So....I got a job offer. Now gotta figure out what to do.

Skip over the -italicized text- to avoid the over-explanation I'm prone to.

Ok, I've been at my current job 6 years. I was here 3 years before getting laid off in 2009 along with a LOT of other folks around the country. -After things stabilized my then-manager tried to for years to get me to come back. I declined because my old job required a lot of travel. I didn't want that anymore. He essentially created a position for me, and I accepted an offer and came back 6 years ago.- 
The company has things I like, and things I don't, like every other job out there. 
Late in 2019 my family decided to move to alleviate health concerns for my wife and youngest son. Our house was scheduled to go on the market March 16th 2020, the world shut down on March 13th. Our move has been on hold.

We are ready to start pursing a move again. My current employer has not been favorable to work-from-home, -though I've been doing it 100% for the last 14 months with my manager noting that my productivity has improved with the lack of distractions in the office.- I have not talked to my current manager about my desire to move and work remotely because I don't want to show my cards, lest they find my replacement before I find theirs.  The new manager currently has one remote worker and would like to have everyone 100% remote, but he's not sure if that'll happen. This one guy is the test case.

So I'm going to outline the pros and cons of each (current job, potential job) below and see how things look:

Current job:
Pros:
I know the company and the folks I work with. It's the evil you know, vs the evil you don't know.
Higher pay
More vacation*
 

Cons:
I know that I will ALWAYS have a work-load that is 300% more than 1 person can be done. That's a stress for me, though my manager understands that and his expectations are realistic
The work-from-home potential is unknown. New CEO starting in a few weeks. Who knows what that brings
*Due to work load, I have a hard time taking my vacation as it is, and I usually end up putting in about 20% time so I aren't hit so hard when I come back from not resting and not relaxing.

 

Potential job:
New and exciting skills and software that will make me more marketable in the future. This is kind of a big deal. The software I'd be using is big in my field. Not having experience with it has prevented me from applying to dozens of jobs over the last year. 

Cons:
Less pay (though I can totally live on that)
Less vacation (I have a HARD time taking my current time off due to work load)
Uncertainty of remote work possibility
More than 40 hours a week. Not sure how long that'll last, but when it goes away, I'm making less money than I am now. 

Here's what I'm currently thinking. When I get the official job offer (the contract house is currently trying to negotiate a few more bucks, and clarify my need to be able to work remotely) I'll tell them I need a few days to think about it. At that time, explain to my current manager that I have an offer. I'm not looking to leave, but I need the ability to work 100% remotely. I fully expect they'll try to get me to stay. At that time, I'll tell them I need to be able to continue to work remotely, and I need that in writing. 

-If they provide that, I suspect I would stay. but I'm not going to give them an ultimatum. But if they don't, do I accept the other offer? Man, this whole being an adult and having others depend on you is tough.- 
 

I'd really shy away from mentioning to your current employer that you have another offer already. No matter how you say it, it is sort of the nuclear option since it IS an ultimatum at that point. 

I'd be having the conversation with current employer now about how you will need to be 100% remote in order to stay - otherwise life will force you to move on. 

I would talk to your current manager, especially if they're a proponent of work from home. The other option sounds like a very good one, but reading between the lines it sounds like you'd prefer to stay in your current role, but work remotely.

Your employer will likely find it impossible to replace you, especially with your knowledge of the company and your workload.

There is going to be a huge work from home reckoning over the next few years as everyone tries to find the right balance post-COVID. Many people are not willing to return to the physical workplace full-time (for a variety of reasons), and it's going to be interesting to see how everything shakes out. My guess is that once companies start losing their best and brightest, they'll adjust their policies.

First thought: Remote work is 100% necessary. The new job doesn't give you that. It sounds like the ONLY benefit right now is to get the software on your resume. 

Second thought: Tell the new job that you're considering it, but the lack of vacation and the lower pay is making you hesitant. The fact that you can't take all of your vacation currently is not relevant to that specific negotiation. 

