8 ms·

How to Accept and Decline Job Offers

61 points by barrettabrooks 13y ago

georgefox 13y ago
I hate to comment only on details and not on the actual content itself, but the aggressive use of bold text led me to read only the bold text. I didn't even bother to give the full text a chance. I saw typography that seemed geared toward the skimmer, so I skimmed. I'm not sure if that's the desired result, but that's the result it had on me.
- barrettabrooks 13y ago
  Great feedback. Thanks for that. I'll keep it in mind when I write articles in the future.
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
- lotsofcows 13y ago
  I managed the second paragraph. The constant switching of font really irritates me for some reason. It's like trying to read the bible.
  - barrettabrooks 13y ago
    Really glad you called this out. Thank you.
abrichr 13y ago
I think you should also try to cover how to respond when the reason for declining an offer is low compensation. Also, there seems to be some character encoding issues in the text.
- barrettabrooks 13y ago
  Great suggestion. I have an entire section on responding to a low offer and negotiating the offer, with specific scripts in the upcoming book. I'll make note that it would be good to write about negotiations on the public blog as well, as I realize the book may not be the right match for people who aren't looking for jobs. Can't find encoding issues on my end. Any specifics on that?
  - dgempesaw 13y ago
    Here's a couple examples - latest chrome, win7. http://d.pr/i/ONmu http://d.pr/i/ONmu http://d.pr/i/ucl0 http://d.pr/i/ucl0 http://d.pr/i/pwXI http://d.pr/i/pwXI
    - habosa 13y ago
      I am seeing the same behavior.
  - pmh 13y ago
    > Can't find encoding issues on my end. Any specifics on that? Since the page's character encoding isn't specified (at least I didn't see anything in the source or via HTTP headers), it's defaulting to a Western encoding rather than UTF-8 (at least here on Win7/FF 21).
habosa 13y ago
This all looks like great advice, I'd just add that a phone call should be encouraged whenever you feel you have a suitable relationship with the recruiter to call him/her directly. Especially if you're rejecting a company that you could see yourself working for/with at a later date. A phone call is much more personal, and has the added benefit of being more "final". While an email-reply chain can drag on for days or weeks, a phone call can normally settle most issues in one shot. Some people find a phone call more unnerving but I actually prefer it to agonizing over email wording, sending a long email, and waiting for the asynchronous reply that may never come. Note that I have very little experience in the job market, this is more just a social recommendation and reflects some feedback I got from recruiters and friends who have been in this situation.
- barrettabrooks 13y ago
  Completely agreed here. Perhaps I should have been more specific in the article in saying that a phone call is almost certainly the better option. As you mentioned, most people are uncomfortable with the phone call, regardless of the situation, which is why I built in an email option. I will keep this in mind, especially as I teach this material within college settings.
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
nraynaud 13y ago
I love the business novlang in the templates.
- barrettabrooks 13y ago
  Tell me specifically what you're referring to. Would love the feedback.
  - nraynaud 13y ago
    I can pinpoint it, but I'm not sure this is to be eliminated, maybe this is for that kind of people in that kind of company and candidates have to blend to the culture. "excited" and variants appears 6 times in the article (inclusive for the answer to proposal you're about to reject), "guidance", "I feel best fits my current professional and personal goals" well, simply "that I prefer" would work too. I think we can't have blogs about GTD and shorts emails and at the same time padded sentences in the templates of the career advice sites, this creates a cognitive dissonance. But again, I'm jobless, and hated the business-speak and "professional" things when I had a job, so I don't think I should be giving career advice, I was pointing just this funny stuff out in a very un-professional and non constructive way.
    - barrettabrooks 13y ago
      Great point here. I do agree that having clearly conflicting information flowing is a bad thing. I may go back to the drawing board and see if we can draw up alternative templates with different language so we're providing for people in different cultures. Thanks for that feedback. I do sincerely appreciate it.
7Figures2Commas 13y ago
There is some really bad advice in here. When declining an offer, there is almost never anything to be gained from explaining your rationale. Be gracious (i.e. thank the person who delivered the offer to you), indicate that you have decided to pursue another opportunity and move on. If you feel the need to explain your decision, it can and likely will be misconstrued. "I have decided to accept a competing offer that I feel best fits my current professional and personal goals" may be read as "I don't believe your organization can support my professional and personal goals." If you write "I do not believe that I am a good cultural fit for the organization", somebody is likely to interpret that as "Your culture sucks." Additionally, it rarely makes sense to notify everybody involved in the interviewing process of your decision not to accept an offer. After your initial interviews, assuming you are still considering the opportunity, you should send a thank you note to the people you met with, as appropriate. Unless you had a relationship with one of these individuals before your interviews, further communication regarding your decision to decline an offer is probably not going to be to your benefit, particularly if you have the hubris to invite the other party "to let you know if you can ever do anything to help them reach their goals." Really? Finally, consider that your dealings with others in the context of a job search will probably be more enjoyable and well-received if you don't pretend that you have a "personal brand" instead of a reputation.
- barrettabrooks 13y ago
