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Ask HN: What’s it like to work in finance as technologist

8 points by mr_o47 4y ago

What are some differences between tech and finance especially working as a technologist

TheAlchemist 4y ago
Finance is a very big sector, so I guess it's completely different if you work for say 'fintech', a trading desk, or a 'traditional' banking activities. Here is one interesting article: https://calpaterson.com/bank-python.html https://calpaterson.com/bank-python.html
GianFabien 4y ago
My experiences might not be typical. As always YMMV. I've worked for several superannuation and insurance companies. During the early days I couldn't believe how poorly informed most of the management were. Since I couldn't believe that they could be that stupid, I kept things to myself did a lot of research and in that process learnt a lot about the underlying accounting, investing, trading principles. The technical aspects of the work were the least of my problems. But the unrealistic timelines made virtually everything feel like a death march. Burn out is the ever present danger.
maxilevi 4y ago
I've worked in the technology back office of a well known hedge fund. Although it was a very technology focused fund and the founder was a computer scientist, you could still feel that engineers were second class citizens in the organization.
tacostakohashi 4y ago
Have done this for a decade and a half... it obviously there is some variations but a few themes: * Pay is decent, amazing locations like NYC / Manhattan, City of London, Hong Kong, Tokyo, nice buildings, some travel (business class, etc). * High status... it shouldn't matter, but it does, even really crappy jobs in this sector give you instant credibility with the rest of society. * Actual monetary compensation is decent... you won't starve, but it's kind of discounted because a lot of people are attracted to the first two items above. * Code can be ok (at best)... or sometimes really crufty, so long as it does whatever it needs to do, lots of legacy stuff 10, 20 or more years behind. * Most software is actually not actually that mission critical. Outside of a few very specific areas like high frequency trading, most errors can be undone with a phone call, or roll back and rerun it, etc. * Some of the most important things are done in excel spreadsheets. All sorts of very sophisticated systems and algorithms send roll up to feeding their data into some spreadsheet for analysis/manipulation. * It's all about the people, ultimately if the company is in the equity trading or life insurance business, those people will be the key decision makers, and tech is just a cost center. If you can fix things for those people, great, if you can't, nobody cares how good your coding is in an academic sense.
- giantg2 4y ago
  As a dev I've only worked for a financial company, so I don't have a comparison. I mostly agree with the above. The locations can include the listed places. They can also include other sites like JPM at Wilmington, DE or smaller companies in smaller cities/suburbs. The status is sort of right. One side of this that I've seen is that being on the tech side rather than the hard finance side will mean you are viewed as lower status within the company.
  - tacostakohashi 4y ago
    Yeah, they're always trying to move various back office / support / tech jobs to second tier / lower cost locations / "nearshoring", MS has Montreal, GS has Utah, lots of them do Budapest, etc. But, they always have core people on site too. It's not so much that the work is only in Manhattan, London, etc... but more that, if you want to be in one or visit those locations, finance is among the best ways to get there.
- dev_0 4y ago
  [dead]
- GianFabien 4y ago
  > Actual monetary compensation is decent ... After you take into account the much higher cost of living in the places you mention, it remains hard to save much. For example for an excellent job in London it was the choice to live centrally and enjoy the experience, or to commute several hours a day and be able to save for the future. Besides the hours are long so you end up living it up far less than you expect.
kusari_tim 4y ago
It really depends on which type of finance you mean. I've worked at some of the world's biggest hedge funds, as well as banks, and they are WILDLY different. Hedge funds * Pay can fluctuate pretty drastically depending on what you do. Your value add in this space is to understand the financials more than other software devs. Remember their main goal is to generate money from money, NOT software development. It's a means to an end, so the more you can understand, the more valuable you are. * Intense working environment - there's no real 9-5 here. High turnover, and there tends to be a lot of early turnover, so you either make it or exit quickly. * Fun - generally given the intensity of the environment, you get to know your team really well and becomes a tight knit group. * Expect weekends / holidays when things hit the fan. The amount of money on the line makes it very likely you will be pulled in for emergencies, which will happen. * Deep tech knowledge and moves quickly. Banks * Bureaucracy heavy. You are more likely to find yourself managing paper work than doing software development. The software dev requirements are low, given the complexity is also low. * Aging tech - given the heavy regulations things move slowly. Very slowly. The sense of urgency is replaced by reducing risk of getting something wrong. Often times they compensate with manual procedures over technology. * Very high pay - Banks will pay someone who can understand technology, manage the process, and stay there for a while, very high salaries. So, depending on what you're looking for, YMMV.
- mr_o47 4y ago
  Agreed, Hey i just saw your profile looks like you worked at Bridge water associates. What was it like it work at a pretty prestigious hedge fund
  - kusari_tim 4y ago
    Loved it - was there for over 12 years. It can be very intense, and it's definitely not the kind of environment you can slack off. It gets a lot of strange press, but many of the things that make it strange to the outside are what make it such a high performing place. In general - be honest, work hard, have integrity, and demand that of others. I have a new startup now, and I credit BW with a large amount of the skills and problem solving I needed to go out and tackle big problems.
badpun 4y ago
My experience from a large and fairly typical, boring bank: - Lots of inflated egos on the management side - Technology is just a necessary evil to them. This makes you a necessary flunky. They will not respect your opinion as they don't think there are any insights to be had from the tech side of things - which may be right, they're trying to accomplish their goals with the crappiest and most primitive software they can get away with, that gets the job done. It's all decades of horrendous tech debt, that they're somehow ok with - everybody in management accepts slow pace of development it causes, as I think they prefer it over giving some power to the IT people.

