I was offered another job in August. I originally accepted the job and handed in my notice. I was in week three, day two (of four weeks) of my notice period and I changed my mind and retracted the acceptance and accepted a counter offer from my current employer. I explained that I received a counter offer to the new employer (the counter offer was made in the very early stages i.e. before I accepted the offer from the new company).

I then called the new employer back the following week and said that I had changed my mind again and explained that the retraction was more to do with "cold feet" (which is true). The hiring manager told me that someone else had accepted the offer a few days ago. I asked if I had burnt my bridges and she said that it is difficult to find the "right" people and that I was a very credible candidate and encouraged me to apply if something else comes up again with the company. It appears that we departed on good terms.

I am wandering if we did depart on good terms or whether she was just being nice!? She did add me to her LinkedIn network after I turned down the opportunity.

I was contacted by another recruiter recently on LinkedIn. The same job has come up with a competitor. I have two options:

1) Wait for something to come up at company A in the future. Company A (my number 1 company!) offered me the role. I would rather work for company A.
2) Apply to company B (my number 2 company!). Company B is a competitor of company A.

In my defence; moving jobs is stressful. My decision making processes are usually structured (I weighed up all the pros and cons and made the right decision initially). I now know that I have to be able to recognise cold feet and differentiate it from second thoughts.

Has anyone ever accepted a senior job, then retracted the acceptance and then ended up working at the company in the future? How far in the future?