Overworked engineer gets passed up for promotion, uses company training to secure 200% raise at new job: 'That's more than I make'

Author image for Isabella Penn
Isabella Penn
Oct 12, 2025 1:00 PM EDT

After four years of grinding for a defense contractor, one engineer finally hit his breaking point. He'd done everything right by climbing the ranks, leading a team that built a system bringing in $1.6 million in its first year, securing a company patent, and even getting flown to D.C. for a Defense Department award. His annual review was a flawless 10/10, but his raise? The same 3% everyone else got.

To add insult to injury, a member of his own team (who had a different manager) was promoted instead. When he asked why, his boss said, "I didn't think they deserved it either, but I'm not their boss. Try again next year." That was the last straw.

He didn't quit outright; he quiet quit. No late nights, no unpaid travel, no heroic overtime. Instead, he used the company's own resources to his advantage, signing up for every paid class he could. Within months, he built up his skills, applied elsewhere, and landed a job paying double his salary — with overtime that brought it to nearly triple.

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    Image is representative only and does not depict the actual subjects of the story.


     

  • When his boss begged him to stay, he simply pointed out the irony that his new paycheck was bigger than his boss’s. Turns out, loyalty doesn’t pay, but strategy does.

  • Early in my career I worked as an engineer for a defense contractor for about 4 years getting my typical 2-4% raises and standard promotions that take years and years to qualify for.
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  • I realized that in my current role I was pretty much maxed out for the foreseeable future, and would be scraping by for years more, so I tried to get on the management track and got given a project engineer position to prove myself.
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  • I managed a team of 4 engineers, a designer, and 2 admins and we designed and manufactured a system that made $1.6M in sales in our first year of work.
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  • We got the company a patent, and were nominated by the USAF and became finalists as DoD Contractor Technical team of the year (I don't recall the exact wording) and were flown to DC for a big awards ceremony.
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  • I spent 100 days away from my family that year, traveling to test locations, customers, vendors, etc.
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  • It was brutal but we were wildly successful. When annual performance reviews came in mine was 10/10.
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  • I was thrilled, then I found out one of MY team members (who had a different manager) was promoted early to a senior position and that I did not and I just got the standard 3% raise again.
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  • I was livid. I had a meeting with my boss. and his response was that he didn't think my team member deserved a promotion or a big raise but he wasn't their boss so basically I should try real hard again and we'll see next year.
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  • LL F that. I basically quite quit and just barely worked my 40hrs and went home. I never traveled unless I really wanted to, I never stayed late, I took almost every Friday off to burn through my leave.
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  • I took all my sick days, etc. My mental health was much better. The only thing I really did extra was take advantage of the education budget our group had but rarely got used.
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  • My previously promoted co-worker (who I really liked personally) started taking MBA evening classes, that the company reimbursed him for, but they came with obligations to stay there for x amount of years.
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  • They also had a nice budget for software training (without such stipulations) so we both signed up for FEA and 3D modelling classes.
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  • We traveled around together taking these classes and building our resumes. About a month after the classes were finished I secretly started applying for jobs that required those specific skills and quickly got hired for a position with a base annual income that was 200% my existing rate plus it paid overtime.
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  • I put in my notice and my boss was really upset. "We just paid for you to travel all over to learn these new skills that we need!" "Don't you have any loyalty or guilt!" "How much are they paying you, lets see if we can match it" "That's more than I make!" It was and with OT I made about 3X the following year for a competitor.
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  • RESIGNATION
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  • Life changing good times.
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  • pop_tab "That's more than I make!" Is hilarious.
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  • chrisk9 Wouldn't be surprised to see management respond by slashing training budgets rather than directly address the appropriate compensation issue
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  • Tweedldum Best revenge is your success
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  • fvives Nice. Always love the "you have no guilt?!?"..."oh I do, the same amount you had when you denied me a promotion after I crushed my goals and made the company top $".
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promotion employee job work engineering i quit raise Horrible Bosses paycheck resignation
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