8 points by mr_o47 4y ago

What are some differences between tech and finance especially working as a technologist

Finance is a very big sector, so I guess it's completely different if you work for say 'fintech', a trading desk, or a 'traditional' banking activities. Here is one interesting article: https://calpaterson.com/bank-python.html https://calpaterson.com/bank-python.html

GianFabien 4y ago

My experiences might not be typical. As always YMMV. I've worked for several superannuation and insurance companies. During the early days I couldn't believe how poorly informed most of the management were. Since I couldn't believe that they could be that stupid, I kept things to myself did a lot of research and in that process learnt a lot about the underlying accounting, investing, trading principles. The technical aspects of the work were the least of my problems. But the unrealistic timelines made virtually everything feel like a death march. Burn out is the ever present danger.

maxilevi 4y ago

I've worked in the technology back office of a well known hedge fund. Although it was a very technology focused fund and the founder was a computer scientist, you could still feel that engineers were second class citizens in the organization.

tacostakohashi 4y ago

Have done this for a decade and a half... it obviously there is some variations but a few themes: * Pay is decent, amazing locations like NYC / Manhattan, City of London, Hong Kong, Tokyo, nice buildings, some travel (business class, etc). * High status... it shouldn't matter, but it does, even really crappy jobs in this sector give you instant credibility with the rest of society. * Actual monetary compensation is decent... you won't starve, but it's kind of discounted because a lot of people are attracted to the first two items above. * Code can be ok (at best)... or sometimes really crufty, so long as it does whatever it needs to do, lots of legacy stuff 10, 20 or more years behind. * Most software is actually not actually that mission critical. Outside of a few very specific areas like high frequency trading, most errors can be undone with a phone call, or roll back and rerun it, etc. * Some of the most important things are done in excel spreadsheets. All sorts of very sophisticated systems and algorithms send roll up to feeding their data into some spreadsheet for analysis/manipulation. * It's all about the people, ultimately if the company is in the equity trading or life insurance business, those people will be the key decision makers, and tech is just a cost center. If you can fix things for those people, great, if you can't, nobody cares how good your coding is in an academic sense.

giantg2 4y ago
As a dev I've only worked for a financial company, so I don't have a comparison. I mostly agree with the above. The locations can include the listed places. They can also include other sites like JPM at Wilmington, DE or smaller companies in smaller cities/suburbs. The status is sort of right. One side of this that I've seen is that being on the tech side rather than the hard finance side will mean you are viewed as lower status within the company.
- tacostakohashi 4y ago
  Yeah, they're always trying to move various back office / support / tech jobs to second tier / lower cost locations / "nearshoring", MS has Montreal, GS has Utah, lots of them do Budapest, etc. But, they always have core people on site too. It's not so much that the work is only in Manhattan, London, etc... but more that, if you want to be in one or visit those locations, finance is among the best ways to get there.
dev_0 4y ago
[dead]
GianFabien 4y ago
> Actual monetary compensation is decent ... After you take into account the much higher cost of living in the places you mention, it remains hard to save much. For example for an excellent job in London it was the choice to live centrally and enjoy the experience, or to commute several hours a day and be able to save for the future. Besides the hours are long so you end up living it up far less than you expect.

kusari_tim 4y ago

It really depends on which type of finance you mean. I've worked at some of the world's biggest hedge funds, as well as banks, and they are WILDLY different. Hedge funds * Pay can fluctuate pretty drastically depending on what you do. Your value add in this space is to understand the financials more than other software devs. Remember their main goal is to generate money from money, NOT software development. It's a means to an end, so the more you can understand, the more valuable you are. * Intense working environment - there's no real 9-5 here. High turnover, and there tends to be a lot of early turnover, so you either make it or exit quickly. * Fun - generally given the intensity of the environment, you get to know your team really well and becomes a tight knit group. * Expect weekends / holidays when things hit the fan. The amount of money on the line makes it very likely you will be pulled in for emergencies, which will happen. * Deep tech knowledge and moves quickly. Banks * Bureaucracy heavy. You are more likely to find yourself managing paper work than doing software development. The software dev requirements are low, given the complexity is also low. * Aging tech - given the heavy regulations things move slowly. Very slowly. The sense of urgency is replaced by reducing risk of getting something wrong. Often times they compensate with manual procedures over technology. * Very high pay - Banks will pay someone who can understand technology, manage the process, and stay there for a while, very high salaries. So, depending on what you're looking for, YMMV.

mr_o47 4y ago
Agreed, Hey i just saw your profile looks like you worked at Bridge water associates. What was it like it work at a pretty prestigious hedge fund
- kusari_tim 4y ago
  Loved it - was there for over 12 years. It can be very intense, and it's definitely not the kind of environment you can slack off. It gets a lot of strange press, but many of the things that make it strange to the outside are what make it such a high performing place. In general - be honest, work hard, have integrity, and demand that of others. I have a new startup now, and I credit BW with a large amount of the skills and problem solving I needed to go out and tackle big problems.

badpun 4y ago

My experience from a large and fairly typical, boring bank: - Lots of inflated egos on the management side - Technology is just a necessary evil to them. This makes you a necessary flunky. They will not respect your opinion as they don't think there are any insights to be had from the tech side of things - which may be right, they're trying to accomplish their goals with the crappiest and most primitive software they can get away with, that gets the job done. It's all decades of horrendous tech debt, that they're somehow ok with - everybody in management accepts slow pace of development it causes, as I think they prefer it over giving some power to the IT people.