[chanced]

Depends on a few factors:

- Type of employment. Is it a contract or "perm" position? Contract positions are expected to hop. It's part of the game.

- Timing. Are you in the middle of something? Can someone else easily pick it? Bailing in the middle of a big migration will leave a nasty taste in managers' mouths.

- Rank. Are you a CTO or a developer? The higher up you are, the longer you're expected to stay.

Changing jobs is something that you should do, in my opinion. Here's why:

- Versatility. You'll be exposed to new challenges/solutions, practices, and possibly languages.

- Network. If you do it properly, you'll establish a lot of new contacts in the industry

- Exposure. The same job at different companies may have different responsibilities and roles. You'll get a chance to build new skills or determine weaknesses.

- Pay. If you're hopping for the right reasons and doing it right, it is hands down the best way to get a pay boost. Once you're "in" a bigger company, they'll put you on a standardized raise ladder. Sure, you can get promoted but those will often have calculations involved that reduce your elevation. With hopping, you can set expectations (I need X% more to jump).

Problems with job hopping:

- Bridges. You'll burn them.

- Fatigue. It's a lot more time and emotionally consuming than you'll realize to look for work. Interviews are exhausting (and intentionally so).

- Loyalty. You won't have any.

- Rank. It's hard to climb a ladder when you're jumping off of them.

[sambeau]

  - Rank. It's hard to climb a ladder when you're jumping off of them.

My experience has been the opposite. To move up a rank I've had to shift company. In pretty much every company I have worked in I have moved further away from the top management every year I've stayed.

I suspect this is to do with two factors: I have mostly been working in fast-growing companies; I have had managers who have had difficulty promoting from within — they see the people they have as hired for a role as the best people to do that role and new roles as requiring new people to do them.

I don't mind missing out on a promotion as long as I am considered for a role and the person replacing me is more experienced (so I might learn from them). But sadly, the people coming in have generally been job hoppers with less experience.

I would now consider myself a job hopper (despite having no intention of moving in the foreseeable future) — I've doubled my income and have a more satisfying job. I'd keep doing it if I didn't like my current job as much as I do.

My advice is to jump in two's, a hop and a skip: do one for the career (and the wallet) then quickly jump sideways to one you prefer. You can then stay put for a while until things go stale or pear-shaped and you then plan the next hop-skip.

It has worked well for me.

[moondowner]

Plus in some companies it's very hard to advance, so it's crucial with which position you start.

There are cases where people go from one company (A) to another (B), and then after some time get back at A and get a better position. If they stayed at the same company the whole time they wouldn't be able to do that.

[potatolicious]

Exactly this. I left one of my previous employers after I got passed over a second time for a SDE1 -> SDE2 jump. It's been two years since I left the company and I've been repeatedly approached by their recruiters for SDE3 positions ;)

Sticking around for promotions is a fool's errand.

[mooreds]

Wow. If that doesn't scream "broken system!", I don't what does.

[FelixP]

> Bridges. You'll burn them.

As a manager, this is definitely not always the case. If someone is leaving for the "right" reasons (namely, they have an awesome opportunity somewhere else), then that's great. While it may be an operational disruption, one of my goals as a manager is always to want the best for the people on my team - even if that means leaving.

[GrinningFool]

I've always wished I could be comfortable having a frank discussion about this with my management (previous jobs - actually quite happy where I am for the moment).

It would be great to be able to say "hey I'm thinking it's time to move on" and have a reasonable discussion about it (exploring other things in the company, etc) instead of being concerned that they now consider me a flight risk and will start trying to find a replacement.

[toomuchtodo]

You are rare, but good people.

[gaius]

Sounds like the Cravath System http://thedailywtf.com/Articles/Up-or-Out-Solving-the-IT-Tur...

[gaius]

The higher up you are, the longer you're expected to stay

This is partly it, but also, it's because as you get more senior, your personal network within the company counts for more and more. If you're going to make big, potentially controversial decisions, then you can't afford to argue every point - you'll get nowhere. You need a critical mass of people who already trust and respect you, and who you trust and respect in return, so you don't have to get bogged down in managing day-to-day stuff. That takes years to develop.

I have seen this a few times, people who job hop for promotions then end up in a position where they're so high up they're starved of oxygen - none of their direct reports take them seriously, ringleaders in the middle ranks openly disrespect them, in a few months they're gone. That's damaging to the organization too, partly because it paralyzes it, and partly because it destroys morale (and confidence in the top leadership).

[rschmitty]

Seems harder to climb the ladder staying put. Also much harder increasing your salary by staying put.

I've found both rank and salary increase with a hop. That being said I've changed maybe every 5 years

[djKianoosh]

I like this answer. And I also think as long as you can speak to why you made each move in a positive way you'll be fine. I'm not a recruiter, but I've done hundreds of tech screens when I was at a consulting firm to know the difference when someone's BS'ing through an explanation of a job change.

So I didn't have a set bias for/against people that moved, say, every 6 months, or every 2 years. You just had to have a good explanation.

In the DC/Virginia area, from my experience, most people moved every 6-8 months, or every 2-3 years. Former were more contractor-types, latter were more employee-types. All generally speaking of course. I have both types on my resume, cause I've done both ;-)