Should You Take the Job? 7 Ways to Know
Should I take the job? Great question!
One of the biggest fears about job searching is the fear that you won’t know if the new job you find is right for you. It’s the thing that often keeps us stuck and sometimes prevents us from even starting a new job search.
Maybe the new job will end up being as bad or even worse than where we are now!
You know the saying: the devil you know is sometimes better than a devil you don’t.
But that fear is the same thing that can keep you from finding something 5-10-20 times better than what you’re dying to get away from.
If you’re willing to take the leap.
In this article I am going to share 7 key things you can do to help you figure out whether you should take the job.
So that you can seriously reduce the risk that you’ll end up in a horrible place regretting making that next move.
If you’re still trying to figure out how to get the interviews that will lead to job offers, check out my Free Linkedin profile cheat sheet. It shows you how to revise your profile so that recruiters and hiring managers find you and offer you the chance to interview! Check it out here.
1. Confirm Promotion Potential
One of the reasons you’re looking to leave your current job may be because you want promotion opportunities.
You just simply haven’t been able to move up the corporate ladder fast enough.
If so, then this is definitely an area you need to look into before you make your move.
You of course can ask about this during the interview in the right context.
But if you’ve done that and still don’t have a clear picture of what’s possible then here’s another way to find out the likelihood of your being promoted and the timing of those promotions.
Look at the colleagues that you’ll be working with in your department as well as other colleagues in the organisation.
Check out their LinkedIn profiles to see if they’ve made moves in the company, and how often.
So for instance you can take a look to see how long someone in the organisation with the same title as yours was in the role before they got moved to the next level.
Or was your potential new boss previously in the role that you’ll be in if you accept the job? If so, how long were they in that role before getting promoted to that next higher level?
Do a little digging. Of course, some of this work can be done before the interview. That way you can ask the relevant questions while you’re face to face.
You can weave the knowledge you have into your conversations to get a more robust understanding of promotion opportunities.
But even afterwards, it will be valuable research to help you decide if you should take the job. Meaning, is this job the right fit for you.
2. Evaluate your Interactions
One of the absolute best things you can do to figure out whether people are happy at the company that you’re considering is to assess their choice of words and their body language during the interview itself.
Likely the people that were selected to interview you were done so because you’re going to be working with them. Or because they’re considered ambassadors for the company in some way.
So it can be challenging to figure out their own satisfaction level. But it’s definitely not impossible.
I know from my own personal experience of interviewing folks while being miserable at a job that it is extremely hard to continue to be upbeat and positive when an interviewee asks certain questions:
“How do you like it here?”
“What’s your favorite part about working here?”
“What’s been your own experience at XYZ Corp.?”
Ask those important questions and then watch their responses closely.
Are they enthusiastic or lukewarm when they’re answering? Do they answer the questions directly or do they hedge? Do they look you in the eye or fidget? Does their tone of voice change?
Do they describe the environment as challenging?
Or do they say things like the place is filled with “personalities” that need to be managed?
Language matters.
You might be able to probe a little bit during the interview.
But most likely you’ll just need to store that information for deeper analysis in case you get the offer.
3. Understand the work that you’ll be doing and where that work will be coming from
Are you planning to leave your current job because you don’t feel like you’re living into your potential or getting the type of challenge or responsibility you want?
A huge source of dissatisfaction when moving into a new job is feeling like you aren’t being challenged.
Or feeling like they weren’t ready for you or that they really didn’t know what work you were gonna be doing when you got there.
Sometimes companies are just disorganized.
Maybe they know that they need a new person because their current employees are stressed and overworked.
But they haven’t fully identified what the new person will be doing. Who they will be taking work away from to ease things up and who they’ll be supporting.
This is extremely important information for them to know and for you to know before you arrive because if you’re walking into a disorganised environment then you being there isn’t going to magically make it organized. Unless that’s your role coming in to perform.
If it hasn’t been clearly defined to all involved that you as a new person are going to be taking work off of Jim’s plate or working on that project with Sue, that could lead to tensions or resentments for the person currently working on it.
Especially if they didn’t know this was happening or the project you’ll be taking over is the one they actually would have wanted to keep.
In your interviews, ask questions about who you’re going to be working with and what projects you will be working on for those first 90 days.
Ask if the role is new or you’ll be replacing someone. If you’ll be replacing someone, then hopefully there is more understanding about the work you’ll be slotted in to do.
