Do you agree with the overall reputation about people working in finance?
Working in finance yourself do you believe the environment makes you selfish and more driven by money ?
No. Some are selfish, IT guys, for instance
Loool
In banking there are serious repercussions for wrong doing, e.g. look at stumpf from wf. https://www.bbc.com/news/business-51231003 he’s banned from banking and paying a huge fine. This rarely happens in other industries.
I thought I would be thinking in the way but the reality is more of completion-driven that brings money
I think being in finance/consulting has definitely made me way more money/status driven than before (especially having grown in a more moderately middle class family). The hierarchy structure of finance is such that there's a bit more interaction between the analysts and senior partners (than at a facebook for example). then you see and hear about their lifestyles (e.g., being able to go with them to country clubs, stay a weekend at their ski mansion). on top of that, the company events/expense policies allows us to live above our typical means, which makes us want to make even more money to finance these lifestyles that we continue to get spoiled with
I would have said this before I knew that Blind existed and seeing all of these tech people share and brag about their comp. tech seems to be just as money driven as anything else, and I’m sure the Bay Area living expense and startup-exit culture exacerbates a similar “me too” / “keep up with the Joneses” attitude. At least making Managing Director / Partner is something I can work towards in finance. I would be pissed if I had the exact same skill set as another e.g. 25 year old and they happened to join a random startup and received millions for doing the same stuff. Yikes!
I think this is kind of true, in tech you hear about the people who get paid a lot and write them off as the lucky few. In finance, the guy making 8 digits a year sits right there nearby. It's a long tailed distribution that makes you wonder, "could that be me?" I used to think 500k was a lot of money, now I wonder when I'm going to get my shot at 2m a year. Not that I need that much, it just feels much more attainable.
In my experience in IB, it was the more money driven that survived and the less money driven that found their own exit or were shown where it is. That's a generalization though, and from a limited data set. Can't judge individuals before you get to know them. Met plenty of great people in IB, too.
I wouldn’t say it makes you more selfish. I would say the stress and long hours definitely makes you believe your time outside of work is more valuable than everyone else’s. And that you work harder for your money than everyone else.
Being on blind makes me selfish and money driven.