Comment by KirinDave

> What is the advantage of not facing this question? I would rather know (and learn from it) than not know at all.

So we know the disadvantages: social strife, perhaps feelings of personal inadequacy, friction with your supervisors.

So why then, do I also have to justify the opposing side? Things are difficult enough right now with the integration pains of moving into Microsoft. Let me be the first to tell you it is not easy to go from the frenetic and dedicated full, sustained sprint of a startup like Powerset to the slower, bureaucratic pace of Microsoft.

We all know some people were more valuable than others. But to get the full and absolute dollar-amount measure of it hurts some people's feelings. You can say you'd rather know, but that's you making a decision for yourself. The unfortunate part of Tom's story is that he decided for everyone at the company, and that has some people miffed. You can say it's emotional and irrational, and that's probably true. That doesn't make it less real.

> I think this is a very interesting take away point - always have something to walk away to.

This is absolutely true, and I also drove up my retention price by making it clear I had opportunities to walk away to. The instant I heard about the MS offer process I immediately applied for several jobs. When it came time to listen to Microsoft's offer, I already had two other offers on the table (one from a stealth startup and one from EngineYard), and I made sure my supervisors knew (in general terms) what I was looking at.