Being a long-term company employee isn’t quite as revered as it once was. In fact, a lifelong corporate allegiance isn’t only becoming obsolete but actively warned against. Contemporary career trajectories now favor strategic mobility, with data indicating the average worker tenure is around 4.2 years—and many professionals change employers multiple times to pursue better opportunities, flexibility, or growth.
This article looks at why, and whether or not you should follow suit.
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Accelerated salary growth and financial benefits
At the core of jumping ship is that, simply, there is greater scope for increasing your salary when transitioning externally compared to working your way up internally. This is, in part, because the new company hiring you doesn’t know your exact current wage (this lack of wage transparency works both ways…)
Employees who strategically change organizations can anticipate average wage increases between 5% and 15%, which is generally inflation-beating. But in high-demand sectors, this could be far more, particularly if you’re jumping into a role of higher responsibilities.
Beyond just the base salary, such moves often unlock other financial benefits, like signing bonuses, equity options and enhanced benefits packages – all of these are commonly used by firms to attract talent, particularly in competitive markets with labor shortages. While the general lack of “volume” in the labor market benefits you, the opposite is true for your own “volume”.
This financial uplift is compounded by the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ finding that average employee tenure hovers at 4.2 years, suggesting a market acceptance of such mobility. In other words, employers will no longer judge your CV if you’re jumping about every four years. It’s not just that loyalty is no longer rewarded but no longer expected.
Levelling up your skills
Exposure to different organizational structures and project scopes is what’s going to broaden your experience. Novel challenges when you change employers aren’t just great for your own personal growth, but they can lead to acquiring new skills. And, if you find the current job isn’t exposing you to anything new, you can then move onto something new.
Each new role can mean learning new technologies, operational methodologies or even sector-specific knowledge. Being a data scientist for an AI firm and a cruise ship firm, for example, can lead to very different experiences.
It’s worth bearing in mind that you can easily forget these experiences as you go from one to another. Ideally, you will document what you can on your own site – a simple website builder can mean just using it as a professional diary. Of course, you can also do this with LinkedIn, which is more public, but it may or may not change the way you write (for better or worse). Business cards don’t hurt, either, for those that supplement their income with freelance work.
Change employers to avoid stagnation
External recruitment is like comparing what the world has to offer you vs just one company. You’re always going to see more interesting and varied job openings, but you’re also able to position yourself better for senior roles. While this is done because some people embellish their past role a little, meaning they fake it ‘til they make it (which is harder to do internally), it’s also a matter of finding someone willing to take a chance on you. And so, the more options, the better.
Remaining in a single organizational context can bring some loyalty rewards such as tenure or enhanced pension schemes, but these are far less common today. Therefore, while you wage might be going up along with inflation, this is the same as stagnating (neither growing nor shrinking). Zippia research indicates that around one-third of employees who changed jobs cited the pursuit of enhanced career development opportunities as a primary motivator.
Building a wider professional network
Each new job has a bunch of new employees that you can begin connecting with. A new ecosystem of professional contacts, from colleagues to mentors, and even going to more varied industry events.
The cumulative effect of this means broadening your professional network, which has a snowball effect on getting new jobs – or being offered better roles at previous jobs after a sabbatical.
Of course, anybody looking to become a freelancer should seriously consider this. Exposing yourself to the industry in as many different lights as possible, and meeting as many people as possible, both contribute to building up a clientele that can help you transition to self-employment.
Strategic moves for a dynamic career
Moving between jobs isn’t necessarily needed if you’re looking for a steady income with less stress. But, for those looking to progress up the corporate ladder and/or develop new skills, it’s highly recommended to change employers every four or so years, unless they’re actively investing in you through training and internal hire opportunities. It’s proven that moving jobs frequently helps grow wages, and so it’s also worth considering that before tying yourself down with a property in a certain location.
