Why Asking Friends for Career Advice Backfires
Well-intended advice & comfort could quietly ruin decision quality
I have a friend who spent an entire month asking everyone he knew whether he should take a new job.
He collected dozens of opinions from his friends. Everyone had a take. Some said he should go for it. Others warned him to stay put.
He hesitated for weeks, and finally accepted the offer right before the deadline.
Six months later, I heard that he was already looking for a new job.
“What happened?” I asked. “I thought you had thought it through.”
“It turns out this job was not for me.” He replied.
He also talked about his friends’ suggestions:
“I spent a month asking everyone else what they would do. By the time I accepted the offer, I wasn’t confident in the choice anymore. I just wanted the debate to stop.”
That’s when I started to realize that relying too much on your friends for career advice can backfire.
You need the right mindset to get real values from your friends.
Why We Default to Asking Friends
When we face a difficult decision, most of us start with a message to a friend.
Should I take this job offer?
Should I start that side project?
Should I quit my current role?
You start that conversation. It feels productive. It feels safe.
And that might be the problem.
It Feels Safe and Low Effort
Asking a friend is the safest possible starting point. It requires almost no preparation and very little emotional exposure.
You don’t need to fully understand what you want yet.
You don’t need to explain the risks.
You can simply say something like, “I’m thinking about changing jobs,” and see how it goes. That moment alone creates relief.
Asking Feels Like Progress Without Commitment
When you start a conversation with a friend, you’ll feel progress, even though no decision has been made.
Asking for advice creates the feeling of movement without forcing a decision. At the end of the conversation, it often ends with: “OK thank you. I’ll think about it.”
You delay the inevitable moment of committing. For high-stakes decisions, that can be very appealing.
Their Advice Comes with Hidden Costs
Friends care about you. But when they give career advice, there are often misaligned incentives and hidden biases.
Some friends can evaluate your opinions, but they don’t feel the consequences.
Life is Different
Even close friends often miss critical variables:
They don’t share your financial situation
They don’t have your visa or family constraints
They aren’t measured by the same career timeline
Yet friend advice rarely comes with a disclaimer. They are just trying their best.
They Don’t Prioritize Decision Quality
Friends are nice.
Most friends don’t challenge you even when your idea is weak. They protect you from pain.
So you hear a lot of reassurance.
“You’ll be fine either way.”
“At least it’s stable.”
“You can always change later.”
Those statements reduce anxiety. They don’t necessarily improve decisions.
The real advice you need to hear often buried under these comfort.
It Creates Noise
Asking one friend is ok, but asking five different friends for advice, it creates noise. Noise delays your decisions instead of clarifying them.
You collect opinions instead of defining tradeoffs
You feel informed, but not convinced
Without you knowing, you eventually pick something just to stop thinking.
Talk to Your Friends The Right Way
Don’t get me wrong. You should still talk to your friends, but differently.
Here’s what I think you should use your friends for.
Sanity Checks
First, list your tradeoff, and have a tentative decision in your mind. It does not have to be perfect, but you need to go through it yourself first.
And then bring that to a friend.
Talk through your logic, and then ask them:
“Does this assumption sound unrealistic?”
“What am I missing here?”
Friends are better at spotting blind spots than setting direction. It’s a lot better than asking a vague question like: “So… what do you think I should do?”
Instead, tell them your tentative decision and listen carefully to where they push back.
Emotional Support
Friends are excellent at helping you live with a decision.
They help you process doubt, fear, and disappointment after you commit.
They remind you that a setback isn’t a personal failure.
They help you recover when things don’t go as planned.
It works in a different way.
But emotional support should come after the decision. You need more sanity check than emotional support before you commit.
When the Decision Actually Matters
If the cost of being wrong is low, ask your friends.
But when the decision shapes the next few years of your career, you need a structured way to evaluate tradeoffs and commitment.
Once you miss that great job offer, the next one might take years to come.
That’s why I offer Career Decision Consulting starting this month.
It’s designed for mid- to senior level software engineers who are stuck between decisions.
For example,
Stay in your current role or move to a new company
Accept a promotion vs. change teams
Staff engineer track vs. management
It’s an one-off, structured session that helps you with clear options, explicit tradeoffs, and narrowing down to one decision you can own.
Start deciding like the consequences are yours (because they are).
That’s it for today.
If this resonated, feel free to like or share it.
I’ll see you in the next post.
Adler from Tokyo Tech Lead