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I can identify with the red flag where they try to pressure you to accept the offer in a short period. This is also called an exploding offer. I had a place do

I can identify with the red flag where they try to pressure you to accept the offer in a short period. This is also called an exploding offer. I had a place do that to me and I ended up turning the opportunity down.

nickff 6y ago
On the other hand, there often needs to be a time limit, or else they will be too late to make an offer to the runner-up (when the leader turns it down). I am not sure what a 'reasonable period' is.
- whatshisface 6y ago
  That only applies when the company needs to fill a specific position. Specific positions that need a particular person are a minority of SWE roles. In fact it is bad management to let your team get in a situation where there are individual hyper-specialized roles with no knowledge shared.
  - nkingsy 6y ago
    Even if the roles aren’t specialized, there may not be enough headcount for multiple offers to be out at once.
  - MereInterest 6y ago
    I think it also depends on the size of the company/department. A company with 4 people might be looking to bring on a 5th to fill some specific role. In that case, the offer to the second choice depends on the response to the first. On the other hand, a department with 300 people might be looking to increase head count by 10-20%, in which case the offers to each person are quite independent.
    - ghaff 6y ago
      Although the reality is that a lot of hires will still be hired by a manager targeting a specific need. When I was hired the job description was even written for me. I'm in more of a marketing organization but if I look around me, there are positions for vastly different skill sets, backgrounds, and preferences. Most of the people in the larger team couldn't do my job well and I couldn't do theirs.
- ashtonkem 6y ago
  Long enough for you to wrap up your other interviews. I think the biggest issue is when the time limit isn’t moveable. If you’re finishing up interviews next week and the time limit cannot be moved, then that is a problem. Inflexibility from the get-go is a bad way to start a working relationship.
  - pnw_hazor 6y ago
    You can always accept the time critical offer and continue interviewing and then jump if a better one comes through. There is no reason to be nice or considerate to companies, they will drop you in hot second if it is convenient for them.
    - nickff 6y ago
      Accepting an offer without an intent to follow through is fraud. If you think your counter-party is dishonest or ill-intentioned, then you should refuse to enter into any agreement with them.
      - user5994461 6y ago
        If you want to play the legal game, the contract is void because it was signed under duress. Forcing the employee to sign in 24h qualifies as consent under duress, not free consent.
        nickff 6y ago
        First, I don't care whether it's illegal; lying to people is wrong. Second, the definitions for fraud vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, but the course of action recommended here falls under the common definition of civil fraud: >"Somebody misrepresents a material fact in order to obtain action or forbearance by another person; >"The other person relies upon the misrepresentation; and >"The other person suffers injury as a result of the act or forbearance taken in reliance upon the misrepresentation" Third, a time limit is not duress unless there are other exigent circumstances. Duress is usually defined as:"threats, violence, constraints, or other action brought to bear on someone to do something against their will or better judgment." Getting someone to accept a slightly lower salary is not 'against their will or better judgement', it's just a negotiation.
- compiler-guy 6y ago
  A reasonable period is: You tell them up front your ideal timeline, that you have a couple of other irons in the fire (if you do), and you keep them informed of the progress of those other fires. And they do the same for you. Maybe you can't get a timing that works for both sides together, but that is OK. The pressuring is what isn't.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - jnwatson 6y ago
    I've been the recruiter in this position. I think it is unethical to string your runners-up along in this situation. You're essentially taking up their (and your) valuable time with little chance at success. Exploding offers are the least bad solution. Give them 48-72 hours, with a small extension if they are currently talking to someone else.
    - deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]
    - victor9000 6y ago
      If you don't like being a runner-up then you should negotiate with the candidate so that your company ends up in a more competitive position.
      - duderific 6y ago
        It's extremely hard for smaller companies to compete with the likes of Google and Facebook, who (I've heard) offer 25% more than everyone else. Which is why they end up with all the talent. Lather, rinse, repeat.
        victor9000 6y ago