Questions to ask yourself:

• You can't take all of your vacation. Could you take all of the vacation at the new gig? Is the vacation at the new gig the same that you're able to take now?
• With less money than you're making now, does this move retirement farther off? Don't forget to factor in raises into that as they compound on themselves.
• You're getting an offer for this job despite not having the software experience. Why? And where I'm going with that is, why is the lack of that experience stopping you from applying to other jobs that say they require it? I can almost guarantee that it isn't that hard to learn and other companies will train you in it too.

As with anything, I would look at your priorities and prioritize them accordingly.

From what I'm reading, your priority is 100 percent work from home. Your current job does this and seems amenable to continuing to do so.

The new job offer does not. This means the new job offer is useless to you unless they agree to 100 percent work from home. 

Really it sounds like you need an option 3 more than anything

Edit:  Other people covered most of what I was going to say, but I'll leave this:

Honestly, I think you're looking a bit too short-sighted.  Can you come up with what an ideal situation would look like in 5 years for you?  Is the new company willing to work towards that vs. the old?  Basically, instead of listing up front what the pro vs. cons are, start by listing the goals and working backwards to that.

Learning new skills is always valuable, although you may need to move to capitalize on the value after you've learned them...

It sounds like the new software is a big part of the attraction of the new job.  If your existing company brought in that software, would that convince you to stay, at least long enough to build up transferable qualifications in it?  If Yes, is that in the cards?

I'll clarify. Well, not really clarify, but put in some info I forgot to add. 
my current manager is 100% work from home. But he doesn't make that decision. Our current CEO is 100% against work from home, just because he says so. 
to further complicate things, the current CEO has only days left, with no successor named. 
 

mtm said:

You're getting an offer for this job despite not having the software experience. Why? And where I'm going with that is, why is the lack of that experience stopping you from applying to other jobs that say they require it? I can almost guarantee that it isn't that hard to learn and other companies will train you in it too  
 

the potential manager said he wants me for my current skillset, but also for other skills he wants to implement down the road. Creating videos and 3d animations. His group (documentation and training) is headed that way, and he way to leverage that knowledge. 

DrBoost said:

I'll clarify. Well, not really clarify, but put in some info I forgot to add. 
my current manager is 100% work from home. But he doesn't make that decision. Our current CEO is 100% against work from home, just because he says so. 
to further complicate things, the current CEO has inky days left, with no successor named. 
 

Current CEO is old school. New CEO has a much better chance of seeing that it is 2021. I wouldn't jump to a potentially worse situation - and this sounds to me like it has high potential of being worse.  

Take a look at the two positions I posted. No problem with being WFH and remote. 

z31maniac said:

Take a look at the two positions I posted. No problem with being WFH and remote. 

Unfortunately, I don't have any of the skills required. 
I did finally get an official offer letter. This is through a contract house, so the verbiage isn't as concrete as I'd like. 
as per my request to WFH, the offer says "Ability to work fully remote presented as a requirement for future to coming on the team"

So, it's not quite black and white. But I'll say this. During the interview the interviewer was the one to mention they he wants his whole team to work from home. Before I said anything about working from home. He currently has one person working from 700 miles away as the test bed. 
that does make me feel like he's not actively trying to blow smoke. 
 

still on the fence

DrBoost said:

still on the fence

What's your 5/10/15 year goal?

Skip the games and ('not an') ultimatum, and just go with the new job. Your words and actions are not that of somebody who doesn't want to leave.

In reply to Driven5 :

I don't believe in staying.  If the job blows and they up the pay to stay it's going to blow in 6 months.  

Just some data points to add to your arsenal.  My current employer has been very anti WFH since the dawn of time.   Very old school mentality and we are a production site so its inevitable that some people do need to be there.  However this past year has changed the way the whole world views remote work.  Its now a fact of life.  The workforce has for the most part proven that we can do our jobs remotely and it is an expectation that an employer can support that.

Our severely head in the sand, old school, management has even warmed to the fact that if they want to be competitive in the hiring market they have to be open to the option.   You may hear the upper guys talk a good game and rail against it but if they are at all attuned to the current job market and the drastic shift that has come about due to the past year then they are doomed to fail if they arent open to the change and you should not be ready to go down with that ship.