Pros and Cons of Job Hopping

[sjoes006]

So the old way of doing things anyone who moves companies every two to three years was seen as unstable and not a good prospect.

But as employers have come to learn this generation is ambitious and will happily take the skills they have learned to move on to greener pastures. If a 20-something wants a real raise they must shop over to a competitor for work.

Pros- it's the quickest way to get a pay

bump when making a lateral move. Finally

wages for new hires and on the rise while many companies still have caps on annual raises that don't reflect the market. These companies often assume that landing the candidate means the competition is over and they could not be more wrong. They simply just made that applicant more marketable.

Cons- always the new guy proving yourself, loss of vacation days depending on how well you negotiate and sometimes being the company man and staying the course does lead to promotion. You'll have to change healthcare plans and even though your day to day job that you exceed in doesnot change the dynamics of the companies are different. Just when you figure out the game it's time to hop again.

Still studies show you lose in the six figuresovera decade by being that loyal company man and waiting for the big pay day.

Great benefits and 401k matching isn't enough to keep the younger generation in their seats. They do have new and valuable insight and most will leave no matter the pay if they don't see a future or feel the voice of the company.

Many companies aren't embracing the incoming generations influence. Thus many hop on pay looking for a company they can embrace.

Most want to get involved and have a chance to have an idea be heard if it benefits everyone. But in a market where wages are rising you can't retain those employees by instituting a 5% raise cap no matter their potential. They will leave if they are ambitious.

Im a fan of low hire pay with accelerated pay based on performance.

I think too many employers lose good employees by uniformly applying raises.

Staying longterm gives you social capital and maybe job security. Moving companies means risk if you aren't smart about it.

But as I see it I have a very low retention tool for the employees I want to keep and build into other roles if HR says he gets capped at a percentage no matter what.

Loyal employees will work for less than they know they could making jumping ship but not when it is desperately less. You lose good people that way.

Another assistant bites the dust.

[SmartButBroke]

I work in tech, too, but I have worked in several different fields. I job hop because I'm not happy, plain and simple. And for me, that's not about money or ambition or anything these types of articles/blogs normally discuss, but just, damn, can I find a job that doesn't give me stomach aches/migraines on Sunday and early weekday mornings because I am dreading work.

But what I've found is that when you job hop, 95% of the employers who will hire you are awful ones that either have horrible environments, unrealistic expectations and/or bad management combined with crappy pay (given what they expect). The majority of these places have a high turnover rate, which is the main reason they don't care if you job hop, but they have a high turnover rate because of what I just said about them being awful employers.

I know with tech, it partially depends on what you do in that field and partially depends on where you're located. Like you said, there is some normality to going from company to company, particularly if you're a programmer and/or deal with startups. But in my situation, it's not that I can't get jobs because I can, but I have messed myself up in terms of QUALITY and am kind of stuck in that cycle. I see myself eventually starting my own business and/or just writing books and getting away from the standard employer/employee nonsense altogether, and this is what a lot of millennials are doing, i. e. coming up with creative/nontraditional career paths because they're not happy with what's out there.

There just seems to be too much of a gap between there being all of these crappy jobs/environments/pay that are fairly easy to get and there being good jobs/environments/pay that are hard to get into without the perfect work experience and work history, seemingly with very little in between. I think it will hurt, certainly, some employers and sectors at some point as they drive younger, less tolerant/loyal/whatever you want to call it employees away from our current work system off to their own endeavors and/or continue to refuse to hire them in the first place because they don't meet unrealistic standards.

[jacquesvol]

During their first year in a company job hoppers are throw away employees. Employers LOVE that.
We once hired a job hopper to acquire a technique that wasn't present in our company. We promised him a big career. Once he had introduced it and a few people knew it we fired him without severance pay.
It was a VERY good deal for our company. :)

[sjoes006]

Haha yes! This is true. Or at least was. This generation tends to average three years at a company. But of course you play you card close to your vest.

I don't let any company mine me for intel or knowledge all at once. Pay to play kind of thing. My knowledge costs money so I don't give it away as a new hire. It is disloyal to my previous employer and devalues me.

[jacquesvol]

Job hoppers want to score right away so it's easy to lure them.

[dipta]

Many loyal employees only stay because of the sallary or they don't have the guts to jump ship, despite not being satisfied - which doesn't mean they actually add something to the company. Many times one good employee is doing the work of two or three other, but these have benefits and he doesn't, because he was hired later or some other reason.

Many job hoppers want the world, others just want to find a job where they're respected and can use their skills.
It goes to say that just because someone is in the place of an employer, it doesn't mean they're a good employer and can actually manage people.
It's a tough world.

[NatashaJ]

I don't think you should be loyal to a company in case they planning to screw you over you should just be able to switch jobs if that happens. Recently last month I got fired, I regretted not leaving like other girls do because our manager was the issue. I didn't see when I got firing coming because her reason was a bad reason. I don't get why she pick the dumbest reason to fired me I get it I'm not perfect I made mistakes but during that time I would correct my mistakes. Now I know if the manager doesn't like me I need to get the fuck out of there. I wish I did earlier to another job.

[coolbreeze]

Good. Mytake. Staying long term has risk and even jumping from job to job has risk. I guess it's important for a person to do what makes them happy. It says a person should be happy at their job and if not to find something that makes them happy.

[Eternallylucky]

Companies aren't loyal to their workers esp with horrible work culture. So job hopping is the result of that.

[Cosytoasty]

Good take, but i will say it depends a lot on the job. Something which requires a lot of teamwork, connections and liaising within the industry will not look favourably on a serial job hopper.

[sjoes006]

Oh those are the ones that help the most. I'm not talking every six months. But I work in a technical industry and it helps to have friends at competitors to stay on the inside track. I know what is going on in the industry because I've worked for competitors and still have strong ties with them.

We are a right knit industry however. We all job hop and know each other even though it is a rather large industry.

[Anonymous]

Good mytake!