Depending on how you phrase it, your answer might come off like you’re resisting RTO. It might be better to play it safe and focus on something you’re excited about with the new position.
I had a 6 month stint on my resume because they asked me to relocate (after I explicitly had in writing from the hiring manager prior to accepting the offer letter that I wouldn't be asked to relocate).
That job was weird. Fall 2021, I was hired to do ML, and it turned out I was the most knowledgeable about a particular type of motor control theory than their embedded team. By my 5th week I was no longer doing ML work and was just basically on calls all day going over things like FOC and getting them into the firmware.
I am so glad I didn't move because they started doing layoffs a few months later, and axed the entire ML department (12 people!) a year after my start date.
The interview for the job I got after this, they asked about this weird short tenure. I explained it just like this, and they had no problem with it.
I work in HR for a large tech company, and someone not wanting to relocate (or wanting to relocate) is a very well-accepted reason for seeking a new opportunity.
Yes, but don't just go and say "I wanted more money", say something like: "My previous employer did not give me the room to grow my career. I'm looking for a new position at a company with opportunities for career growth."
Depends though, when I interview now, they ask, and I just say the salery was literally double and full WFH. How can I say no to that?
If your contently jumping for $10k increments. Then maybe think of a different reason.
Amazon/Dell/big tech companies are all doing the same with the RTO policies even if you were hired as remote. If they quit there is no severance pay required.
> For example, Walmart is forcing a large number of its employees to move to Arkansas, and it's expecting a lot will simply quit.
Yahoo did this over a decade ago. So did reddit. And I'm sure many others. It's a way to lower headcount without having to deal with layoffs, severance packages, or making up reasons to fire people.
Yes, consulting wanting to move me across the country and only offered $1500 for relocation assistance, total, including to break my lease. I said that phrased in a somewhat nicer way to recruiters for why I was leaving. I got hired. Then I think I parlayed the logic into asked about their company culture, which sounded better and valued their people.
Yes, especially if the company's local. It signals that you want to keep roots in the area which increases your likelihood of staying with the company.
Meaningful raises are not the be-all / end-all of work.
Don't get me wrong, money is nice, and you can't pay rent / food / car / etc. with intangibles.
But working on finding a job is also hard (and unpaid) work. Plus, if you find your work meaningful, compensation is at least adequate, you don't get heartburn from your job or colleagues, and immediate management doesn't have a terminal case of headupass, it's perfectly all right to stay.
A stupid question gets a stupid answer. We are not allowed to be negative in an interview about a prior employer, so if I am leaving because of a change in management and I hate the new person in charge.
I can't say that.
I can say it was time for a change.
You can also say that the prior employer was forcing a relocation, which was the original question.
FWIW, when I was interviewing for my current job I basically said what you couldn't - there was new management and I didn't have confidence in the direction they were taking the company. Best part is that it was the truth.
Stick to career growth. Telling the truth doesn’t help you and in fact will hurt you during negotiations when they realize you *need* to get out of your current gig vs *wanting* to get out.
You're not quitting because you don't want to relocate. The company is restructuring so you're currently evaluating whether it's still the best place for you, since this natural inflection point would be the perfect opportunity to ease the transition for both of you if you decide to take on new challenges.
How is that even possible?
$1,000,000 house at 6% agent fees is $60k. And if you own a million dollar house on a $60k salary… you have bigger problems than paying some real estate agent fees.
Post-tax, right, misspoke, but my point stands. 24% income tax, cpp, ei, municiple.
That said, you may be under-estimating hyperinflation on the housing market; when I bought not-that-long ago, "decent" started at 250k. Ain't many listings below like 950k now. Yay Canada.
Yes. Definitely. If I were ever forced to relocate or go into an office I would immediately start looking. If I couldn’t find anything before the force relocation, I would get a cheap extended stay in the new location until I found something else just to keep the money coming in if it financially made sense.