        If this is a company's reason for not finding talent then the hiring team is simply not competent at hiring. You can do any number of things to differentiate yourself from a FAANG to make your company more appealing. However, each candidate will have different values, so in order to gain an edge you first have to engage each candidate with the goal of discovering these values. For example, this morning I was reading a recruiting email while considering a Sr SDE role on the AWS S3 team. They list 4 basic requirements for candidates, one of which reads: · Able to debug, troubleshoot and resolve complex technical issues reported by customers This screams of being responsible for legacy code and spending time on-call resolving other people's bugs. Can your company offer green-field development? Then congratulations, you've just gained an edge over a FAANG! Other ways to differentiate are to consider the candidate's career trajectory. Maybe they want to become a manager, a technical lead, or pick up new technical skills. Can you place them on a team that will facilitate their professional development? If so then holy cow, this small company is looking better and better! The point is that you can't go to war with a Goliath and expect to win using brute force. So if your opponent has 10 ships while you only have 1 then do yourself a favor and fight on land. For context, I've had to lead and grow technical teams in the Seattle market, which means competing with Amazon, Facebook, Microsoft, and to a lesser degree Apple and Google. Having filled ~50 technical roles, I can say that succeeding in a competitive market requires you to be hands-on and highly engaged. And if your recruiting pipeline begins and ends with a submit form then you're going to make life really hard on yourself.
- alexbanks 6y ago
  There is no reason to not be honest about these types of things (unless of course you're doing something shady). If you want to fill the position quickly, you should say so. Now, of course, as a candidate if I heard that I would jack up my compensation numbers, but again, if you want to fill the seat quickly that's how it works.
alextheparrot 6y ago
It can be a problem for companies too — candidates accepting an exploding offer and then leaving after a month when another offer comes through can be a rational approach. The first place just gets left off the resume.
kerng 6y ago
This. My biggest mistake once was falling for that pressure, and then I left soon again. It's a big red flag, or offeres that are only valid a few days...
opportune 6y ago
I know a lot of people who have “accepted” exploding offers but then just keep interviewing and will try to renegotiate or just reneg if they get a better one.
- naberhausj 6y ago
  "Let your 'yes' be 'yes' and your 'no' be 'no'" I would personally feel uncomfortable doing this as would a lot of the people I know.
  - ghaff 6y ago
    I know you sometimes gotta do what you gotta do. But word of reneging will get around and it could come back to bite you some day. I likely wouldn't unless the company was really being unreasonable and wouldn't budge (and that should probably give you second thoughts) and you have another hot lead that you'd really prefer if it came through.
  - opportune 6y ago
    I agree I wouldn’t do this. I wouldn’t actually feel bad doing this if my offer were exploding but I would worry about burning bridges. Most of the people I know who were doing this were new grads
- user5994461 6y ago
  Indeed, the employee can give 1 day notice during the first month, by law in the UK. Exploding offers are the least of the problems as a candidate.
- draw_down 6y ago
  That does seem like the correct strategy in such a scenario. It’s unethical to try to use your leverage to force people into working for you, so you reap what you sow.
circlefavshape 6y ago
I refused to accept an offer quickly twice, only to find that the place was about to be bought and I would have gotten a payout if I'd have been an employee. As a new employee it wouldn't have been huge, but still it would have been nice
- victor9000 6y ago
  Sometimes playing good poker means folding bad hands that end up winning due to random chance. If you make a habit of accepting offers due to pressure tactics, you will end up regretting it more often than not.
AtlasBarfed 6y ago
Well, outside of Silicon Valley, if you accept an exploding offer, you will very frequently show up to work and sit around for weeks doing little while the project you were hired for goes through the project funding pachinko machine a few times. Or you accept and don't hear back for two weeks. Or any other number of reasons that some lumbering company loses you in the intake paperwork.
matsemann 6y ago
I have done the same when I was about to graduate and started looking. One company started the process long before the others (which all basically followed the same schedule), and gave me an offer before I even had applied to anyone else. At the time I was very afraid of missing out, but the way they gave me only a few days to think about moving to a different city almost a year ahead left a sour taste in my mouth and made me turn them down. I ended up contacting the company I wanted to work for the most, and said I had an offer. They ended up fast tracking me and giving me an offer as well. So at least the first company validated me and helped me land the one I wanted..
- kevinmchugh 6y ago
  My spouse works as a career counselor at a university and students often end up with exactly this problem. Many of them come to the solution of accepting the less favored offer and continuing to interview, and then reneging on the company that made the exploding offer. Sometimes, employers will call my spouse up and complain that students have reneged and she shouldn't have allowed them to do so!
- naberhausj 6y ago
  Hah! I experienced the exact same thing just a month ago. It did build up goodwill between myself and the company that fast tracked me an offer. Thus, some good came out of it. I don't see how an exploding offer is a good strategy. The kind of people you'll catch with that trick are not the unicorns. Until the exploding-offer, I was a big fan of that company.
Reedx 6y ago
Sometimes they do that on Shark Tank (Mark Cuban especially), making an offer and saying "but you have to decide right now". Giving them just seconds, even when there are still other potential offers on the table. It's a terrible dark pattern and wish everyone would just dismiss it outright. Kudos for doing so.

