The Dilemma of Job-Hopping vs. Loyalty in Pursuit of Professional Success

Feeling pressured to move just because people have ingrained in you that moving every 2/3 years is the best and fastest way to progress and you think that if you don’t you will fall behind?

Let’s be honest it’s not uncommon to hear that if you want to achieve a high salary fast you should be moving regularly and that people who stay at the same business for 5/10/20 years + don’t ever see the uplifts in salary you can see if you do make those regular moves.

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Whilst this can be true, there is definitely a few things to consider:

• Moving every 2/3 years can do more bad than good in the long term if you’ve repeatedly done this throughout your career. It can be perceived as a lack of commitment for the long-term and go against you at certain points
• Building long term relationships is hard if you are constantly moving – this could be with colleagues, peer groups and senior leaders with who you will no doubt cross paths at some point
• You may never become an expert in any area as it takes years to gain full knowledge in most specialisms of the actuarial field and even then, it’s a changing landscape with new regulations, world events and an evolution of systems to create efficiencies
• Unsustainable salary increases – most businesses have salary bandings and budgets and whilst you will see increases for the first few moves, you will hit the ceiling for your experience fast and then find it hard to find a new role as your experience doesn’t justify the salary you are looking for compared to your peers. Unless you are happy to take a pay cut
• Future employers see you as a risk – hiring is a huge investment, so if a employers see 4 different businesses in 5 years on your CV there is a high chance, they will question your regular moves in short period of time

Similarly staying at a business for 8+ years can also have it’s downsides:

• Skills gap - If you stay in the same role and just progress through the ranks there will be noticeable skill gap as you most likely haven’t had the opportunity to move within business units, vary the scope of work and ultimately, get to know a single business inside and out (not a bad thing) but employers might think you have a less diverse and evolved set of skills than a candidate who has mastered a broader range of job
• Salary – over the last 12-18 months, we’ve seen and moved many candidates who have almost been penalised for their loyalty and who have been severely underpaid for their experience. Why? Because businesses have been able to offer their employees regular pay rises to seem like progression but the external market has shifted many times to increase the value of your experience and people are being brought into roles more junior but being paid more as the market rate has shifted
• Progression – we’ve seen far too many times that people who have been loyal have missed out on progression opportunities as compared to their peers who have moved externally to progress. It can be rather subjective but naturally, if you work for a relatively flat structured business, the progression may not be there and as a result the work/responsibilities can’t and don’t change
• Building a varied network – you’ll only ever build relationships with your colleagues, your clients, your stakeholders but the market is much bigger and those who spend a long time at one business become institutionalised and their network often starts and stops with where they work
• Limited systems and process knowledge as you’ll only ever know one system, one way of working (as that’s how it’s always been done) and often in this market, there can be resistance to any real change due to the scale and where the competition may have evolved, your knowledge and experience may be outdated and therefore less transferrable
• Ambition – staying at one business can feel comfortable but nothing kills ambition more than staying comfortable. Moving more frequently provides an opportunity to challenge yourself, build new work relationships, continue to learn new ways of working and by staying in one business for a long time, the desire for all of these things goes away

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As I said above, there are (or can be) downsides to both sides and ultimately it can be rather subjective and depend on both your professional or personal circumstances. I could list out several other reasons to add to those above but my final take is this:

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1. Yes, while job hopping can hurt your chances of getting hired, so can staying put
2. If you weren’t promoted, be prepared to show that you added responsibilities and learned new skills
3. If you’re no longer learning new things and/or enjoying your work, it may be time to make a change

The market is and no doubt will continue to be busy going into 2024 so if you’d like some advice, some more context on any of the above or just a peer-group overview to see where you compare, drop me a message to discuss.

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