I just heard the news one of my friends at work quited PMC and joined BRCM. Most people congratulate him that he can leave the living hell of ESD. I have been talking to a few people about this news. It seems everyone agree that we don’t have to ask him why he leave, instead we should ask ourself why we stay. So the consensus is that people stay because there is no better offer out there. The golden handcliff symdrome. High pay is the only reason not leaving the company. I have talked to this friend. He said that he had a struggle before accepting the offer. BRCM is a remote office in Vancouver, while PMC is the headquarter. In case of a down turn, remote office have a higher danger being shut down than the HQ. He have calculated that BRCM should be safe for another year, while PMC is safe for another 2 years. The problem is if the company is going down, it is not safe in even in the HQ. After he hands in the resignation letter, usually a normal boss will say a few words to wish him luck and try to perusade him to stay half-heartly. His boss has the reputation being one of the worst manager in the company, he actually spent two hours trying to talk him out using FUD. At the end, the conversation more or less ended in his boss cursing him taking the new job will be worse than staying here. If I were him in this situation, instead of passively listening to all the BS, I put up my best arguments to convince my boss that he is wrong.