Please help! Can I withdraw a job offer (already secured) for another offer?

Hi,

This may seem crazy or even dishonest, but a few weeks ago received an offer from a firm known for its shareholder advisory services. Though I wasn't interested in shareholder advisory, I needed to secure my offer (exploding offer) because I am an international MBA student. My dream was to secure a job in corporate strategy, but last week I was suddenly given the opportunity to interview with one of the best firms on the street for their corporate strategy role and received an offer today. I know I shouldn't have done this but I really wasn't expecting this result and only interviewed for practice purposes. Is there any way I can withdraw the job offer from the first firm, and accept this offer for the corporate strategy role? I would really appreciate any honest advice.

Thank you.

10 Comments
 

Agreed. I can guarantee you that if it was the other way around (aka the company has ro decide whether to commit to you or not) they would drop you in a minute (and the only reason they may stick with you is to prevent legal issues).

Take the other offer and don’t look back. Else you’ll spend your next years miserable thinking about how you should have taken the other offer.

As for being blacklisted, firms are surprisingly chaotic and may even forget they blacklisted you 

 

If you don’t mind being blacklisted at the shareholder advisory firm for future opportunities, you should go with the corporate strategy firm. Your employment is at-will and reneging early on before you start the job actually saves the sharedholder advisory firm the expenses related to onboarding and training you. Furthermore, backing out of an offer before you start is not that uncommon in this industry and to be expected at the junior level.

 

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