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Today I have gotten into an argument with my fiancee and I want to hear everyone's opinion on this.

I received a call today from a company that I consider to be my dream company. They are a big health care provider in Ontario. They asked me if I wanted to interview for a job that is different than the one I applied for. I was interested but then they said it was temporary full-time (3 months) with a possibility of moving to full-time in November based on if the person I was filling in for was able to receive life long disability status.

I am marrying my fiancee in October and currently we rent a house and have 2 dogs, 2 cats and a rabbit. We pay all utilities and she is also going back to school in September to further her degree.

I currently work full-time for another company so I have stability right now and assurance that I will have a job tomorrow or 4 months from now.

I politely and professionally turned down the opportunity to interview for this position solely for my family. I don't believe we can risk the possibility of me not having a job come November.

My fiancee is FURIOUS! I mean over the moon pissed and doesn't see my reasons as valid stating that I could apply for internal postings and such during those three months and is afraid they will never call me again for a position.

Did I make the right choice? I always think about money and didn't want to risk our current security. If I was wrong please let me know how so I can learn for next time.

EDIT: I should mention that my current full-time job is as a software developer so it's not some menial job and the person on the phone said the chance of it becoming a permanent position was less than 40%

Resistance
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3 Answers3

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If I was wrong please let me know how so I can learn for next time.

This is way off-topic for Money.SE, but I feel compelled to offer my advice. Feel free to downvote and I'll consider deleting (or flag for migration).

The mistake you made was not discussing it with your fiancée before turning down the offer. You are not married yet, but you have made a commitment that should mean that your decisions affect each other for the rest of your lives. She may be more hurt that her opinion wasn't considered in your decision. That doesn't mean that she makes the decision for you, but it was a perfect opportunity to make a decision together that affects both of you. Where you saw risk and uncertainty, she saw opportunity. Neither is "correct" - only two sides of the same coin.

Hopefully it's an experience that you both can learn and grow from.

D Stanley
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Did I make the right choice?

Only you can determine that. Financial security and stability are not worthless, but they do not have infinite value either. Any time you go out for a walk you're trading a small amount of financial independence for personal satisfaction, since you could be struck by a car and become disabled. That's a silly example, and you're risking much more financial security by changing jobs than by going for a walk, but it illustrates that sometimes risk is worth it. Would changing jobs be worth the risk that you could end up unemployed? Only you can determine that.

Nosrac
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I don't want to get in the middle of a fight between you and your fiancee. Well, I suppose if she gets mad at me she can't break up with me or anything.

But I'd say that you were right. Say you took the job. After 3 months there are 3 possibilities:

  1. The job becomes permanent. Hooray, everybody's happy.

  2. They say sorry, there is no long term position for you here, good bye. Now you've already quit your last job, this job is gone, and you're on the street. I don't know what the job market is like for people with your particular skills, but at the very least it would be inconvenient, and if you can't find another job quickly, you could be in serious trouble.

  3. They say they can give you a permanent job, but the pay, benefits, working conditions, whatever, will not be the same as they were for the temporary job. Now you're in a very poor negotiating position, as if you turn down any offer they make, you're unemployed.

Something similar to this happened to me once: I quit my job to take a position with a contracting company. They placed me on a contract making a good salary, all around nice job. Then after a year I was told that the client wanted to turn this into a full time position. They were pleased with my work and were happy to hire me for the full-time job ... but the pay would be $15,000 less than what I was making as a contractor. I had already quit my previous job and moved to a new city. I had very little negotiating leverage. I basically had to take the job or be unemployed.

@DStanley says you should have discussed this with your fiancee before making the decision. Fair enough, probably so. This is the sort of issue that can break up a relationship -- I mean radically different ideas about the proper balance between opportunity and security. Better to find out when you're engaged than after you're married. And if you were married you should certainly discuss such things with your wife and at least hear what she has to say before making a decision.

Jay
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