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Yep, work in a bank is really stress free, especially in Europe. No one does anything, the hierarchical structure is so meaningless hundreds do nothing at all.

Yep, work in a bank is really stress free, especially in Europe. No one does anything, the hierarchical structure is so meaningless hundreds do nothing at all. People get stressed out when they are expected to work a little. Everyone is chatting on meetings about which button is the best. Yep, it’s a career suicide and leaves you with no future prospects but it’s pretty stable. Some play the politics to get higher paychecks, some squeeze the newcomers that actually do the work but things stabilize pretty quickly.

danielscrubs 6y ago
This is false in the Nordics. Of my friends in finance 100% are working overtime on weekends as we speak. Banks are a heavily competitive field, try governments and unions instead. Which country and which kind of work? I might relocate when I get older so it’s good to know... ;)
- knuthsat 6y ago
  Working overtime is a madman's choice. It's possible to work overtime but it's completely irrelevant. It's done mostly for politics. For example, you have small chances of a raise or a promotion if your overtime hours are small. Collecting overtime gives opportunity for under-performers to make progress in the company. I've been to more than 5 banks in Croatia and Austria (Most of the banks in Croatia are subsidiaries of Italian and Austrian banks). The contracts make overtime mandatory but one can negotiate to remove overtime completely. Most people that tell their wives and friends that they work overtime either do not work during the overtime hours, are unnecessarily inefficient for the purpose of collecting hours (unpaid) or have periods of struggle because most of the time they do not work and have no idea what's going on (so when they have to catch up, the stress and the lack of knowledge forces overtime). Some cases I encountered of people who complain about working too much in a bank are those that prefer the company of their coworkers more than that of their spouses.
  - danielscrubs 6y ago
    Occams razor, it’s just a very competitive field with salaries that reflect it. Heavy responsibility and slinging Petabytes of data. PhDs, suits and fpga developers in the same room. Insanely great mix in my humble opinion. I hope you find an area that you like.
    - knuthsat 6y ago
      Well, most EU banks do not care about FPGA or PhDs, especially in subsidiaries. They're just building "apps" in Qlik, PowerBI or similar, using a workforce of a thousand people to interact with that.

danielscrubs 6y ago

This is false in the Nordics. Of my friends in finance 100% are working overtime on weekends as we speak. Banks are a heavily competitive field, try governments and unions instead. Which country and which kind of work? I might relocate when I get older so it’s good to know... ;)

knuthsat 6y ago
Working overtime is a madman's choice. It's possible to work overtime but it's completely irrelevant. It's done mostly for politics. For example, you have small chances of a raise or a promotion if your overtime hours are small. Collecting overtime gives opportunity for under-performers to make progress in the company. I've been to more than 5 banks in Croatia and Austria (Most of the banks in Croatia are subsidiaries of Italian and Austrian banks). The contracts make overtime mandatory but one can negotiate to remove overtime completely. Most people that tell their wives and friends that they work overtime either do not work during the overtime hours, are unnecessarily inefficient for the purpose of collecting hours (unpaid) or have periods of struggle because most of the time they do not work and have no idea what's going on (so when they have to catch up, the stress and the lack of knowledge forces overtime). Some cases I encountered of people who complain about working too much in a bank are those that prefer the company of their coworkers more than that of their spouses.
- danielscrubs 6y ago
  Occams razor, it’s just a very competitive field with salaries that reflect it. Heavy responsibility and slinging Petabytes of data. PhDs, suits and fpga developers in the same room. Insanely great mix in my humble opinion. I hope you find an area that you like.
  - knuthsat 6y ago
    Well, most EU banks do not care about FPGA or PhDs, especially in subsidiaries. They're just building "apps" in Qlik, PowerBI or similar, using a workforce of a thousand people to interact with that.