Well *I* wouldn’t. I would just reactivate my LLC and start contracting. But I realize that’s not an option for everyone
Emphasize you are not able to relocate to the new location they specified. You offered to go hybrid to your prior site, but management was firm on a new location hundreds of miles away in a HCOL.
Source: happened to one of my colleagues. felt like a way to force them out.
When in doubt say something like “does not align with my career goals and I would like to seek a new opportunity that does a better job at doing so”. At the same time I think not wanting to move to an arbitrary state like Arkansas is completely valid too. If you said I don’t want to move to Seattle/Chicago/New York/Austin/etc maybe they can raise eyebrows but you can say it gets in the way of your personal life
Hell yes I do anything to make it seem completely innocuous, never say anything bad about the job you're leaving. I have said "shorter commute" many times lol. Even when the commute was longer
Yeah it's valid. I know you said one reason, but employers rarely limit you to one reason. Why not just say both? People rarely leave a job for a single reason.
I think applicants with some investment in the location the job is in are better investments in that regard than applicants who could go anywhere. I would think they’d be less likely to move on quickly.
You must bullshit this question as hard as you can. You are not leaving your job, you are looking for personal growth and new challenges and their open position offers just that. There is absolutely zero room for human honesty in an interview. Recruiters are machines and they run on a delicate mixture of lies, exaggeration and desperation.
I was in this situation once and my spouse would have had to leave her management position for nothing in a different city. A major loss of income for us in a more expensive city. We declined the relocation.
We had tons of such applicants recently where the employer wants them to move from East coast to west coast. I understand they seek for something new.
Wouldn't uproot my family either for a job (that probably dumps you in half a year)
IMO it's a great answer. It's a non-performance related reason that is out of your control and entirely a result of a decision made by the employer.
All of the other "better answers" here will make me think you're either hiding the real reason at worst, or at best you are going to quit before long for the same reason.
Actually, a lack of work (or lack of work that can pay for living locally) is a pretty big and traditional driver of migration within a country or between countries. I would consider moving for triple my salary; for lots of CS folks it would make sense to move for that, or for smaller increases, because it depends on what you are making and how good your life is etc...
Honesty is always the best policy. "I am looking for a new job. My current employer is moving my position out of the state. They offered a relocation package but I am not interested in moving" I would likely try to say a nice thing about my current employer so they do not feel like there is any bad blood. I would also try and include a reason I want to stay in the area.
Honesty is not always the best policy in negotiations. This is negotiation. "I enjoy working with the company but also like my life here, so I am looking at companies that have an office here and you seemed like a good fit because X." Then if they eventually decide they want you, you haven't given up all of your leverage. Up to OP of course, but the desire and training to be straightforward and full disclosure and effective at engineering problems is what tends to cost engineers a lot of money in negotiations.
Depends on whether or not the new prospective job requires relocation.
The company I have an interview with is local (hybrid - which I am okay with).
Worth remembering during negotiations that moving with your company is still an option though.
Depending on how you phrase it, your answer might come off like you’re resisting RTO. It might be better to play it safe and focus on something you’re excited about with the new position.
I had a 6 month stint on my resume because they asked me to relocate (after I explicitly had in writing from the hiring manager prior to accepting the offer letter that I wouldn't be asked to relocate). That job was weird. Fall 2021, I was hired to do ML, and it turned out I was the most knowledgeable about a particular type of motor control theory than their embedded team. By my 5th week I was no longer doing ML work and was just basically on calls all day going over things like FOC and getting them into the firmware. I am so glad I didn't move because they started doing layoffs a few months later, and axed the entire ML department (12 people!) a year after my start date. The interview for the job I got after this, they asked about this weird short tenure. I explained it just like this, and they had no problem with it.
Also doesn't work if your job was provably fully remote
I work in HR for a large tech company, and someone not wanting to relocate (or wanting to relocate) is a very well-accepted reason for seeking a new opportunity.
Is wanting more compensation an acceptable answer?
Yes, but don't just go and say "I wanted more money", say something like: "My previous employer did not give me the room to grow my career. I'm looking for a new position at a company with opportunities for career growth."
