Pros
- Lack of a face-time culture: You get your work done, then you're free to leave. - Low expectations: Expect to be treated like a genius if you can use a pivot table - Amicable people and young, hip staff - Lots of opportunities for training and development - Nice facilities - Lots of social clubs and opportunities to network
Cons
- Level of technological savvy is alarmingly low for a company so dependent on systems; especially among AVP+ level staff, but really true across-the-board - Production is king: Think of this as being an assembly line or a glorified sweat-shop; Any and all time spent on process improvements is simply not rewarded - There is no real push, at any level, for us to work better, faster and more efficiently unless something totally blows up and costs the bank money. Proactive, long-term thinking is notably absent. - Local management-level communication of strategic direction is poor; expect to be treated like a mushroom - "Churn and burn" culture; one HR manager told me that ~30% of new hires are expected to leave or be fired - "Meat-head" culture; conversations are ~90% about sports; aspiration toward higher education is treated with suspicion - Work is rather tedious, but at the same time medium-high stress