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When I was a junior in the financial industry, I worked in small trading shops where stone-age behaviors was the norm. I had a boss who wanted me to join him at
by jplr8922 6y ago
When I was a junior in the financial industry, I worked in small trading shops where stone-age behaviors was the norm. I had a boss who wanted me to join him at a strip club. Another one did drink on lunchtime before trading in the afternoon. I once had a manager who wanted to discuss the number of women he had sex with during happy hours. I've seen sport bets with big numbers simply to impress the colleagues. I could go on and on. They all had this toxic kind of ''work hard play hard'' mentality, where work hard = do everything I tell you and play hard = some toxic way to deal with the stress.
This kind of ''hockey team leadership'' works well when all players have the same hard skills and backgrounds, but quickly crumble if the team size gets higher and more diverse. Its easy to fake group cohesion if all members are the same douchebag.
- antihero 6y agoIt's like financialised toxic masculinity.
- secondcoming 6y agoIn the UK (London at least) it's not unheard of to have a pint at lunchtime, and not just in the finance industry.
- kelnos 6y agoSure, but I think the parent was referring to much heavier drinking than that. Most people can drink a pint of beer at lunch without much or any negative affect on their afternoon work performance. But I expect here we're talking about two (or more) cocktails, glasses of wine, or even hard liquor at lunch.
- jplr8922 6y agoYup, I was talking about extended lunches with many beers. In my opinion, heavy drinking is still bad outside work hours. I've seen supervisors making financial decisions while hangover from their last night party. Was I supposed to believe that their judgment was not biased and faculties ready for any situation? Would you better have an inexperienced sober junior or an experienced senior under effect of alcohol as an employee?
- __blockcipher__ 6y agoDepends on the person. Some people can do better work hungover than others can sober purely because their base level of skill/output is higher so the -20% or -40% hit (or however you wanna mathematically represent it) doesn’t outpace their increased productivity relative to the next guy
- interactivecode 6y ago[Citation Needed]
- __blockcipher__ 6y agoThere’s no citation needed, it follows directly from the fact that output varies between individuals. Unless you want to argue that fact...
- beambot 6y agoBallmer peak for finance?
- kortilla 6y ago1 pint of beer will have 2-3 units of alcohol. That’s equivalent of 2-3 shots of hard alcohol, which is what you would get in “two cocktails”.
- abvthrow906 6y ago
- bayindirh 6y agoFrom my experience, a pint at lunchtime is considered normal in all EU, and it's not harmful when done in moderation (read: not every day). This implies something way harder. BTW: I've always thought that Margin Call is a very very movie showing internals of the financial institutions.
- xref 6y agoIs that second “very” supposed to be “realistic” or “fake”? Think I’ve heard people say “realistic” before
- bayindirh 6y agoIt's an editing error. It should read: BTW: I've always thought that Margin Call is a very good movie showing internals of the financial institutions. It was late, I was tired, mistakes were made. :)
- quantified 6y agoUK has lots of great beers that an imperial pint of leaves you in good shape for returning to work.
- sonthonax 6y agoIt's a Friday team lunch thing, quite civilised really.
- mobutu 6y agoSounds cool place to work at.
- jplr8922 6y agoIn my experience, most workplaces have at least one manager with a light-medium addiction problem (tends to be alcohol for olders, and marijuana for millenials). It might be hard to spot, but the best way to track it is the quality of decision making. Unfortunatly, addiciton and other mental health problems are almost impossible for the firm to adress until its too late for everybody (disgrunted employees, missed business opportunities, etc). I hope this COVID crisis will make us more preventive regarding these issues.
- cratermoon 6y agoAddiction is a disease of the brain, not a mental health issue.
- glial 6y agoCan you elaborate on the distinction?
- cratermoon 6y agoMental health issues may have no clear physiological cause. Even if there's a physiological aspect, it's unclear what the causes that condition. Depression, for example, we see low serotonin levels, but we don't know why the levels are low. In the case of addiction, the mechanism is clear. https://science.sciencemag.org/content/278/5335/45 https://science.sciencemag.org/content/278/5335/45
- curryst 6y agoAddiction issues are mental health issues because there is no reward; it is not a rational choice. It follows that people with addiction issues are either not informed enough to make a rational choice, irrational, or for some reason are unable to say no. If the model were really this simple, relapse would be non-existent. I can't believe any former addicts would make a rational choice to relapse.
- simplestman 6y agoThis is very unsettling comment for me. I have participated in same behavior but in the tech industry. I joined my managers at strip clubs for lunches, I introduced fresh grads and H1Bs to endless buffets at strip clubs. Happy hour were pretty much required work activity everyday. But I never thought it was bad, I mean strip clubs are sleazy, but I always considered happy hours to be part of team bonding. The best teams, I have worked in, also drank heavily. Not sure if it is age or if it is because I don't go to happy hours that much anymore but I also don't have a strong bond for my team. But I sort of feel bad for all those reluctant H1Bs who I introduced to strip clubs. I wonder if they really enjoyed hanging out with us or if they were pretending.
- jplr8922 6y agoWell if you end up in a toxic workplace there are limits to what you can do as ''the new one'', and unfortunatly you often have to follow along if you don't want to loose your job. In my view there are two ways to understand this problem. 1) As a feminist issue. And it is, since no women will feel good in this kind of workplace where strip clubs are the norm. On the long run its counterproductive for society to allow these behaviours at the workplace. 2) As a creativity issue. Even in a hypothetical where women/minorities don't exist, these behaviours would still be an issue from a business point of view. The ''sport team mentality'' kills intellectual creativity. Try to sell these guys an idea which is alien to their monkey-culture... impossible. While working in these environments, I think I've read up to 10 books about ''how to pitch your idea'', not understanding what was wrong. True creativity is impossible in these circles, and their business usually fails at some point. It happened two times in my life, and I'm not 35 yet. Getting in touch with your subconscious is like loosing your virginity ; it wont happen if you alway group with similar peers.
- _lazlo 6y agoCalling it a feminist issue marginalizes the men who are uncomfortable. There are a lot of gentlemen who want to treat women with respect and who value women in the work place.
- rajacombinator 6y ago