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When and How to Walk Away From The Wrong Job, with Andy Hibel

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You’ve been searching for a job and you finally have an interview, but something doesn’t feel right. At what point do you walk away? According to Find Your Dream Job guest Andy Hibel, you need to consider several factors when making that decision. If your goals and values don’t match those of the company, it might not be the right fit for you. Andy also stresses the need for working with a team that supports the success of others. If you’re in a position where you must take any job offer, take it, but don’t stop looking. Continue to follow the best job search strategies to find the job that will truly be the perfect fit for you. 

About Our Guest:

Andy Hibel is the chief operating officer and the co-founder of HigherEdJobs. It’s the established leader in the academic recruitment field. Andy also co-hosts the HigherEdJobs podcast.

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Transcript

Find Your Dream Job, Episode 496:

When and How to Walk Away From The Wrong Job, with Andy Hibel

Airdate: April 9, 2025

Mac Prichard:

This is Find Your Dream Job, the podcast that helps you get hired, have the career you want, and make a difference in life.

I’m your host, Mac Prichard. I’m also the founder of Mac’s List. It’s a job board in the Pacific Northwest that helps you find a fulfilling career.

Every Wednesday, I talk to a different expert about the tools you need to get the work you want.

You interview for a job.

And you decide it’s not the right position for you.

How do you say no?

Andy Hibel is here to talk about how to walk away from the wrong job offer.

He’s the chief operating officer and the co-founder of HigherEdJobs. It’s the established leader in the academic recruitment field.

Andy also co-hosts the HigherEdJobs podcast.

He joins us from Chicago, Illinois.

Well, let’s jump right into it, Andy. We’re going to walk through three scenarios about when and how to walk away from the wrong job offer, but before we do this, let’s start with some general questions.

Shouldn’t it be clear before you apply whether or not a job is going to be a good fit or not?

Andy Hibel:

You would hope that it would be. Unfortunately, submitting your application is the start of the process. Job posting ads don’t always include all the nuance of a position, and not only is it the substance of the position, but it’s the process that you’re going through as an applicant that may reveal some of the reasons that you don’t necessarily see within the confines of the words of a job posting.

Mac Prichard:

It’s not uncommon for people to send in that job application and have that initial conversation and decide that it’s not a good fit. Is that true, Andy?

Andy Hibel:

I think it’s absolutely true. It’s probably just about as common as looking for a house on a short-term rental site and looking at the pictures and then eventually experiencing the house and saying, “Wow, these things don’t quite match what I thought I was getting myself into.”

Mac Prichard:

So this is likely to happen in a search, but what’s been your experience? Is it hard for candidates to drop out of a hiring process once they start?

Andy Hibel:

I think if there’s one thing that needs to infuse our conversation, Mac. I don’t want to, in any way, appear to be insensitive to one cold, hard fact, that there are simply sometimes where you can’t walk away from a job. Where you’re in a position where you need to pursue anything and everything that you can to have work to keep your life moving in the direction that you need it to.

In many of these instances, we’re talking about ideal situations or situations where you’re making choices that you have the ability to make choices, as opposed to choices that you have to make. With that, there are definitely times where you need to walk away, and I think it’s difficult sometimes because once you put your foot into the water, it’s really hard to remove yourself because you want to learn more.

You want to see if maybe you have some red flags, whether or not they’ll resolve. I think that’s just human nature, and if you’re really committing yourself to this process, you kind of want to run everyone out, if you will.

Mac Prichard:

Say more about that difficulty, about why people struggle with this. If they do have the privilege of a choice, why is it hard to walk away?

Andy Hibel:

I think it’s hard to walk away because the process in and of itself is challenging. It puts yourself and who you are to be tested, and the idea of just voluntarily removing yourself from an opportunity that is active just seems counterintuitive to the process. It’s just not what we’ve generally done, and most people don’t do it, but I think if we’re looking at the flip side, there’s things that you can do to better understand: A. What you’re looking for, but B. the flip side of it is that you have a finite amount of bandwidth to do this, emotionally, time wise, you can only spend that to the point that you have it.

The more time that you’re spending on positions that you maybe shouldn’t be pursuing, the less time you have to start identifying ones that you should be.

Mac Prichard:

What about fear, Andy? Especially if you’ve been looking for a job for a while. How can someone overcome the fear of saying no to a job offer?

