
Ask HN: Ever be verbally told you got the job, then no firm offer? - a_lifters_life
How&#x27;d you handle it being told you got the job, but took awhile (or forever) to get the actual firm offer?
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joeld42
"Great, I'm excited to start. I've still got some other interviews lined up,
I'm going to keep going with those until we sign the offer letter and get a
firm start date."

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petervandijck
This is absolutely the best approach, and I say that as an employer. Do this.

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throw_temp
Keep interviewing. It stinks but you have to look out for yourself. Even
asking for the offer can put you in a weaker position.

There is the argument to be made that an interested applicant should follow
up, etc, but I look at all the interactions in the interview process as part
of the negotiation. So I want to be careful of the message I send either via
reaching out, or via my silence.

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a_lifters_life
Why do you say asking for the offer puts you in a weaker position?

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lgieron
It shows that you care about it enough to ask.

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kbart
If you cared enough to go through all their interviews, it already shows that.

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debacle
Happened to me on Friday, actually. Had the offer, in writing, was told the
job wasn't mine. Ruined my whole weekend. Felt a serious lack of self-worth.

Monday I got an equitable offer from a company I'm more interested in working
for and I've been riding high all week.

YMMV.

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sharemywin
Was at a job where they did that to a guy. The manager thought he had
approval/funding. Things got tight and they pulled the funding for the job.
Eventually, it worked out but took a month or too. I would keep looking and if
something comes up great.

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bitshepherd
I was at an interview for a startup, when the person interviewing me yelled
out the room to someone passing by "hey $guy! I found our new sysadmin!" and
we finish our chat, and I go home. Never heard from them again. Reached out to
the recruiter and got the silent treatment. Fuck 'em, I thought, and moved on.

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throweway
How arrogant to assume you'd take the job. Implied by 'ive found our..."

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throweway
Damn it i didnt articulate the point very well and got downvoted :-( but i
meant the interviewer was arrogant.

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codegeek
It is simple. If nothing in writing, then you should assume that it is a no
go. Yes the hiring manager may really want you and verbally confirmed but
there are a lot of "behind the scenes" factors that impact hiring.

Of course, if you do finally get the offer in writing, good for you. The
question is should you wait or move on. That will depend on where you stand.
If you need a job asap, then keep looking. If not, you may wait for the
confirmation in writing.

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rurban
Yes. Apparently upper management decided to kill the job, and forgot to tell
me for 3 months.

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pmiller2
Yes. It was an intern to FTE conversion. They'd just installed a new director
and a VP of engineering, and the VP had told me in a 1x1 that there would be
an offer made. A few weeks later, no offer.

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thefastlane
i assume you've already negotiated and agreed upon a salary with the hiring
manager. there's no 'following up' to do at that stage in the game. if you've
been interacting with an internal recruiter (rather than the hiring manager),
then it could be an additional layer of politics, bureaucracy, or something
else stretching things out, but either way: if after say 2 weeks, no offer
letter has been emailed to you, that reflects very poorly on the hiring
manager, and all the more reason to keep on looking elsewhere.

in the meantime, do not let up on the job search.

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a_lifters_life
Thanks for your post! We hadn't agreed on an exact salary, but he mentioned a
range for what he was looking at...now thats in limbo. Ive never been assigned
a recruiter yet, and its so far been all through this hiring manager
supposedly talking to hr...ever hear of this? How would you proceed?

~~~
thefastlane
i just mean that in larger companies, sometimes the negotation/etc will happen
through a sourcer/recruiter in their HR department rather than directly w the
hiring manager. in such cases, the recruiter will act as the messenger between
you and the hiring manager basically.

this is the way things usually go (curious to know how much this jives with
other people's experience):

\- first step is they decide they'd like to hire you. ie, the "we'd like to go
ahead and bring you on board / make you an offer." this is verbal, or
sometimes via email. it is typical for them give a specific number at this
time (edit: actually, i'd say this is pretty much what a 'job offer' is). you
might or might not have discussed salary prior to this, but when they want to
hire you, they will almost always start out with an explicit figure (it will
be lower than you want 99% of the time).

\- then, the salary negotation begins. eventually, after some back-and-forth
(which can happen either in a single phone call, or can stretch out over
weeks), both parties finally agree on a specific number for the salary, along
with other aspects of the comp package including signing bonus, RSU
payout/schedule, and other things like time off, etc etc. this all happens
verbally normally.

\- only when a salary/comp is agreed upon, would they send you a written offer
letter -- this is usually done as a PDF emailed to you. until this happens,
keep up the job hunt.

decide where you are in the above flow (if at all). if they have not uttered a
specific, singular figure (and i suggest you let them do that first, no matter
the circumstance -- but that's a different discussion), then the interview
process is still going imo, and it might be worth a follow-up at some point,
use your best judgment.

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aprdm
I got an offer with a contract. It got cancelled two days before the start
date. For a permanent position and a visa.

Def. happens... mainly with unprofessional start ups

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mrfusion
One place wouldn't give me an offer until I agreed to take the job.

I assumed it was a hard sell tactic (and red flag) and declined.

