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by mmh0000 744 days ago
Yes! I've done it several times. It's one of the best and most reliable ways to get a raise.

It's "business." Your manager isn't going to make a counteroffer, then wait a month and fire you. I mean, they might if they're a total D.bag, but I've not yet had that experience. And if I had, I'd already proven to myself and my manager that I could get a higher-paying job elsewhere. It'd be a minor annoyance on my side.

I don't want to give away specifics, so take these numbers with a lump of salt; the ratios are correct:

Went from $50k/yr [1]-> $80k/yr [2]-> $120k/yr [3]-> $205k/yr

[1] The company wanted me to stay and raised my pay to match the competing offers.

[2] The company wanted me to stay and raised my pay to match the competing offers.

[3] The company didn't want to pay that much, so I put in my two weeks and moved to a different company.

From my experience, I've found that requesting a raise without a competing offer often leads to a small or no increase in pay. However, when I've approached my manager with a better offer in hand, it has consistently resulted in substantial pay raises.

1 comments

I'd feel bad wasting the time of the other company just because my current one doesn't value me.
Why? You proved you're competent to the potential suitor by obtaining an offer. They got some valuable quality candidate interviewing experience which can be difficult to achieve, and you got a rock solid tangible improvement in your work QoL, even if the target ultimately didn't achieve their hopeful hire. Possibly they got some data that (to them) implies they should have offered more money. Win win. I would say a win for all of us because "more money".
Sure, I guess you could play it back and forth like your sibling comment implies, that seems risky though (you might end up with no offers).

Also why do I want to stay with the cheap people? They proved to be unable to deliver market rates for my efforts unless I make a big scene about it. I don't like to do business with people like that.

If you want to get the best deal, you always have to shop around and negotiate.

No employers going to give you the maximum that they can afford without negotiation or a reason to. It's not being cheap, it's common business sense.

There might be other factors at play, though. Like one company I stayed at for a while was only a lovely 45 mins walk from my house, and that was excellent for my mental health every morning and afternoon. Trading that for an hour in the car would mean I'd want more to offset it.
They're always welcome to offer more money.
Why? Everything is a negotiation and you're not wasting their time.

It's no different than price shopping between mechanics. You can do that while being clear on your intentions and not making any promises you can't keep