What does it mean by job hopping? According to The Free Dictionary, job hopping means “The practice of changing jobs frequently, especially as a means of quick financial gain or career advancement”. Let me ask you all a question, how many of you actually practice this job hopping or used to do that?

I must admit that I’ve changed 4 companies in 2 years of working as an IT developer, but it was not for quick financial gain.

According to Bob Weinstein in his article “Job hopping is OK again“, there are 2 kinds of job hopping - random job hopping which is moving everytime you get a better job offer (the typical quick financial gain job hopping) and strategic job hopping which is taking a new job because it enhances and helps build your career.  

From a company’s perspective, it’s not advisable to hire a job hopper. They would prefer a long serving employee who is willing to contribute a lot to the company and will probably seek retirement in that company. The cost of hiring and retraining someone is sometimes too high. They rather keeping the same person who knows the company inside out, than spending time on training or orientation or maybe, the hiring process itself.

However, from an employee’s perspective, it is a completely different story. As an employee, you should be thinking for your future. Job hopping to a new job which is more suitable and has more prospect might be a good option. Sometimes, it pays to job hop than to stay in a job with no prospect. You’ll be just wasting your time. This happens in many places especially in a not-so-competitive working environment (where you can see a lot of people there seeking early retirement). It’ll take a very big and bold move for you to climb over these experienced people. By the time you managed to climb above this group of people, you would’ve wasted too much time. Worse still, you might not even get pass this hurdle. If you can’t, then there’s no point staying on. Choose a company with better prospect, maybe a better job role, and move on. Remember, only job hop if there’s better job opportunity….something necessary to advance your personal career. Do not consider job hopping as a mean to get quick financial gain. If you really choose to do so, you’ll be chasing after money and not your future.

In the end, job hopping is neither good nor bad. It really depends on situation. From the employers’ perspective, it is definitely a bad thing. From an employee’s perspective however, sometimes job hopping is necessary to advance your career.

Anyway, this is just my opinion. Do feel free to voice out in the comments section below. Hope it helps ;)