nickff 6y ago

On the other hand, there often needs to be a time limit, or else they will be too late to make an offer to the runner-up (when the leader turns it down). I am not sure what a 'reasonable period' is.

whatshisface 6y ago
That only applies when the company needs to fill a specific position. Specific positions that need a particular person are a minority of SWE roles. In fact it is bad management to let your team get in a situation where there are individual hyper-specialized roles with no knowledge shared.
- nkingsy 6y ago
  Even if the roles aren’t specialized, there may not be enough headcount for multiple offers to be out at once.
- MereInterest 6y ago
  I think it also depends on the size of the company/department. A company with 4 people might be looking to bring on a 5th to fill some specific role. In that case, the offer to the second choice depends on the response to the first. On the other hand, a department with 300 people might be looking to increase head count by 10-20%, in which case the offers to each person are quite independent.
  - ghaff 6y ago
    Although the reality is that a lot of hires will still be hired by a manager targeting a specific need. When I was hired the job description was even written for me. I'm in more of a marketing organization but if I look around me, there are positions for vastly different skill sets, backgrounds, and preferences. Most of the people in the larger team couldn't do my job well and I couldn't do theirs.
ashtonkem 6y ago
Long enough for you to wrap up your other interviews. I think the biggest issue is when the time limit isn’t moveable. If you’re finishing up interviews next week and the time limit cannot be moved, then that is a problem. Inflexibility from the get-go is a bad way to start a working relationship.
- pnw_hazor 6y ago
  You can always accept the time critical offer and continue interviewing and then jump if a better one comes through. There is no reason to be nice or considerate to companies, they will drop you in hot second if it is convenient for them.
  - nickff 6y ago
    Accepting an offer without an intent to follow through is fraud. If you think your counter-party is dishonest or ill-intentioned, then you should refuse to enter into any agreement with them.
    - user5994461 6y ago
      If you want to play the legal game, the contract is void because it was signed under duress. Forcing the employee to sign in 24h qualifies as consent under duress, not free consent.
      - nickff 6y ago
        First, I don't care whether it's illegal; lying to people is wrong. Second, the definitions for fraud vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, but the course of action recommended here falls under the common definition of civil fraud: >"Somebody misrepresents a material fact in order to obtain action or forbearance by another person; >"The other person relies upon the misrepresentation; and >"The other person suffers injury as a result of the act or forbearance taken in reliance upon the misrepresentation" Third, a time limit is not duress unless there are other exigent circumstances. Duress is usually defined as:"threats, violence, constraints, or other action brought to bear on someone to do something against their will or better judgment." Getting someone to accept a slightly lower salary is not 'against their will or better judgement', it's just a negotiation.
compiler-guy 6y ago
A reasonable period is: You tell them up front your ideal timeline, that you have a couple of other irons in the fire (if you do), and you keep them informed of the progress of those other fires. And they do the same for you. Maybe you can't get a timing that works for both sides together, but that is OK. The pressuring is what isn't.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- jnwatson 6y ago
  I've been the recruiter in this position. I think it is unethical to string your runners-up along in this situation. You're essentially taking up their (and your) valuable time with little chance at success. Exploding offers are the least bad solution. Give them 48-72 hours, with a small extension if they are currently talking to someone else.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - victor9000 6y ago
    If you don't like being a runner-up then you should negotiate with the candidate so that your company ends up in a more competitive position.
    - duderific 6y ago
      It's extremely hard for smaller companies to compete with the likes of Google and Facebook, who (I've heard) offer 25% more than everyone else. Which is why they end up with all the talent. Lather, rinse, repeat.
      - victor9000 6y ago
        If this is a company's reason for not finding talent then the hiring team is simply not competent at hiring. You can do any number of things to differentiate yourself from a FAANG to make your company more appealing. However, each candidate will have different values, so in order to gain an edge you first have to engage each candidate with the goal of discovering these values. For example, this morning I was reading a recruiting email while considering a Sr SDE role on the AWS S3 team. They list 4 basic requirements for candidates, one of which reads: · Able to debug, troubleshoot and resolve complex technical issues reported by customers This screams of being responsible for legacy code and spending time on-call resolving other people's bugs. Can your company offer green-field development? Then congratulations, you've just gained an edge over a FAANG! Other ways to differentiate are to consider the candidate's career trajectory. Maybe they want to become a manager, a technical lead, or pick up new technical skills. Can you place them on a team that will facilitate their professional development? If so then holy cow, this small company is looking better and better! The point is that you can't go to war with a Goliath and expect to win using brute force. So if your opponent has 10 ships while you only have 1 then do yourself a favor and fight on land. For context, I've had to lead and grow technical teams in the Seattle market, which means competing with Amazon, Facebook, Microsoft, and to a lesser degree Apple and Google. Having filled ~50 technical roles, I can say that succeeding in a competitive market requires you to be hands-on and highly engaged. And if your recruiting pipeline begins and ends with a submit form then you're going to make life really hard on yourself.
alexbanks 6y ago
There is no reason to not be honest about these types of things (unless of course you're doing something shady). If you want to fill the position quickly, you should say so. Now, of course, as a candidate if I heard that I would jack up my compensation numbers, but again, if you want to fill the seat quickly that's how it works.