  Thanks for your feedback. I would perhaps agree that if handled incorrectly, the notes or calls to various people might not be taken well. On the other hand, they also represent a valuable opportunity to continue building relationships. As for explaining your reasoning, that is perhaps the case. I would then be curious to know what you would recommend when the recruiter offers the inevitable question of: "Why did you decide to take another offer?" Planning an answer and being proactive about the reasoning in a judicious way can avoid even bigger snafus in response to an unexpected question. I would be curious to know how you typically offer to help others. I have found in my personal experience, as well as that of others, that asking how I can help is one of the single greatest ways to build trust and respect in a relationship. Now, perhaps "reach your goals" takes it a step too far. If so, simply remove it from the phrasing. As for the brand. Call it what you will. You have a reputation, or brand, in the eyes of other people. Maintaining a consistent reputation is the point, rather than the exact phrasing of the words. Again, thanks for offering constructive criticism. I enjoy a healthy debate about career search tactics, and I am always open to continuing the conversation.
lvs 13y ago
This whole article made me feel sad on the insides, even down to the domain name in the URL.
brianberns 13y ago
"You should decline the offer as soon as you have accepted another offer or made a definitive decision not to accept." "In rare cases, your final decision (either verbal or written) may trigger a decision to negotiate with you. In case you are given the opportunity to obtain what you want from the offer, you should be prepared to conduct the negotiation." I understand that this is rare, but I wonder if you've really thought the scenario through. You've already accepted job offer A, but now you're negotiating job offer B? How would you explain your behavior to the first company if you end up taking the second offer?
- barrettabrooks 13y ago
  Agreed. That would be a bad call. In this case, if there are two offers on the table and you are confident in your choice, then there would be no further room for negotiations. If you have two comparable offers and you want to test the negotiating waters, it would be best to approach that company first (before accepting an offer). In some cases, however, you may have decided to turn down an offer as it stands, despite a lack of competing offers. In this case, if the employer opens up negotiations, it would be a good time to have the conversation.
  - brianberns 13y ago
    Yes, but the point I'm getting to is that sometimes you have to actually turn down one offer before accepting a competing offer.
    - barrettabrooks 13y ago
      The logic being that the acceptance should come last to account for any potential alternative outcomes?
      - brianberns 13y ago
        Not exactly - I think you have to respond to the offers in descending order of your interest. If you really want Offer A, but they refuse to negotiate on a sticking point, you tell them that first in hopes that they will loosen up. If they still won't budge, you turn them down, then go on to accept Offer B instead. If there's a third Offer, C, that's not as attractive as B, you notify them after you've accepted B, as you originally suggested.
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
- lotsofcows 13y ago
  Clear, yes. Also bloody rude. Someday you'll want to change job again and the pool of potential employees will be that much smaller.
logicallee 13y ago
If VC's don't give founders a "no" (in case the situation changes, the startup takes off) then why would you as an employee? Say you have 30 offers on the table. What's to be had by saying "no" to 29 of them instead of just "yes" to 1 and not replying to the rest? If that 1 drops out you now have 29 pending job offers. If you "declined" the rest, you now have what pending?
- barrettabrooks 13y ago
  Well, I suppose if you were lucky enough to have 30 offers then you might be in a slightly different situation and I would love to tell your story on the blog. In my experience, especially in the recent economy, candidates are lucky to have one offer. Those that receive multiple are in great shape, and I have yet to hear of anyone that has trouble with too many offers to respond to. Again, if that's you or you know someone, I want to interview you to find out how you did it.
willvarfar 13y ago
Please, everyone, only decline other offers after an offer you have accepted has actually gone all the way through!
miketomo 13y ago
Wow... It's reading articles like this that makes me very pleased that I decided to decline an offer to move to the USA a couple of years back. "Personal brand"? Thank you letters to recruiters? "Thank you for your guidance and support"... I can't be the only British person to read this article and feel a little bit sickened by the cloying falseness of the language used here, it's one of the main reasons why I no longer consider job offers from big US companies - I like to work with people who tell me what they think, not what they think I want to hear. Apologies for this sounding like an anti-American rant, I don't mean it in that way, but there is something very wrong with the false-friendly, euphemistic speech used by a lot of people and organisations over that side of the pond. I think a lot of it is really just "please-don't-sue-me" speech.
- ratherbefuddled 13y ago
  I absolutely agree. What I find extremely distasteful about what the article recommends is the total fakeness of everything. Were I on the receiving end of that sort of communication it would leap out as less than genuine and I'd be insulted. Straightforward honesty and integrity will get you much further than a personal brand.
  - barrettabrooks 13y ago
    I don't think a personal brand and integrity are mutually exclusive ideas. In fact, I think the people who have great "reputations" or good "names" in their respective communities base that on their honesty and integrity. I'd be curious to know how you would alter the wording of one of the templates to be more honest and integrity-based.
- yashodhan 13y ago
  This pretense permeates American culture and it's one of the things that really gets to me, because my personality is very somber by nature. I talk to everybody as I would a close friend or neighbor, and this includes potential employers. I just can't seem to adopt default business lingo/customs, and this may ultimately be my downfall, but I'm not comfortable slapping on a fake persona.
shanelja 13y ago
It's funny because if the company didn't want you they they would simply not reply, yet you are expected to show a much greater level of care when dealing with them.
- barrettabrooks 13y ago
  This is a huge challenge, especially when we know it's the case. Most companies simply don't respond. It's personal preference, but I always err on the side of turning the other cheek and doing what I can to build new relationships.