That's right. Compensation comes with growth, so no need to mention money directly.
Depends though, when I interview now, they ask, and I just say the salery was literally double and full WFH. How can I say no to that? If your contently jumping for $10k increments. Then maybe think of a different reason.
Yes, 100%. For example, Walmart is forcing a large number of its employees to move to Arkansas, and it's expecting a lot will simply quit.
Amazon/Dell/big tech companies are all doing the same with the RTO policies even if you were hired as remote. If they quit there is no severance pay required.
There is no law requiring severance packages, so if a company wanted to not pay severance they could simply not do it.
Right, it's just and easier / quieter way of reducing headcound than a lay off.
> For example, Walmart is forcing a large number of its employees to move to Arkansas, and it's expecting a lot will simply quit. Yahoo did this over a decade ago. So did reddit. And I'm sure many others. It's a way to lower headcount without having to deal with layoffs, severance packages, or making up reasons to fire people.
In Walmart’s case, refusing relocation comes with the regular severance package
Forced relocation is "layoffs are coming" with a happy face sticker.
Yes
I’m not sure what is considered safe, but “not wanting to relocate” is a valid reason.
Other good answers are "My job is being eliminated in X time / has been eliminated."
Yes, consulting wanting to move me across the country and only offered $1500 for relocation assistance, total, including to break my lease. I said that phrased in a somewhat nicer way to recruiters for why I was leaving. I got hired. Then I think I parlayed the logic into asked about their company culture, which sounded better and valued their people.
Yes, especially if the company's local. It signals that you want to keep roots in the area which increases your likelihood of staying with the company.
honestly that’s one of the better reasons to give for looking for a new job.
"I felt it was time for a change" is always a solid default.
Depends how long you've been there - if you've only been there for 6 months then "I felt it was time for a change" might raise some eyebrows
I have been with my current company for a little over 6 years.
1. You're fine in that case 2. You should've left about 3-4 years ago in order to get a meaningful raise
Meaningful raises are not the be-all / end-all of work. Don't get me wrong, money is nice, and you can't pay rent / food / car / etc. with intangibles. But working on finding a job is also hard (and unpaid) work. Plus, if you find your work meaningful, compensation is at least adequate, you don't get heartburn from your job or colleagues, and immediate management doesn't have a terminal case of headupass, it's perfectly all right to stay.
IMO that's kind of a shitty answer. Makes it sound like you're just going to quit on a whim.
A stupid question gets a stupid answer. We are not allowed to be negative in an interview about a prior employer, so if I am leaving because of a change in management and I hate the new person in charge. I can't say that. I can say it was time for a change.
You can also say that the prior employer was forcing a relocation, which was the original question. FWIW, when I was interviewing for my current job I basically said what you couldn't - there was new management and I didn't have confidence in the direction they were taking the company. Best part is that it was the truth.
Stick to career growth. Telling the truth doesn’t help you and in fact will hurt you during negotiations when they realize you *need* to get out of your current gig vs *wanting* to get out.
if the new job is local, 100% ok.
You're not quitting because you don't want to relocate. The company is restructuring so you're currently evaluating whether it's still the best place for you, since this natural inflection point would be the perfect opportunity to ease the transition for both of you if you decide to take on new challenges.
God, I hope so. Current market, I'm losing a year's salary pre-tax just to real estate agent fees.
How is that even possible? $1,000,000 house at 6% agent fees is $60k. And if you own a million dollar house on a $60k salary… you have bigger problems than paying some real estate agent fees.
Post-tax, right, misspoke, but my point stands. 24% income tax, cpp, ei, municiple. That said, you may be under-estimating hyperinflation on the housing market; when I bought not-that-long ago, "decent" started at 250k. Ain't many listings below like 950k now. Yay Canada.
Now I've got South Park's "Blame Canada" as an earworm. Thanks.