Andy Hibel:

Well, let’s first use the nuance that you presented there, Mac. Which is, if you’ve been looking for a job for a while. I think if you’ve been looking for a job for a while and it’s been a particularly difficult search, I think a lot of the stuff that we’re talking about today is best case scenario, and if you’re in a position where you need to do something, I’m going to once again stress, you just need to do it.

We can get to what happens if you get that job, and maybe it’s not the right fit, but the idea is that if you’re in one of those situations, that those are different rules that apply.

I think fear, going to the emotional side of a job search, fear is a very difficult emotion to deal with in a job search. Fear is going to motivate everything that you do, but fear is also going to come out in your candidacy. If you’re doing your job search for fear, and fear is the emotion that’s leading it, that’s going to absolutely come through in your process. It’s hard to hide what you’re feeling at the end of the day.

Mac Prichard:

How do you overcome that fear, Andy?

Andy Hibel:

I think you overcome that fear, not by necessarily overcoming it. I think that your fear is kind of what keeps you motivated and going, but I think that you channel it toward positive things. What are you looking for, first and foremost? Why are you making this change? And what you’re looking for there is not to just react because you’re in a job search and this looks like a job that kind of fits it, but does it actually fit the criteria that you’re looking for to make that move? Because part of this is part of your career story.

It’s not just your job, but it’s the story you’re going to tell employers years down the line when they look at your resume and see this position. “Well, why did you take this position?” And if it fits in your job story, there’s a positive feel to what your career looks like. If you’re just making choices out of fear from one position to the next because you “needed a job”, I think employers get a sense of that, and your resume and your candidacy is going to show that.

Mac Prichard:

I want to walk through these three scenarios for when you might say no to the wrong job offer. Before we do that, let’s talk about when you might walk away and how you do it.

You’ve applied, you recognize that it’s not the right position for you. When in that hiring process should you communicate that, Andy?

Andy Hibel:

I think you can communicate it at any point where you realize that and you understand that your investment is not worth the return of getting this job. Now, I’d also say, and this is kind of analogous to the quiet quitting, if you’re in one of those scenarios where you just have to roll with the inertia, you get the job, I would also say that you don’t have to stop looking at that point. You can keep looking at other positions that are out there, and keep your search going.

The idea that you’ve landed a new job, and yes, you owe it to yourself, first and foremost, but also to this organization that’s hired you to put yourself into this position, but that doesn’t mean that you have to leave the job search. There is no legal obligation.

A lot of employers have a certain probationary period. You can put a probationary period on an employer, too, and keep your job search going.

As far as other points during the process, hey, there is nothing wrong with it. I would just say, probably the most important point is that when you withdraw or you decline it, you’re open and honest about the specific reasons. “I don’t feel supported like I’m going to be successful in it.” “At further learning about the position, it really did not meet the criteria of what I’m looking for in my next move.”

I think that when you have objective standards of what you’re looking for and the position doesn’t meet it, it’s a lot easier to be clear about why your candidacy is no longer viable from your perspective.

Mac Prichard:

How do you say no gracefully? What are your dos and don’ts that you recommend here, Andy?

Andy Hibel:

I think, first of all, grace is a great word there, Mac. I think you have to do it with grace. You need to put yourself in the position of the employer. Make sure your feedback is honest, make sure it’s direct. It should not in any way be personality related. If there’s some truth to the personality, I don’t think that helps to say. I think you can talk more about culture or other things other than making it personal, but don’t say, “I can’t work for this person. They’re not someone who I’d work well with, from a personality prospective.”

Nobody wants to hear that, but to say, “Listen, it just appears like the culture of management doesn’t fit within a system that I think I would thrive in. I don’t think you’d be getting your all out of me, and I don’t think that I’d be able to put my all into it.” I think that those things are there.

I think understanding from your perspective why you need to do that, waiting for the offer until you say no, if you know earlier in the process, you’re only taking bandwidth away from the employer and bandwidth, more importantly, away from yourself, to get to a point that you will eventually say no if you get the offer. If you’re thinking, for a moment during the process, “Well, if I get the offer, I don’t know if I’m taking this,” you really need to sit down and have a conversation with yourself about what it is that you’re looking for and why you have that reaction.

Then, I think that’s going to give you the tools on how to be able to go gracefully and professionally let that be known to the employer.

Mac Prichard:

Well, let’s take a break.

