<story><title>Exploding Offers Suck</title><url>http://blog.ycombinator.com/exploding-offers-suck</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>tieTYT</author><text>&amp;gt; when someone offers you an exploding offer, it&amp;#x27;s because they really, really want you to take it.&lt;p&gt;Couldn&amp;#x27;t it be because they&amp;#x27;ve got a lot on their plate and after a certain period of time they want to free up their brain cycles and stop wondering if you&amp;#x27;re going to accept that deal?&lt;p&gt;Couldn&amp;#x27;t it be that you&amp;#x27;re barely preferred and making the deadline shows them that you&amp;#x27;re excited about the offer?  Missing the deadline shows that you&amp;#x27;re not excited and they&amp;#x27;ll know to go with the second best candidate?&lt;p&gt;FWIW, I&amp;#x27;m relating this to exploding job offers as I have no direct VC experience.</text></item><item><author>malgorithms</author><text>A dear friend and excellent negotiator told me that when he gets any kind of short-term exploding offer, the first thing he does is verbally reject the deadline. And the second thing he does is ignore the deadline and offer feedback only after it has passed.&lt;p&gt;I&amp;#x27;ve seen him employ this many times in practice and it has always worked out. I don&amp;#x27;t want to be responsible for anyone losing a deal, but remember: when someone offers you an exploding offer, it&amp;#x27;s because they really, really want you to take it. If anything, it should be a sign there&amp;#x27;s (a) more time to be had, and (b) plenty of room on the terms.&lt;p&gt;Any deadline claim has to be concrete and believable. The start of the YC program is a good example.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>wycats</author><text>Whenever I&amp;#x27;ve offered an exploding offer in the past, it&amp;#x27;s because I had several candidates: an extremely strong candidate and several strong but somewhat weaker candidates. In general, all of the candidates have a limited timeframe to make a decision, and there&amp;#x27;s a risk of losing &lt;i&gt;all&lt;/i&gt; candidates if I waited for an indefinite time on the strongest candidate.&lt;p&gt;In other words, candidates sometimes also need an answer within a certain timeframe (often for very legitimate reasons; a job change can often be a life-changing event) and that means that there are some real time-limits across all of the candidates (in both directions).</text></comment>
<story><title>Exploding Offers Suck</title><url>http://blog.ycombinator.com/exploding-offers-suck</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>tieTYT</author><text>&amp;gt; when someone offers you an exploding offer, it&amp;#x27;s because they really, really want you to take it.&lt;p&gt;Couldn&amp;#x27;t it be because they&amp;#x27;ve got a lot on their plate and after a certain period of time they want to free up their brain cycles and stop wondering if you&amp;#x27;re going to accept that deal?&lt;p&gt;Couldn&amp;#x27;t it be that you&amp;#x27;re barely preferred and making the deadline shows them that you&amp;#x27;re excited about the offer?  Missing the deadline shows that you&amp;#x27;re not excited and they&amp;#x27;ll know to go with the second best candidate?&lt;p&gt;FWIW, I&amp;#x27;m relating this to exploding job offers as I have no direct VC experience.</text></item><item><author>malgorithms</author><text>A dear friend and excellent negotiator told me that when he gets any kind of short-term exploding offer, the first thing he does is verbally reject the deadline. And the second thing he does is ignore the deadline and offer feedback only after it has passed.&lt;p&gt;I&amp;#x27;ve seen him employ this many times in practice and it has always worked out. I don&amp;#x27;t want to be responsible for anyone losing a deal, but remember: when someone offers you an exploding offer, it&amp;#x27;s because they really, really want you to take it. If anything, it should be a sign there&amp;#x27;s (a) more time to be had, and (b) plenty of room on the terms.&lt;p&gt;Any deadline claim has to be concrete and believable. The start of the YC program is a good example.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>malgorithms</author><text>It&amp;#x27;s imaginable that there&amp;#x27;s a very short-term deadline affecting a deal. But remember: that puts the side with the deadline at a disadvantage, not an advantage. Consider these examples: really needing to sell something for the money, desperately needing someone to fill a job, needing to use a scarce item in the short term, etc. If one of these is happening for real, then the offer they make will have to be compellingly high and convincing, demonstrating their position of weakness. If someone offered you 5X your normal rate and explained they needed a job done this weekend, that&amp;#x27;s not a negotiation strategy on their part.&lt;p&gt;But feigning indifference and giving you a short-term deadline for an offer you&amp;#x27;re unsure you can beat -- that&amp;#x27;s just a negotiation move, and personally, I would call them on it. Again, I don&amp;#x27;t want to be responsible for failed application of this :-)</text></comment>