Interview Once a Year Even When You Are Happy

You do not have to be unhappy to go and find out what you are worth.

Once a year, take an interview. Not because you are leaving. Because the only way to know what the market thinks of your skills is to put them in front of the market.

Most people only interview when something has already gone wrong. The project was cancelled, the manager changed, the offer that was promised never came. So they end up learning the hardest skill in their career at the worst possible moment, with rent pressure behind them and no practice in years. Interviewing badly while desperate is how people end up taking the first thing that says yes.

Doing it while you are calm is a completely different experience. You can be curious. You can ask the questions you would never dare ask if you needed the job. You can say no and feel nothing.

Here is what you will learn.

You will learn what your current work is actually worth, which is often not what your last raise implied. Internal pay drifts behind the market almost by design, and nobody is going to volunteer that number to you.

You will learn which of your skills travel. Three years of deep knowledge about a system only your employer runs is worth less outside than you hope, and you would much rather discover that now, while you still have time to fix it.

You will learn what other teams are building, which is the cheapest industry research available to you.

And you will learn what your own job looks like from the outside. Some people go to one interview and come back grateful. That is a real outcome and a valuable one.

A word on doing it honestly. Do not waste the time of a company you would never join, and do not run a process you have no intention of finishing just to squeeze your employer. Take the conversation seriously, be clear that you are exploring, and treat everyone well. You will meet these people again.

Afterwards, write down what you learned and what you want to be true by next year.

Your market value is a fact about you. Check it on your own schedule, not someone else's.

– Asael Shinder