A few years ago, I was working as team leader for a small department (me and two other guys) at a company that had just gone through a merger. We were responsible for highly specialised work – geographic and demographic analysis and targeting.
I start noticing that various managers (including mine) obviously now make more money after the merge. New cars, fancier new clothes, not to mention various corporate retreats and other perks, while me and the team are still on exactly what we made before the merge.
Following the second year of “sorry team, there's no money for pay rises this year”, I step into my boss's office to talk to her about a pay rise. By this point I've been with the company 7 years, and my team is directly responsible for us gaining and keeping the biggest, most lucrative accounts the company has. For the record, I'm making significantly less than the average wage for the city we're based in.
Boss tells me “Sorry, there's just no money in the budget for a raise, for you or anyone else in your team.” She tells me “Besides, you're at the ceiling of what the company pays for anyone that isn't a manager.” So I ask, but there's no way they are going to make me a manager.
I go back to our office, and break the news to the team. My 2IC tells me quietly that he's been looking for another job for a while, and that our boss knows he's looking.
I immediately jump online and start looking for another job.
A few weeks and 2 interviews later, I get a phone call at work, it's the interviewer from a job I interviewed for a day earlier, for what is essentially my dream job. My field of expertise, plus travel, work from home (long before Covid made that normal). They offer me $14k more than my current rate, with another $5k after 6 months if things work out. They say they just need to draw up the paperwork.
I write up a short resignation letter, print it out, and walk into my boss's office and hand it over.
She goes white as a sheet and freaks out. Starts asking if there's anything they can do to make me change my mind – I say “yeah, more money.” She says give me 10 minutes.
15 minutes later she walks into our office and offers me $10k more than what I am earning on the spot, with a promise of more in the next review.
I tell her thanks, but no thanks, and ask where this money was 3 weeks earlier when I asked and was told there was no money.
After my boss leaves, my 2IC tells me he emailed her that morning letting her know he had an offer and was going to hand in his notice… which explains her panic.
I work out my notice, and my 2IC is able to negotiate himself and the other team member a significant payrise to stay.
Last I heard, he's still there, now making double what I earned there, and my new job has allowed me to travel, grow my skills (and get the hell out of the advertising industry), and I earn close to 3x what I was then.