y ago

What I call the Dilbert-o-meter. When you start noticing too many Dilbert comics acted out in real life, it's time to leave.

le-mark 9y ago
The Gervais principle illuminates a lot of what happens in large organizations. If you ever feel like what you do matters less than how you're perceived, then you're absolutely correct [1]. So far as when to leave, I try to keep track of the health of the division (in a Big Dumb Corp) or company (smaller companies). If the business area I'm in is no longer a focus for the company (opex vs capex) or not meeting targets (whatever they maybe; sales goals, customer retention, etc) then that's a strong signal to start looking. A few other warning signs: churn in leadership, senior people leaving. When you see the organizational knowledge base packing up and leaving that's a bad sign. Currently, I've chosen to work in a Dilbert wonderland. This Big Dumb Corp is so dumb it's astounding. I'm here and staying (for now) because the division I'm in is a growth area, my manager is cool, I have one semi interesting long term project to work on, and since they are so big and dumb, they're paying 10-15% above market rate on salary and benefits. [1] https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2009/10/07/the-gervais-principle-or-the-office-according-to-the-office/ https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2009/10/07/the-gervais-principle-...
mrweasel 9y ago
That's a pretty good rule. I worked at a telco and a co-worker pointed out that the seemed very likely that Scott Adams had hidden cameras and microphones in our offices. When Dilbert-like rules and decisions start showing up to frequently, it's time to leave. Generally speaking I don't think you should go work for companies with more that 50 - 100 employees. After that stupidity start showing up way too frequently.
- gargravarr 9y ago
  Before I started my first job, the summer I left uni, I read the entire archive from 1989 to 2012 and laughed at it. When my job started a few months later, I was absolutely floored when some of the stuff I saw there played out exactly as the comic. I quit after 3 months. I could not get a single thing done in less than 3 weeks there.

deleted 9y ago

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Nursie 9y ago

When there's not a "project" in sight and I have little control over the direction of my work. But then I'm a contractor, and I change up to every few months. Or weeks.

gbajson 9y ago

When I see that smarter guys are leaving.

lllr_finger 9y ago
As long as you're aware that this may not happen if your org is experiencing Dead Sea Effect. Having just gone through this situation, it can be challenging to understand when you're bitter and when you really are surrounded by less-than-ideal developers. Imposter Syndrome complicates this, as well.

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polote 9y ago

When I feel like I can't bring as much to the company as I would like, and either coworkers, managers, company's culture prevents me to so or that I don't feel rewarded for my skills

34090doood9 9y ago

What I'd like to know is how to decide when to leave/switch careers.

ulfw 9y ago

When a company starts focusing the majority of its energy inwards: politics, favoritism, infighting, thinking of how to look good internally, bullshit stats and presentations, you name it - but very little time spend on the customer or the product.

gargravarr 9y ago
One of my reasons for leaving is that I'm watching our internal systems dissolve - some of the stuff I have responsibility for is hosted on rickety old systems that are long due for replacement, but management refuses to spend any money (or allocate time to rebuild them) because they're not customer-facing. Painful underinvestment for political reasons will be the death of this company. The IT team are fighting fires on a daily basis, and a major outage would probably have the 4 of them walking out (yes, 4 people supporting a global company). I've wisely decided to move on before it all melts.

eru 9y ago

You always keep looking, and when something sufficiently better comes up, you switch. Get offers in time, so you have some on hand in need.

zavulon 9y ago

If on a Sunday afternoon you get a sinking feeling of despair about having to go to work tomorrow, it's time to leave.

thehardsphere 9y ago

If you're having bourbon for breakfast to cope with the current death march, you should have left months ago.

alkonaut 9y ago

Just switch often until you are sufficiently paid and found one that doesn't suffer from dysfunctions like employee/manager churn. Then use the capital you built up to work less, focusing on other things in life than work. Every time you switch you have to prove yourself again, you'll have to prove you are worthy the perks (working from home etc). My recipe was switching around and then back to my first employer later in my career. A place I knew had good climate where I could stay 5-10 years with ease.

borplk 9y ago

If we collect all the reasons in this thread together it rules out a significant majority of companies. Just saying.

bb88 9y ago

I have a simple rule. If you're already seriously contemplating leaving, then it's time to leave. Because typically, it's only going to get worse from there. Chris Dixon once posted something along the lines of this: "If you think you're going to fire someone six months from now, you should fire them now." I believe that if you think things will get worse 6 months from now, then leave now.

