Comment by jevgeni | Hacker News Reader

Comment by jevgeni | Hacker News Reader

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Speaking from the trenches here.

Banking, especially non-consumer banking (i.e. IB, prop trading operations, etc) is divided intro three tiers: front, middle and back office.

Front office are the people directly dealing with "clients" (or better "counterparties") and get shitloads of money and an aura of being business savvy and knowing where it's at. Basically it's sales, trading and some higher-tier management. Contrary to what one might think based on the "Wall Street" films, these people don't need to be smart or sophisticated. I know quite a bit of traders, who only finished high school.

Mid office are the people who do the actual nitty-gritty work, that one would actually associate with a working banking institution: research, risk oversight (in Europe mostly known as risk control), legal, compliance, marketing, accounting, ALM, etc. They usually earn OK, but nowhere near what front office makes.

Back office are the people who are there for the infrastructure. Transaction banking, for example (i.e. making sure that your transactions are settled correctly, that money is wired to direct recipients, etc.) Tech is in most banks a back office thing (especially if we are not talking about algo trading). They earn shit.

I'm involved in quant finance, so I hoped, that I would see a culture shift after 2008-2013 from get-rich-quick-with-other-peoples-money schemes to a more serious business culture, but that is not the case. I honestly don't believe that Goldie can change its culture so quickly.

> Speaking from the trenches here. [...] Tech is in most banks a back office thing (especially if we are not talking about algo trading). They earn shit.

You are in the wrong trench, my friend. High performing developers and systems folks are extraordinarily well compensated at the higher end banks and hedge funds.

When people change jobs, it's usually for another job in financial services, largely because most technology companies cannot even begin to touch the total compensation for such a person.

You have to have a thick skin a mate of mine got told by a big swinging dick in the city "I have a pair of shoes that cost more than your entire wardrobe"

Given yesterday's Amazon scandalous news, along with all other tech scandals (e.g. Condoleezza Rice at DropBox, no-poaching agreements), it's disingenuous to claim that only happens in finance.

two different things: corruption and illegal activities happen all the time in the Corporate America. Finance, Tech, Auto, you name it. That's one thing and that's where (I believe) your comment is coming from.

Second thing: you will have much harder time becoming manager, doing important work, becoming CEO, etc in company that is not directly in your field. It gets worse. The Companies tend to get rid of employees who are not their "main line of business" in the economic downturns. In other words: your job as a developer or IT engineer at a large bank or hedge fund can (and will!) be outsourced easily if needed. They are not an IT company! They could care less about agile or not using Ruby or Java or Perl. They are financial insitution. You are there to make their infrastructure work. If not you then someone else. If nobody else, then India. You are not their core business. They have you as a nice to have extra because times are good, extra cash is there and someone thought it might be a good idea to do it in-house. On the other hand Google, Facebook, MS, etc -- they live and breathe technology. Your Manager won't be a dude who doesn't care about technology. You won't be treated as the proverbial "fifth wheel in a car". You are the core business here. On the other hand, here is the place, where employees running books can be outsourced at a CEO grim. Let ATP or someone take care of that crap!

I can't believe talented computer scientists would go to GS to waste their time building great stuff for a company that will put them to jail for many years if they put some of the HFT source code on the public server.

I don't think Google or Facebook would ever do that. The same way GS would never try so hard to jail their traders for inside trading.

Totaly agree with you but certianly in the city its a lot more overt. I know that more staid companies like publishers look down on thier technical staff as does the Pricipal civl service.

I think that is changing as well now. Although tech people don't get paid as much as traders, traders fully realise that their success depends on technology. It's not considered an imposition like it was 15-20 years ago. I'm dealing with FX traders now, and with Treasury Traders in a previous role, and although their standards are high, they pretty much all behave in a friendly and professional manner.

I'm not in tech. :)

Also, comparing bulge bracket and higher end hedge funds with most tech companies isn't entirely fair. Are you sure you aren't in M&A? :d

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