Stay with us.

When we come back, Andy Hibel will continue to share his advice about how to walk away from the wrong job offer.

We’re back in the Mac’s List studio. I’m talking with Andy Hibel.

He’s the chief operating officer and the co-founder of HigherEdJobs. It’s the established leader in the academic recruitment field.

Andy also co-hosts the HigherEdJobs podcast.

He joins us from Chicago, Illinois.

Well, Andy, before our break, we were talking about how to walk away from the wrong job offer.

We started out with questions about how people might find themselves in this situation and steps that they might take, especially in terms of timing, about when and how to say no.

You’ve got three scenarios where you say this is likely to happen. Let’s walk through each of them, and I know that you touched on some of these points in the first segment.

The first of your three scenarios is you might find yourself in a situation where you can’t walk away from a job offer. Tell us more about this and give us examples of what you have in mind.

Andy Hibel:

I think, unfortunately, that this scenario is a pretty prevalent scenario, and it’s one that absolutely occurs to everyone over a period of time. If you’re out there and you’re in a longer job search or a search where you just need to take that job that comes along, know you’re not alone, know that just about everybody has been at that point at some point in their career. It’s okay. Don’t panic. Don’t operate, like we spoke before, out of fear. Just understand that that’s the situation you’re in.

I think that looking at that scenario, it’s a really tough way to start a position, where you’re starting to forward yourself, put your best professional self forward, but at the same time, as we discussed before, probably keep that job search going, and maybe have some hope. Don’t over-commit to hope, but have some hope that maybe some of those reservations about the position, going into it, resolves itself and it’s actually much more palatable of a position than you thought it would be and give it time to see if things might end in a nice way.

You might find out after a few months that actually this is not a bad place for you to be, and you’re not seeing anything come in that job search that you’ve kept open, and maybe you’ll stick around there for a while.

Mac Prichard:

What do you say to employers if you’re still looking after you’ve been at a position for 3, 6, 9 months, about why you’re looking? Won’t they worry that you might jump ship if you join their team as well?

Andy Hibel:

I think that in some instances, I absolutely think that they would worry. In other instances, I think that it might be a little bit different. I think that in the instance of, first, what you say to employers, I think that you’re just direct. “I’ve started this new position.” I think that you say, “I’ve kept my search going for what was in progress at the point that I accepted it, and I wanted to run things through.”

I think that that is a fair answer that a lot of employers will understand of why you’re still there.

I think the second point you need to understand is that if you have a history of this, this is a harder thing to pull off. If you’ve gone from job to job to job, with a shorter tenure at each one, those employers are going to see that. Do I think that this is the one thing that is going to put it over the top? I don’t necessarily think so if you have one of those resumes that has shorter tenures. I’m not sure that that’s going to be the major cause of them having that, but I do think that it will definitely make the red flags a little redder, not crazy redder.

If you have a history of established employment at a good number of places for longer tenures, I think that a mulligan here or there, people understand, and I wouldn’t worry about it the same way.

Mac Prichard:

Your second scenario is that you might say no to a position that doesn’t match your goals. What kind of goals should you consider when thinking about saying no to the wrong job offer?

Andy Hibel:

I think logistical and your life and how you manage your life along with your professional career is probably at the top of that list. If you have responsibilities at home that are going to be very difficult or put a major strain on you or your family to make this work out, and we’re talking a lot of people have this, you really need to think about it.

I think that that is the first area. I think that the second area is, it could be workplace issues, it could be the supervisor, could be culture, could be a lot of people hopping in and out, or maybe you don’t know who your supervisor would be. That would be the second issue.

The third issue would just be: how’s it fit into your career story? “This is not really what I want to be doing right now. I don’t want to be making this change just for this.” I think from the career story and those issues, going into it understanding why you’re leaving your current position and what you’re seeking differently and maybe also doing an honest evaluation of what you like about your current position, will help you better determine what those criteria are.

Mac Prichard:

It’s striking, Andy, that you haven’t mentioned money on your list of things that might lead you to consider. You’ve talked about culture, commute time, personal responsibilities. Where might salary figure into your consideration?

Andy Hibel:

I mean, I haven’t mentioned it, in that first set of topics for you and your family and the circumstances. Assuming that you’re taking more responsibility, you’re making more money. I think that money figure in there, but I think it’s also a question of it you’re just taking a position because you want more money but it doesn’t fit the scenario, I don’t know if that would be a time where if a friend of mine came to me and said, “You know, I’ve been making X and I want to make 20% more than X.” I would ask the question, why? Why do you need to do that? Tell me.”