cardosof 9y ago
+1. My father always says "when you're thinking about getting out of the boat, you're already out". Meaning, if you were 'in the boat', you would be thinking of fixing it.

dano 9y ago

If you find yourself doing maintenance work, move on. There is nothing wrong with maintenance work, it is valuable and gives the company the ability to service its clients. However, if you are no longer able to improve the process and that is what you were doing before, move along. Maintenance work is a big signal, don't ignore it.

lmilcin 9y ago

When either of these is true, I quit my job: - I can't benefit the company I work for anymore, - I feel I have stopped learning/advancing in my current position, - I have stopped feeling satisfaction from my accomplishments.

nunez 9y ago

TL;DR: The first few job changes I've made were, in large part, due to two things: 1. me trying to find a job in NYC that would allow for a seamless transition to TX while preserving my compensation and job responsibilities, and 2. Finding a job that will accelerate my transition into a senior management or technical sales role. It took me a few years to find a job that met goal (1) (I'm actually making more now than I did in NYC by a healthy margin), and I have a strong feeling that my current job will really put the gas on goal (2). Longer: There were also minor reasons behind me switching roles: * Job 1 -> Job 2: Lots of micromanaging and process that made it difficult to do real engineering. Job 2 was much more fun and provided free food and a wear-what-you-want policy. Also, $20k pay increase, which was a deciding factor. * Job 2 -> Job 3: Potential of moving to Houston at Job 3. Job 2 was amazing but I felt like there was no way of growing my career vertically unless I wanted to become a Linux admin (which I, ironically, became anyway, at least of sorts) or quant (a very high bar to hit, at least at the time). $5k pay increase was not a factor. * Job 3 -> Job 4: No opportunities in Houston outside of tech support with Job 3. Also, Google was Job 4; no way I was turning that down. They also had an office in Austin. $30k salary cut front loaded by a sign-on bonus and RSUs; opportunity to work at Google outweighed this. * Job 4 -> Job 5: No relo opportunities available on the short-term (and very unlikely long term). The $35,000 pay cut also hurt over time despite sign-on and peer bonuses. I didn't stay long enough to vest my RSUs, which would have made up for most of the loss. Also didn't feel like I fit with the team well. Very different working/communication style that wasn't for me (it felt very isolated). I kind-of like being in a party atmosphere; open space, lots of noise, events all of the time, etc. My team didn't have any of that; very nice, but quiet, bunch of folks. Also didn't like how far I was from the money and how arguably meaningless the work felt, despite the work being really good engineering overall. (Google makes its money on Ads. I was in Corp Eng maintaining non-prod app servers.) I also ALSO didn't like how you effectively HAD to move to Mountain View or stay in NYC to advance (most of the senior folks are in MTV) and how it took many many years to make it into management at a salary that's slightly below market (even though RSU reloads effectively offset that). Also, Job 5 restored most of my lost salary ($30k pay increase, was a deciding factor). * Job 5 -> Job 6: LOVED that place, but it was time to move to TX (couldn't take NYC anymore) and Job 5 wouldn't allow it despite having a sales office in Austin. (My boss and I tried to make an extended eng team there; CTO wasn't having it. She was nice, though.) ($10k pay cut but slightly over $10k gained from not having to pay income or state/city taxes. It was a minor factor. I would've seen more of that had I not fucked up my withholding that year!) * Job 6 -> Job 7 (current): Really enjoyed working there too. Learned that I LOVE LOVE LOVE to travel. Wanted more of a sales-like position. Tried really hard to get myself plugged into sales pursuits; I networked with damn nearly every sales person in the US org and offered to effectively be their PowerPoint person lol. Did a lot of blogging and solo pursuits alongside my engineering work. Was VERY vocal about work that me and my teams have accomplished. Getting to where I wanted wasn't happening quickly enough; also, company outlook was shaky. Also turns out that I was dramatically underpaid (despite it being a lateral salary move). $25k pay increase was a factor.

uberdru 9y ago

There's one simple rule. When all the executives start reading the same book, and try to get everyone in the company to read that book, run! If they announce the construction of a new HQ, you've already been there way too long.

eru 9y ago
Never work for a Christian (or Muslim etc) company?