alextheparrot 6y ago

It can be a problem for companies too — candidates accepting an exploding offer and then leaving after a month when another offer comes through can be a rational approach. The first place just gets left off the resume.

kerng 6y ago

This. My biggest mistake once was falling for that pressure, and then I left soon again. It's a big red flag, or offeres that are only valid a few days...

opportune 6y ago

I know a lot of people who have “accepted” exploding offers but then just keep interviewing and will try to renegotiate or just reneg if they get a better one.

naberhausj 6y ago
"Let your 'yes' be 'yes' and your 'no' be 'no'" I would personally feel uncomfortable doing this as would a lot of the people I know.
- ghaff 6y ago
  I know you sometimes gotta do what you gotta do. But word of reneging will get around and it could come back to bite you some day. I likely wouldn't unless the company was really being unreasonable and wouldn't budge (and that should probably give you second thoughts) and you have another hot lead that you'd really prefer if it came through.
- opportune 6y ago
  I agree I wouldn’t do this. I wouldn’t actually feel bad doing this if my offer were exploding but I would worry about burning bridges. Most of the people I know who were doing this were new grads
user5994461 6y ago
Indeed, the employee can give 1 day notice during the first month, by law in the UK. Exploding offers are the least of the problems as a candidate.
draw_down 6y ago
That does seem like the correct strategy in such a scenario. It’s unethical to try to use your leverage to force people into working for you, so you reap what you sow.

circlefavshape 6y ago

I refused to accept an offer quickly twice, only to find that the place was about to be bought and I would have gotten a payout if I'd have been an employee. As a new employee it wouldn't have been huge, but still it would have been nice

victor9000 6y ago
Sometimes playing good poker means folding bad hands that end up winning due to random chance. If you make a habit of accepting offers due to pressure tactics, you will end up regretting it more often than not.

AtlasBarfed 6y ago

Well, outside of Silicon Valley, if you accept an exploding offer, you will very frequently show up to work and sit around for weeks doing little while the project you were hired for goes through the project funding pachinko machine a few times. Or you accept and don't hear back for two weeks. Or any other number of reasons that some lumbering company loses you in the intake paperwork.

matsemann 6y ago

I have done the same when I was about to graduate and started looking. One company started the process long before the others (which all basically followed the same schedule), and gave me an offer before I even had applied to anyone else. At the time I was very afraid of missing out, but the way they gave me only a few days to think about moving to a different city almost a year ahead left a sour taste in my mouth and made me turn them down. I ended up contacting the company I wanted to work for the most, and said I had an offer. They ended up fast tracking me and giving me an offer as well. So at least the first company validated me and helped me land the one I wanted..

kevinmchugh 6y ago
My spouse works as a career counselor at a university and students often end up with exactly this problem. Many of them come to the solution of accepting the less favored offer and continuing to interview, and then reneging on the company that made the exploding offer. Sometimes, employers will call my spouse up and complain that students have reneged and she shouldn't have allowed them to do so!
naberhausj 6y ago
Hah! I experienced the exact same thing just a month ago. It did build up goodwill between myself and the company that fast tracked me an offer. Thus, some good came out of it. I don't see how an exploding offer is a good strategy. The kind of people you'll catch with that trick are not the unicorns. Until the exploding-offer, I was a big fan of that company.

Reedx 6y ago

Sometimes they do that on Shark Tank (Mark Cuban especially), making an offer and saying "but you have to decide right now". Giving them just seconds, even when there are still other potential offers on the table. It's a terrible dark pattern and wish everyone would just dismiss it outright. Kudos for doing so.