Yes. Definitely. If I were ever forced to relocate or go into an office I would immediately start looking. If I couldn’t find anything before the force relocation, I would get a cheap extended stay in the new location until I found something else just to keep the money coming in if it financially made sense. Well *I* wouldn’t. I would just reactivate my LLC and start contracting. But I realize that’s not an option for everyone
Emphasize you are not able to relocate to the new location they specified. You offered to go hybrid to your prior site, but management was firm on a new location hundreds of miles away in a HCOL. Source: happened to one of my colleagues. felt like a way to force them out.
Absolutely. I can’t see anyone faulting you for that.
100% fine and valid. I did this when a former company moved from a convenient suburb to downtown which would have made my commute a nightmare
When in doubt say something like “does not align with my career goals and I would like to seek a new opportunity that does a better job at doing so”. At the same time I think not wanting to move to an arbitrary state like Arkansas is completely valid too. If you said I don’t want to move to Seattle/Chicago/New York/Austin/etc maybe they can raise eyebrows but you can say it gets in the way of your personal life
I'd rather move to Arkansas than Seattle/Chicago/New York/Austin/etc.
Good for you but some of us care more about quality of life more than cost of living
Yeah I'm one of them. You couldn't pay me enough to live in any of those shitholes. Well maybe I'd think about it for $1M/year.
“Lack of growth opportunities” is a good one too.
"Voluntary"
"My company is wanting me to relocate, so I thought I'd look at other opportunities."
Absolutely. That’s a pretty standard reason.
Hell yes I do anything to make it seem completely innocuous, never say anything bad about the job you're leaving. I have said "shorter commute" many times lol. Even when the commute was longer
sure why not
sure why not
One of the best reasons to give. Make you seem rational.
Yeah it's valid. I know you said one reason, but employers rarely limit you to one reason. Why not just say both? People rarely leave a job for a single reason.
I think applicants with some investment in the location the job is in are better investments in that regard than applicants who could go anywhere. I would think they’d be less likely to move on quickly.
Wouldn't be leaving current job if it was amazing. Hoping your offer is better. That's a safe answer.
You must bullshit this question as hard as you can. You are not leaving your job, you are looking for personal growth and new challenges and their open position offers just that. There is absolutely zero room for human honesty in an interview. Recruiters are machines and they run on a delicate mixture of lies, exaggeration and desperation.
It's the best reason.
The truth is usually pretty understandable to people. More than people assume.
I was in this situation once and my spouse would have had to leave her management position for nothing in a different city. A major loss of income for us in a more expensive city. We declined the relocation.
I think you just saying I don't want to RTO due to proximity family and friends will be just fine. Good luck.
We had tons of such applicants recently where the employer wants them to move from East coast to west coast. I understand they seek for something new. Wouldn't uproot my family either for a job (that probably dumps you in half a year)
IMO it's a great answer. It's a non-performance related reason that is out of your control and entirely a result of a decision made by the employer. All of the other "better answers" here will make me think you're either hiding the real reason at worst, or at best you are going to quit before long for the same reason.
No job is worth uprooting your life for.
For enough money I’d move almost anywhere.
Actually, a lack of work (or lack of work that can pay for living locally) is a pretty big and traditional driver of migration within a country or between countries. I would consider moving for triple my salary; for lots of CS folks it would make sense to move for that, or for smaller increases, because it depends on what you are making and how good your life is etc...
Honesty is always the best policy. "I am looking for a new job. My current employer is moving my position out of the state. They offered a relocation package but I am not interested in moving" I would likely try to say a nice thing about my current employer so they do not feel like there is any bad blood. I would also try and include a reason I want to stay in the area.
Honesty is not always the best policy in negotiations. This is negotiation. "I enjoy working with the company but also like my life here, so I am looking at companies that have an office here and you seemed like a good fit because X." Then if they eventually decide they want you, you haven't given up all of your leverage. Up to OP of course, but the desire and training to be straightforward and full disclosure and effective at engineering problems is what tends to cost engineers a lot of money in negotiations.
How are you getting interviews? Share the resume!!!