[reid]

> Using it as leverage with your current employer will damage your relationship with them, even if you win that negotiation.

I have used a better competing offer multiple times to negotiate with my employer of 13 years. My relationship with my superiors improved each time…

I believe how you go about this negotiation will determine if it damages the relationship, not if you do it or not.

[WalterBright]

Every case is different. I did not speak a universal truth. But in my experience and the experience of colleagues, what I wrote is what happens.

[sebastianconcpt]

And now I want to hear more about that how :D

    I believe how you go about this negotiation will determine if it damages the relationship, not if you do it or not.

In your experience, what things are a must in that way to go about that negotiation to keep a healthy or improved relationship?

[reid]

I believe Walter’s comment (sibling to yours) is a common experience because there isn’t a solid relationship with superiors before the negotiation takes place.

Building relationships takes time. Restarting new relationships every couple years via job hopping can impede such a conversation and make it feel more transactional than mutually beneficial. Since short tenure is more common, this may be another reason Walter finds his colleagues’ experience common.

When negotiating, I knew I was solving the right problems for my superiors and I wanted to keep working to solve their problems but for wages which were more competitive. My bosses understood, wanted the same, and used the offers from other companies to make the case for a raise or promotion.

I would not advise going into a negotiation simply with the notion “I can get paid more over here.” That wasn’t the point of the negotiation. If you go about it that way I believe it would be damaging. A conversation only about pay feels transactional which is damaging to these kinds of long-term relationships. Instead, I was truly desiring to continue my good working relationship with my bosses, but for more pay, and the negotiation was the way for both of us to win.

Over a long time, relationship building snowballs and can be even more effective. The last time I did this after working at the same place for a decade, I got a call from the company’s CTO a few hours after my talk with my manager. He was traveling on business but made time for me to discuss my concern since he knew my work. The call was the start of a satisfying new career direction in a new department.