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From time to time, IT recruiters do work with candidates who receive counter-offers from their employers.  While counter-offers seem pretty flattering, the truth is that IT staffing agencies would suggest you proceed with caution.  The promise of more money is always exciting, but there are 2 major cons to consider.

Con 1: Accepting a counter-offer may mean that you burn a lot of bridges. Firstly, obviously the IT recruiting firms you’re working with will terminate your relationship if you take a counter-offer.  All IT staffing companies have is your word.  If you break their trust and negate all their work in searching for your new IT job, they’ll likely never work with you again.

Secondly, you’ll also ruin your reputation with your potential new employer and perhaps other companies in the same industry.  IT staffing firms never find that employers are ok with it when a candidate takes a counter-offer.  In fact, that candidate is usually blacklisted at that employer.  Sometimes, this reputation carries on to companies that are connected to this employer, too.  Social media and LinkedIn make it especially easy for word to spread when you do something like accept a counter-offer.  In the age of a quick LinkedIn check for unofficial references, taking a counter-offer could seriously damage your professional reputation and hold you back from getting top IT jobs later on.

Lastly, with your current employer, you’re likely to have seriously damaged their trust in you as a loyal, reliable employee.  They may try to replace you quickly with somebody cheaper, they may retaliate in small ways, or you might find that you’re held back from future raises, promotions, training opportunities, transfers, etc. All of this makes it hard to be happy in your current IT role long term, which leads to con number 2.

Con 2: You’re likely just be delaying the inevitable and creating more work for yourself.  You reached out to IT recruiting companies for a reason: to find new IT jobs.  Technical recruiters rarely see a candidate who wants to leave their job solely for more money.  There are usually other things at play like work environment, maybe a bad boss, or an unreasonable work load.  You might feel ok with a pay bump now, but it won’t change any of the other factors for you long term.  Nobody loves job searching and all the work that comes with it.  Accepting a counter-offer will really just mean you have to search for jobs in IT all over again later when you realize you’re still unhappy at your current job (even with the pay bump).