And don’t forget those promotions
If it’s a new role, then you need to dig a bit deeper to understand where your work is coming from.
Understanding this is also important from a promotions perspective.
You need to know who your boss and hopefully eventual sponsor will be.
If you’re coming into a role where you’ll be getting work from whoever has work on offer, then it will be harder for you to get any one person to be fully invested in you and your growth with the organization.
4. Tap into Your Network for Intel
You may know someone who works at the company already or used to work there.
Or maybe your network of friends and colleagues knows people who used to work there.
Reach out to them to get the real tea.
Any conversations that you have with anyone currently in the organization will likely be tempered because current employees will need to watch their words.
But former employees or your friends will be honest with you.
Ask all the questions that you didn’t feel comfortable asking directly to the people you’ll be working with or for.
Find out whether the organization as a whole or the team you’ll be on is known for people being disorganized.
Do they have a lot of people leave or transfer to other departments?
Are they good about promoting women or championing diversity?
In short, are they aligned with your values?
If their website says that they have a good work life balance policy, your friends and other former employees of the organization will be able to tell you whether that’s true or just something that looks nice on the website.
5. Ask More Questions After the Offer
So remember all of that observing you did during the interview about people’s word choice and body language and your instincts that you had about certain things?
Well now that you’ve gotten an offer, you can dive deeper.
Before you accept the offer, if you have some unanswered questions or reservations based on what you saw during the interview process, ask to speak to a couple of your new potential colleagues.
These would be the people that you interviewed with as well as some other people who you’ll be working with that you may not have had the chance to meet yet.
Ask for the opportunity to speak with them briefly before you make your decision
Say that you want to do this so you can get a better understanding of how the group or department works.
If, for example, you got a certain vibe about the environment from one of the people who would be your colleague, then speak with them again after you get the offer.
Or if doing your process you didn’t have the opportunity to speak with the person who would be your peer or someone you would be working closely with or someone that would be reporting to you then ask to speak with them.
And during that conversation try to get a better understanding of the environment and whether they are happy there. Find out what they like or don’t like about the way the organization or the group is run.
Of course, you’ll need to treat these follow up conversations as an extension of the interviews.
Anything you discuss will likely be reported back to the hiring manager. So be diplomatic in those calls.
6. Compare Their Values to Your Own
Most companies have their value or mission statement on their website.
A lot of times it’s just lip service but sometimes it really isn’t.
If your move to a new job is because you want to be in an organization more aligned with your values, then you need to dig in during your interview process to see if this new company is living up to the mission statement they set for themselves.
Sometimes this is evident in the way that the organization and its employees will speak to you during the interview process.
They may ask you what part of the mission most appeals to you.
They may talk about how their values are weaved into the things that they do on a daily basis.
But sometimes it may not be so straightforward, in which case you need to ask.
You can do that directly by asking about the mission and values. Or if you think through the areas that matter to you, you can ask broader questions focuses on those areas.
Ask the questions and then observe the responses.
If the people you’re speaking to don’t even know what the value statement is from the website, then that tells you something about how integrated that mission is into the day-to-day activities of that team or group, if not the organisation as a whole.
Do some research online about the company in the news. If you’re finding things that are directly against the mission then that speaks volumes.
Listen closely to all the responses and store up all the information you get to think through later after you’ve gotten the offer.
7. Trust your instincts
At the end of the day you need to just trust your instincts.
By the time you need to make the decision you’ve met with many people during the interview process; you’ve spoken with former employees and friends who are current employees; and you’ve asked the right questions and observed the answers.
If you allow yourself the space to really think through everything you’ve seen and heard and it really feels like this is not the right fit, then maybe it’s just not the right fit.
Go deep. Figure out whether your concern is more about fear of leaving what’s comfortable versus this new organization really not checking the boxes.
It might truly be that you are just scared to try something new. And I don’t think that’s a reason to stay where you are.
But if you truly believe after you’ve looked at everything the new company has to offer and doesn’t have to offer that this is not the place for you, then I would hate for you to take it just because they made you an offer.
The right company under the right circumstances in the right environment is available to you.
Your Next Step
Deciding whether to or not to accept a job is a great problem to have, am-I-right?? If even you’d love to have that problem, maybe it’s your interview skills. Check out these articles which will help you master the interview so you can get that offer:
Master Answers to These 5 Top Interview Questions to Nail Your Next Interview
