---
title: Before you change jobs, do a four-layer self-portrait
description: A recruiter offers 20% more. Before touching your resume, line up the real reasons behind your last three moves. What recurs is what the next job must give.
image: https://nobusato.jp/hubfs/four-layer-self-portrait-before-changing-jobs-en.png
---

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# Before you change jobs, do a four-layer self-portrait

[Nobu Sato](https://nobusato.jp/en/profile?hsLang=en)

![Before you change jobs,do a four-layerself-portrait](https://nobusato.jp/hs-fs/hubfs/four-layer-self-portrait-before-changing-jobs-en.png?width=1200&height=630&name=four-layer-self-portrait-before-changing-jobs-en.png)

A recruiter calls. There's a role, 20% more pay, one title up. You're tempted and start updating your resume.

After more than a decade in hiring, I've watched too many people go wrong right here. Not in which company they chose, but in skipping one question: what were the real reasons behind my last three job changes?

## The gap between the survey and the truth applies to you too

In [the exit-survey post](https://nobusato.jp/en/blog/why-exit-surveys-lie?hsLang=en) I wrote that "family reasons" is nearly half of exit questionnaires and under 15% of real reasons. People don't just tell the company a story. They tell themselves one.

"A bigger platform," "a change of industry," "the pay was low." Those are the interviewer versions. The real version is usually closer to: I couldn't work with my boss; nobody saw what I did; meetings until eight every night.

Believe the version you tell others, and the next job trips you in the same spot.

## The four layers, applied to yourself

I assess candidates on four layers: core, patterns, equipment, context. For yourself, the weight is on the first and the fourth.

The core is about drivers. I use six: autonomy, mastery, impact, belonging, security, reward. There's no good or bad, only an order. You don't find it by asking yourself what you value. You find it by lining up the real reason you left and the real reason you chose, for each of your last three moves, and seeing which two keep appearing.

AutonomyMasteryImpactBelongingSecurityRewardMove 1Move 2Move 3

**Fig.1**Three moves by six drivers. In each row, mark the driver behind the real reason you left and the real reason you chose. A column with two or more marks is one of your top two. Here: autonomy and belonging.

If two of three departures were "they took my decision rights away," autonomy is your number one, and a company where everything goes to HQ for approval is out, even at 20% more. If two of three choices were "I followed someone I trusted," that's belonging, and what you should be evaluating isn't the company but [your future boss](https://nobusato.jp/en/blog/choose-your-boss-not-the-company?hsLang=en).

The context layer asks: at what pace, under what kind of boss, in what team mix do I do my best work, and under what conditions do I clearly drop? The same person in a different environment can perform three times better or worse. This layer isn't about whether you're good. It's about fit.

## Why only these two layers

Equipment (skills, experience, track record) is already on your resume. Patterns (how you behave under pressure) are the thing you're worst at judging in yourself; leave them to the interviewer.

Core and context are the two layers you know best and recruiters and interviewers see least. If you don't do this, nobody will.

## What you end up with

A very short list: two things the role must provide, two things in the environment you must avoid. Hold that list against the 20% offer and the answer usually comes fast.

Plenty of people do this exercise and decide not to move. Some move to a place with flat pay that provides both things. Either beats taking the 20% and calling a recruiter again a year later.

## Where I'm not sure

If you've worked less than ten years, three job changes may be one or two. Too small a sample. Count internal transfers, project changes and boss changes too. Any real departure and any real choice is data.

Your last three moves, real reasons, side by side: what does it look like?

---

Shorter notes that don't make it into a full article go on LinkedIn. [Follow me there](https://www.linkedin.com/in/realnobusato/).

## More in this column

- ### [After AI, which layer of you loses value first?](https://nobusato.jp/en/blog/which-layer-loses-value-first?hsLang=en)
  
  Split a person into four layers and the writable part of your skills loses value first. Stanford found a 13% drop for ...
- ### [Telling failure as evidence](https://nobusato.jp/en/blog/telling-failure-as-evidence?hsLang=en)
  
  Interviewers ask about failure to see your patterns under pressure. They want what you did at the time, not the lesson ...
- ### [Choose your boss, not the company](https://nobusato.jp/en/blog/choose-your-boss-not-the-company?hsLang=en)
  
  Nearly 30% of resignation-proxy users in Japan feared their boss. People leave bosses, not companies. Spend the last ...

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