I hate to comment only on details and not on the actual content itself, but the aggressive use of bold text led me to read only the bold text. I didn't even bother to give the full text a chance. I saw typography that seemed geared toward the skimmer, so I skimmed. I'm not sure if that's the desired result, but that's the result it had on me.

barrettabrooks 13y ago
Great feedback. Thanks for that. I'll keep it in mind when I write articles in the future.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
lotsofcows 13y ago
I managed the second paragraph. The constant switching of font really irritates me for some reason. It's like trying to read the bible.
- barrettabrooks 13y ago
  Really glad you called this out. Thank you.

abrichr 13y ago

I think you should also try to cover how to respond when the reason for declining an offer is low compensation. Also, there seems to be some character encoding issues in the text.

barrettabrooks 13y ago
Great suggestion. I have an entire section on responding to a low offer and negotiating the offer, with specific scripts in the upcoming book. I'll make note that it would be good to write about negotiations on the public blog as well, as I realize the book may not be the right match for people who aren't looking for jobs. Can't find encoding issues on my end. Any specifics on that?
- dgempesaw 13y ago
  Here's a couple examples - latest chrome, win7. http://d.pr/i/ONmu http://d.pr/i/ONmu http://d.pr/i/ucl0 http://d.pr/i/ucl0 http://d.pr/i/pwXI http://d.pr/i/pwXI
  - habosa 13y ago
    I am seeing the same behavior.
- pmh 13y ago
  > Can't find encoding issues on my end. Any specifics on that? Since the page's character encoding isn't specified (at least I didn't see anything in the source or via HTTP headers), it's defaulting to a Western encoding rather than UTF-8 (at least here on Win7/FF 21).

habosa 13y ago

This all looks like great advice, I'd just add that a phone call should be encouraged whenever you feel you have a suitable relationship with the recruiter to call him/her directly. Especially if you're rejecting a company that you could see yourself working for/with at a later date. A phone call is much more personal, and has the added benefit of being more "final". While an email-reply chain can drag on for days or weeks, a phone call can normally settle most issues in one shot. Some people find a phone call more unnerving but I actually prefer it to agonizing over email wording, sending a long email, and waiting for the asynchronous reply that may never come. Note that I have very little experience in the job market, this is more just a social recommendation and reflects some feedback I got from recruiters and friends who have been in this situation.

barrettabrooks 13y ago
Completely agreed here. Perhaps I should have been more specific in the article in saying that a phone call is almost certainly the better option. As you mentioned, most people are uncomfortable with the phone call, regardless of the situation, which is why I built in an email option. I will keep this in mind, especially as I teach this material within college settings.

