Revolving door and poor leadership in some technology groups - Anonymous employee Barclays Employee Review

2.0
Mar 1, 2011
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Top-tier bank that escaped the financial crisis relatively unscathed and is growing

Cons

Commodities technology in particular is a mess. Lot's of leadership changes and a seeming inability to commit to a strategy for longer than 1 year. The lack of tenure extends to all levels so there is a real lack of knowledge about the existing systems with very few people remaining who have been at the bank longer than a couple of years. Firmwide technology control processes are so arduous that it sometimes takes more time to complete the bureaucratic procedures for getting a change into production than actually implementing the change. As a result, the change control group can pat themselves on the back for a "stable production environment" but there is little forward progress in terms of significant technology delivery to the business. As a result the front office have isolated themselves from technology and survive mainly on a spreadsheet based infrastructure and are unwilling to invest in the cleanup that is needed in the legacy fragmented technology systems. Technology is becoming a graveyard of legacy system support.

Explore other reviews about Barclays

5.0
Jul 6, 2026
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Good environment to work in

Cons

Good environment to work in overall

5.0
Jul 16, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Culture great people good work life balance.

Cons

Slow and bureaucracy but management is aware.

See reviews by: Helpful|Rating|Date|All