Would you leave a larger company to get to a higher-paying and "potentially" less stable position, due to the "family" feel?

2016-04-27T19:10:27-04:00

The smaller company is stable but did layoffs during the recession, the larger company does layoffs all the time but I have 2 possible promotions coming down the pipe - 1 has been in works for 8 months, other was only offered around 90 days ago, both of the promotions lost their funding. The feel at the smaller company is amazing and seems like a perfect fit - What would the majority do?

Response by Sgt David G Duchesneau made Apr 27 at 2016 7:15 PM

2016-04-27T19:15:31-04:00

Go with your gut instinct Brother and usually you can't go wrong.

Response by CPT Private RallyPoint Member made Apr 27 at 2016 7:31 PM

2016-04-27T19:31:55-04:00

I'm currently looking at several companies and, having retired from the Army, I'm ready to not feel like a number. I am willing to work for a smaller company with a family feel for less money than chase the cheese in corporate America. But, if I was a Veteran with a long career still ahead of me, I might choose the corporate route. A larger exposure to different job positions and greater chance of promotion within the company could be much more attractive.

Response by SMSgt Thor Merich made Apr 27 at 2016 7:58 PM

2016-04-27T19:58:40-04:00

Who are you responsible for? If you have a spouse and kids to support, which job provides more stability for them? That would be my first question I would ask myself.

That being said, I worked 30 years for a small organization that had a the "family feel" for most of my career. It was a great place to work. But near the end of my career, the organization went sideways when the management was replaced with folks from a large organization and the "family feel" went away overnight. Lucky for me, it was at the end of my career and I had to endure the change for only a short time.

Look long range and determine if the long road is what works for you. Good luck with your decision.

Response by SGT Private RallyPoint Member made Apr 28 at 2016 3:30 AM

2016-04-28T03:30:22-04:00

When you step into a promotion it's always better to move to the smaller company. The smaller company will often be more patient as you stretch your legs. When you finish stretching your legs then feel free to move toward the bigger company.. There is no such thing as job security unless you are under contract for a duration. So either positions could disappear even within a week of starting. Which one is the better fit for you.

Response by SGT Jerrold Pesz made May 5 at 2016 6:29 PM

2016-05-05T18:29:14-04:00

I have worked for both kinds of company and the smaller one that feels like home is much better. Money and benefits are great but if you aren't happy there it is not worth it.

Response by TSgt Trevor Vander made Oct 21 at 2016 2:03 PM

2016-10-21T14:03:08-04:00

Wanted to post a follow-up to this, I did leave the stable position from the larger company and pursue the higher paying job with the smaller company. I worked there for 3 weeks, on the first day of my 4th week I was brought into the Vice President of the companies office, then the HR rep came in and I was asked to sit down. I was delivered the following: You are a damn fine worker and an excellent employee however you blew through what we expected to take around 6 years for you to complete in 3 weeks - and we simply can not afford to keep you at your current rate. I was let go by 8:15 that morning. I was hurt and felt a fool for leaving the larger company but belive it happened for a reason as I truly busted my butt there - I got them up to speed in a lot of ways - DFS replication across all of their sites, installed and configured print servers for all locations, built a large server and stood up ESXi and then replicated all of their physical servers to VM's and then brought them into the clustered environemtn for redundancy, honestly I could go on and on. The moral was they wanted someone to do what I did but I worked myself out of a job as they were paying me a lot. I took my licks and went full into job hunting mode, within 3 weeks I got picked up doing pretty much my dream job. I am back in the Space industry and back to working for the DoD which has a lot of comfort and it's a system I know how to thrive in. I started here back in July and in my first week took on a higher roll, that was followed by a promotion in my second week. I have bosses that are thankful to have me and super appreciative of my efforts and I wouldn't change a thing. I'm glad I left the larger company and super thankful for how this all ended up. It was a risk, and ultimately it paid off, but I did have to scrape the bottom a bit to make ends meet during that layoff, ended up being 5 weeks with no pay before I got my first check. I do not make as much money as I did with the smaller company, however this is a 10 year contract and I get to do CEH, Pen test, and all kinds of really fun and cool stuff on NASA, Cape, and Acension along with all sites associated with the space program!