How good is to serve same employer life time?

Those, who serve an employer for long time, hesitate to ask this question to self or others! And those, who keep hopping from one to another employer, obviously don’t want to ask this question. Irony is that all of us want to be under the illusion of belief that what we are doing is good!!

There are several large multinational or iconic organizations, to name a few – General Electric, Siemens, IBM and Exxon Mobil, which most employees enter after their education and exit only on retirement. They cannot imagine their life outside of such organizations.

How good is getting addicted to what you consider as good?

Blessings of serving an employer for long term or life time!

  1. You get fully accustomed to company culture and values.
  2. You gain formidable expertise in the way company operates.
  3. Higher job security.
  4. You gain trust and respect of company management.
  5. Company considers you as dependable and loyal.

Banes of sticking to one employer!

  1. You get too much used to what you have been doing and hence, would be averse to changes.
    This would put you into comfort zone and its consequent perils.
  2. If you are dynamic and diligent, you would be hungry for changes, which same organization may not be able to offer at least in the time frame, you may aspire or desire.
    This would bring you into conflict with your seniors and you would lose congenial work environment.
  3. Often, you would lose opportunities to those, who are equally or even less good performers but more likely to quit the organization. Management of companies always prefer to retain them, ironical though! At that time, you would feel hurt that you are being taken as granted and your loyalty is of little value!
  4. If your career path, if worked out by company, does not foresee eventual promotion to one of top executive positions, you definitely run the risk of being sidelined in due course.
  5. You would be prone to get drawn in company politics.
  6. You would tend to be conservative and risk averse.
  7. Time would make you aloof from outside corporate world and market dynamics.
  8. Your overall personality development would take a severe beating.
  9. At a later stage of employment, your intimate knowledge of how company operates would be treated more as liability than asset by your management!
  10. Over time, you would create more adversaries than admirers!

What can make one employer tick!

If the organization you serve is large in size, transnational, has multiple vertical businesses and your management is progressive in developing employees, rewarding for their loyalty through opportunities and job rotation, then sticking to one and same employer could click.

You have to be careful in evaluating above factors. There is lot of lip service in the name of career opportunities and job rotation. If you are too good in certain function/s, your reward could be that you stay put there!

Ideal course for an employee!

Don’t stick around at one place for too long. You are bound to lose respect and race!

Life is all about Change! Change brings you colossal possibilities. 

Set your goals where you want to be in a defined time frame and make sure that every step that you take is an incremental movement in direction of your goal/s. Focus on being smart and savvy, persistent and passionate.Then, any employer can turn out to be the best for you and you should give your best to employer. Demand duties commensurate with your competence and deliver results. If everything works well, continue to deliver but not more than about 10 years and then seek change to a new employer; but leave current one with grace and on a good note. Gain experience with 2 to 4 employers.

Now is the time to introspect. Be rational and not emotional in giving merit rating to employers you have served. Communicate with no.1 rated employer and see the possibility of joining him back or otherwise his competitor no.1!

If you do the above, your stake and stock would see multifold rise!

Comments

2 responses to “How good is to serve same employer life time?”

  1. Rudra Avatar
    Rudra

    This particular post has been a hot topic of discussion everywhere! 😉

    So you have 5 ‘blessings’ and as many as double the ‘banes’ as far as sticking to one employer is concerned… interesting!! 😉

    So does your 3rd ‘bane’ suggest that we should keep looking for opportunities outside and not let our current employer realize that they can take us for granted?? 😀

    Yes, you hit the nail on its head when you mentioned, “rewarding for their loyalty through opportunities and job rotation”. This was exactly what I was thinking all-through your post till now. If I was the CEO of my company, I would have done the same!! In my opinion, intra-company transfers (for those who serve long) is the best way to go. Of-course that leads to a proper job-rotation.

    If an employee works 5 yrs at Microsoft India, then 5 yrs at Microsoft USA and then 5 yrs at Microsoft Europe, it’s as good as (probably better than) switching 3 small multinationals within one country, isn’t it… and hence solves all the problems!!

    1. Murli Avatar

      I am thankful for your views!

      No; 3rd bane is not suggesting keep looking for opportunities outside. It is talking about pitfall, when employer gets a feeling that you would stay and others may leave. Let us not forget that there is a price and prize for everything!

      You seem to be talking about an ideal world. Real world in never ideal – please refer my last post. In practice, companies rotate jobs of only few select; not that as a rule, everyone gets a chance. Remaining with same organization, while getting opportunity to serve its other offices is good; but you still cannot avoid the disadvantage of getting to know same company culture and challenges all the time. On an average, this should not matter; but, for high fliers, it does present some constraints!

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