Obviously, if there’s legitimate reasons, then that’s part of the reason to do it, but simply making more money for the sake of making more money, for me, I think that there needs to be other stuff other than just that, in my opinion.

If there’s reasons why you need to make more money, absolutely, but if this is just something where, on the scorecard, you feel like you need a higher score, I want to understand why.

Mac Prichard:

Your third scenario where you recommend passing on a position is in cases where the employer doesn’t provide the resources for success. What do you mean by resources for success, Andy?

Andy Hibel:

We all are part of a team; nobody operates within their position by themselves. You have to work with others, and you have to work in the environment that you’re given.

Being here in Chicago, I always like using the example of there’s a number of famous people in Chicago, but I’m not sure that there’s any more famous than Michael Jordan, and there’s a whole great story about how Michael Jordan was passed on by the Portland Trailblazers and they drafted Sam Bowie out from Portland, and Michael then dropped to number three and went to the Bulls, and everyone says, “What happens if Michael had gone to the Portland Trailblazers at that point?”

There was a very famous Trailblazer that I’m sure that you love, Mac, and that was Clyde Drexler. Michael might have played behind Clyde. That wasn’t a scenario where Michael was going to thrive. He couldn’t have an offense focused around him.

You need, as a job seeker, to look at, is there a Clyde Drexler who’s here and really serves that role? Does the team have the budget to sign other people? Are they short-staffed? What’s the goals of the organization and the trends of the organization?

All of those things are so important. Success begets success, and if you want to be successful, you need to see an organization that gives you a pathway towards that. I think that that’s something that’s so essential in this process.

Mac Prichard:

Well, it’s been a terrific conversation, and thank you for reminding me of the Clyde Drexler days.

Tell us, Andy, what’s next for you?

Andy Hibel:

Well, Higher Ed Jobs always has a lot going on, and we expect 2025 to be busy at colleges and universities, and as usual, we have a wonderful, wonderful set of customers that we get to serve, and we’re just delighted to be working. This will be our 29th year with colleges and universities.

I think the one thing that I would want to highlight is we actually, Mac, traded sides with the microphone, and Mac was on our HigherEdJobs podcast talking about a number of things but a lot about older job seekers, and it was immensely interesting, and if you’re looking for that episode on HigherEdJobs, it’s our podcast episode 71, it went live on February 3rd, 2025, and if you want to hear Mac from the other side of the microphone and hear his perspectives, it was a really great conversation. I encourage the Mac fans out there to check that out.

Mac Prichard:

That’s very kind of you, Andy, and thank you again for having me on your show. It was a pleasure to chat with you and your co-host.

Now, to learn more about Andy and his work at Higher Ed Jobs, visit the Higher Ed Jobs website, higheredjobs.com, and Andy also encourages you to connect with him on LinkedIn. When you do reach out to Andy on LinkedIn, please be sure to mention that you heard him on Find Your Dream Job.

Now, Andy, given all of the great advice that you’ve shared today, what’s the one thing you want a listener to remember about how to walk away from the wrong job offer?

Andy Hibel:

I think that it’s pretty clear to me what the most important thing is, and that is, this is your job search, and if you’re trying to find your dream job and develop your dream career, make the choices that are right for you, for the reasons you want. If you go to the effort of doing that, you have a much better chance of making the choices that you want to make.

Mac Prichard:

Next week, our guest will be Kathleen Davis.

She’s the deputy editor at FastCompany.com, where she writes about careers, hiring, and other workplace topics.

Kathleen also hosts The New Way We Work podcast.

You know the difference that connections can make when you apply for a job.

But what do you do when you have no contacts inside an organization?

Join us next Wednesday when Kathleen Davis and I talk about how to get your foot in the door when you don’t know anyone.

Until next time, thanks for letting us help you find your dream job.

This show is produced by Mac’s List.

Susan Thornton-Hough schedules our guests and writes our newsletter. Lisa Kislingbury Anderson manages our social media.

Our sound engineer and editor is Matt Fiorillo. Dawn Mole creates our transcripts. And our music is by Freddy Trujillo.

This is Mac Prichard. See you next week.