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

nraynaud 13y ago

I love the business novlang in the templates.

barrettabrooks 13y ago
Tell me specifically what you're referring to. Would love the feedback.
- nraynaud 13y ago
  I can pinpoint it, but I'm not sure this is to be eliminated, maybe this is for that kind of people in that kind of company and candidates have to blend to the culture. "excited" and variants appears 6 times in the article (inclusive for the answer to proposal you're about to reject), "guidance", "I feel best fits my current professional and personal goals" well, simply "that I prefer" would work too. I think we can't have blogs about GTD and shorts emails and at the same time padded sentences in the templates of the career advice sites, this creates a cognitive dissonance. But again, I'm jobless, and hated the business-speak and "professional" things when I had a job, so I don't think I should be giving career advice, I was pointing just this funny stuff out in a very un-professional and non constructive way.
  - barrettabrooks 13y ago
    Great point here. I do agree that having clearly conflicting information flowing is a bad thing. I may go back to the drawing board and see if we can draw up alternative templates with different language so we're providing for people in different cultures. Thanks for that feedback. I do sincerely appreciate it.

7Figures2Commas 13y ago

There is some really bad advice in here. When declining an offer, there is almost never anything to be gained from explaining your rationale. Be gracious (i.e. thank the person who delivered the offer to you), indicate that you have decided to pursue another opportunity and move on. If you feel the need to explain your decision, it can and likely will be misconstrued. "I have decided to accept a competing offer that I feel best fits my current professional and personal goals" may be read as "I don't believe your organization can support my professional and personal goals." If you write "I do not believe that I am a good cultural fit for the organization", somebody is likely to interpret that as "Your culture sucks." Additionally, it rarely makes sense to notify everybody involved in the interviewing process of your decision not to accept an offer. After your initial interviews, assuming you are still considering the opportunity, you should send a thank you note to the people you met with, as appropriate. Unless you had a relationship with one of these individuals before your interviews, further communication regarding your decision to decline an offer is probably not going to be to your benefit, particularly if you have the hubris to invite the other party "to let you know if you can ever do anything to help them reach their goals." Really? Finally, consider that your dealings with others in the context of a job search will probably be more enjoyable and well-received if you don't pretend that you have a "personal brand" instead of a reputation.

barrettabrooks 13y ago
Thanks for your feedback. I would perhaps agree that if handled incorrectly, the notes or calls to various people might not be taken well. On the other hand, they also represent a valuable opportunity to continue building relationships. As for explaining your reasoning, that is perhaps the case. I would then be curious to know what you would recommend when the recruiter offers the inevitable question of: "Why did you decide to take another offer?" Planning an answer and being proactive about the reasoning in a judicious way can avoid even bigger snafus in response to an unexpected question. I would be curious to know how you typically offer to help others. I have found in my personal experience, as well as that of others, that asking how I can help is one of the single greatest ways to build trust and respect in a relationship. Now, perhaps "reach your goals" takes it a step too far. If so, simply remove it from the phrasing. As for the brand. Call it what you will. You have a reputation, or brand, in the eyes of other people. Maintaining a consistent reputation is the point, rather than the exact phrasing of the words. Again, thanks for offering constructive criticism. I enjoy a healthy debate about career search tactics, and I am always open to continuing the conversation.

lvs 13y ago

This whole article made me feel sad on the insides, even down to the domain name in the URL.

