A few weeks ago I was contacted directly by a tech company. Since I had been waiting on an final agreement for a 10% raise at my current company for 6 months, I decided to talk to them.
It turned out to be exactly the kind of work I was interested in and languages I wanted to code in. I aced all their technical interviews and was made an offer.
Today, both my lawyer signed off on the new contract, AND unanounced my boss gave me the raise I had been waiting for since last fall.
Nothing against my current boss and work. I love them all. I'm lucky. But the new company has much more interesting work. And they offered me a 100% pay increase PLUS equity.
If current company would have just given me the 10% when I asked, I probably would have ignored this message from the new company, just like I had been ignoring others like it for the last year.
Needless to say, I put in my 2 week notice on the same day I received my raise.