brianberns 13y ago

"You should decline the offer as soon as you have accepted another offer or made a definitive decision not to accept." "In rare cases, your final decision (either verbal or written) may trigger a decision to negotiate with you. In case you are given the opportunity to obtain what you want from the offer, you should be prepared to conduct the negotiation." I understand that this is rare, but I wonder if you've really thought the scenario through. You've already accepted job offer A, but now you're negotiating job offer B? How would you explain your behavior to the first company if you end up taking the second offer?

barrettabrooks 13y ago
Agreed. That would be a bad call. In this case, if there are two offers on the table and you are confident in your choice, then there would be no further room for negotiations. If you have two comparable offers and you want to test the negotiating waters, it would be best to approach that company first (before accepting an offer). In some cases, however, you may have decided to turn down an offer as it stands, despite a lack of competing offers. In this case, if the employer opens up negotiations, it would be a good time to have the conversation.
- brianberns 13y ago
  Yes, but the point I'm getting to is that sometimes you have to actually turn down one offer before accepting a competing offer.
  - barrettabrooks 13y ago
    The logic being that the acceptance should come last to account for any potential alternative outcomes?
    - brianberns 13y ago
      Not exactly - I think you have to respond to the offers in descending order of your interest. If you really want Offer A, but they refuse to negotiate on a sticking point, you tell them that first in hopes that they will loosen up. If they still won't budge, you turn them down, then go on to accept Offer B instead. If there's a third Offer, C, that's not as attractive as B, you notify them after you've accepted B, as you originally suggested.

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

lotsofcows 13y ago
Clear, yes. Also bloody rude. Someday you'll want to change job again and the pool of potential employees will be that much smaller.

logicallee 13y ago

If VC's don't give founders a "no" (in case the situation changes, the startup takes off) then why would you as an employee? Say you have 30 offers on the table. What's to be had by saying "no" to 29 of them instead of just "yes" to 1 and not replying to the rest? If that 1 drops out you now have 29 pending job offers. If you "declined" the rest, you now have what pending?

barrettabrooks 13y ago
Well, I suppose if you were lucky enough to have 30 offers then you might be in a slightly different situation and I would love to tell your story on the blog. In my experience, especially in the recent economy, candidates are lucky to have one offer. Those that receive multiple are in great shape, and I have yet to hear of anyone that has trouble with too many offers to respond to. Again, if that's you or you know someone, I want to interview you to find out how you did it.

willvarfar 13y ago

Please, everyone, only decline other offers after an offer you have accepted has actually gone all the way through!

miketomo 13y ago

Wow... It's reading articles like this that makes me very pleased that I decided to decline an offer to move to the USA a couple of years back. "Personal brand"? Thank you letters to recruiters? "Thank you for your guidance and support"... I can't be the only British person to read this article and feel a little bit sickened by the cloying falseness of the language used here, it's one of the main reasons why I no longer consider job offers from big US companies - I like to work with people who tell me what they think, not what they think I want to hear. Apologies for this sounding like an anti-American rant, I don't mean it in that way, but there is something very wrong with the false-friendly, euphemistic speech used by a lot of people and organisations over that side of the pond. I think a lot of it is really just "please-don't-sue-me" speech.

ratherbefuddled 13y ago
I absolutely agree. What I find extremely distasteful about what the article recommends is the total fakeness of everything. Were I on the receiving end of that sort of communication it would leap out as less than genuine and I'd be insulted. Straightforward honesty and integrity will get you much further than a personal brand.
- barrettabrooks 13y ago
  I don't think a personal brand and integrity are mutually exclusive ideas. In fact, I think the people who have great "reputations" or good "names" in their respective communities base that on their honesty and integrity. I'd be curious to know how you would alter the wording of one of the templates to be more honest and integrity-based.
yashodhan 13y ago
This pretense permeates American culture and it's one of the things that really gets to me, because my personality is very somber by nature. I talk to everybody as I would a close friend or neighbor, and this includes potential employers. I just can't seem to adopt default business lingo/customs, and this may ultimately be my downfall, but I'm not comfortable slapping on a fake persona.

shanelja 13y ago

It's funny because if the company didn't want you they they would simply not reply, yet you are expected to show a much greater level of care when dealing with them.

barrettabrooks 13y ago
This is a huge challenge, especially when we know it's the case. Most companies simply don't respond. It's personal preference, but I always err on the side of turning the other cheek and doing what I can to build new relationships.