Facetime
I absolutely despise facetime culture. Whenever I ask someone higher up to explain the purpose of staying in office later than 5-6pm, I am always given the ‘learning through osmosis’ argument, which in my eyes is complete bullshit.
I do not see any benefit of staying in office any later than 5-6pm unless there is a specific, explicitly communicated or obvious need for it for it (i.e. deal team call with client from conference room, in person meeting communicated to be in person in advance, etc.). I am going crazy for not being able to utilize downtime at night - those few hours of WFH go a long way esp if workload is light. But instead we have to sit on our ass pretending to be busy working on some garbage clerical deliverable due in 5 days just to stay long enough to not catch any eyeballs when leaving or even worse, have your bonus impeded.
Could someone explain this ridiculous culture of facetime and is there any reasonable way of pushing back on it as an analyst?
I’m all for being available and getting the job done. What I despise though is having to stay in office until late at night to do things I could do at home just as well.
HOLY. This is sooo true
Who created this?? I don’t get it why we all would be put in situations like this
It’s so funny when nobody even questions it
Exactly.
Seems like it's engrained into everyone's understanding on how it works, but this is not 1980s where you literally had to be there to provide value and be useful. COVID itself proved as clear as day that things can indeed be run online, and I am not even advocating for things to be done fully remote (albeit one could, especially for slower months like late July/August, holidays, etc.).
I simply can not wrap my head around the amount of hours people lose out on when having to hibernate in office during downtime. Fucking pathetic.
Still thinking of ways to reasonably push back on this if it ever gets brought up - started leaving earlier. Will see how it goes.
Wah
FaceTime is just a past of a lot of bank’s culture and is part of the job.
I think it’s because many MDs like knowing that if something pops up late they know juniors are at their desk. But who knows? Maybe they want young kids to put in face time cause they did.
What I also don’t understand is people like you complaining about it when you know it’s just part of the deal. I’m sure when you researched the job you heard juniors complaining of silly face time policies, so why now act outraged?
It will be like that until most of the people in positions of power on Wall Street are millennials and gen-z. Boomers are too stuck in their ways.
I was not aware of the severity of it and also thought that it was group dependent, which it probably is. Got unlucky on that front I guess.
The marginal benefit of staying the extra 3-5 hours (given a slow day) relative to what can be done when WFH during those same 3-5 is close to none.
I am absolutely for staying in office and working given a necessity, but having that to be the instilled norm regardless of bandwidth is ridiculous to me.
I’m not trying to argue that it’s a good policy. I went through it as well and found it just as inefficient.
What I’m saying is that it is a well known drawback of the job and I was expecting it when I signed my offer as a young kid, so I’m surprised you were not prepared for it.
Sure, we all know that there is a culture of facetime in banking. However, that does not mean that it is reasonable. I'm surprised that seniors don't do anything about it because it must have significant negative effects for the bank. Imagine how much more feasible banking would be if you could leave the office at 5-6pm. This would result in lower churn, which must be a huge inefficiency in banking. It would also result in better performance when needed. If you sit around in the office until 1am every night doing nothing, handling a couple of weeks with 4am nights and weekend work will be quite difficult when it happens.
Dude no one is arguing facetime is good, I’m saying it’s a known evil in banking and that’s just the way it is.
Do you really believe what you typed? You’re actually surprised seniors don’t care? You think it has significant negative effects for the bank? You think churn amongst juniors is really worrisome for the top banks?
At all the BBs I have worked at, juniors would always be leaving for the buyside and there would be plenty of people waiting to apply. When the job pays so much compared to almost anything else, and you don’t need a graduate degree to do the job, there will always be a hard working kid looking to break in. And if not, the associate and / or vp have to do a little grunt work until the new analyst gets up to speed. Why the heck would an MD care at all?
I think FaceTime is as dumb as you do.
But it’s a known evil in banking and part of the price you pay to make more than 90% of people your age. Fair trade to me is what I thought when I was a kid.
Unfortunately as an analyst there is no pushing back on facetime, it's just part of the game. Even if you are readily available at home, this job is full of people with OCD and ADD who want things to be instantaneous so want to see you're available within seconds if needed. Sure you can call someone and it's probably fine, but there is an implicit bias for in-person. For example, I think most would agree they are more likely to hire someone they interviewed in-person vs. zoom (holding all else equal).
Also, I am one of those boomers who learned the most by grinding late at night with other colleagues. I still keep in touch with some people from my analyst class 10 years later through the camaraderie built
You’re not a boomer. You’re an associate 3 lol. Calm down hardo.
he might've been a late starter to IB. Don't worry some people cycle out of IB before others finally get accepted. ;)
Yep because I'm sure someone 10 years into their career makes it a priority to update their WSO job title every year
It's because senior bankers all despise their wives and children, and also are operating in an industry incapable of innovating. Put those two things together and you get a top down culture of "paying your dues" and "butts in chairs." Further to this point, I actually do think there probably was a lot of learning done late at night and fun to be had in office back in the day. However in today’s environment at least in my group all the associates are gone by 5 and it’s only our sweaty VP staffer keeping tabs on everyone. I have no doubt I would have enjoyed staying in office later if I could crack jokes with colleagues late at night and actually have senior people there to teach me things but I have personally experienced zero “mentorship” from people above me on the job.
This is exactly the environment that made me express my point in the first place.
See no harm in staying there until late at night if you’re vibing with colleagues/have a timely deliverable due/are genuinely enjoying the atmosphere. I do however see meaningful harm in having to pretend to work during time of day that could be very well utilized for a more productive outlet (e.g. lifting/laundry/cleaning apt, etc), all while remaining available online if anything blows up.
This is currently me
Most analysts leave before 8pm nowadays though.
WFH helped reduce unnecessary time spent in office
I am a young MD and I despise facetime. I didn’t like it when I was a junior banker, didn’t like it through my middle mgmt years, and don’t like it now.
I was fortunate enough to work in a relatively small group with great culture and lots of trust with my seniors, so nobody cared if I was working from home or from the office.
Interestingly, I found that often times I would stay until 1-2am at the office (not working on urgent or live deals). I felt I was just more efficient and more disciplined at the office. Also being at the office meant I didn’t have to deal with home distractions (like doing small chores, talking to roommates). Some people have the ability to work from home, I was never one of those people. Even at college I had to study at the library or Starbucks, but couldn’t just study at home. Finally, having the ability to print is something I don’t have at home (IT compliance).
Having been on this post COVID world for a while, I get the feeling there are some people that enjoy the benefit of working from home, but lack the discipline to perform at the same level as they would be if working from the office.
The type of situations are varied:
Let’s stop pretending that WFH works equally well for everyone. It doesn’t. Some people need to be at the office to perform well. And unless you work on a small group like I did, where accountability is real, it is very hard for mgmt to know who is performing from home vs who isn’t.
That’s a great point. WFH works well for some, and working in office works better for others. It depends on each individual.
I find myself to be more efficient at getting things done when working in office than wfh, especially when it’s busy, but also appreciate the ability to wfh when work is slow.
I'm not in banking and I'm a bit surprised that a couple of these scenarios are looked upon unfavorably.
Is it really a big deal if an associate takes an hour to disconnect for dinner, unless it's a live deal? If it's a live deal, I assume they'd be in the office anyway.
And the VP watching Netflix seems like even less of a problem. Why do they need to be reading the news late at night?
I thought the same thing on these scenarios hahah let the person enjoy dinner for an hour. The world is not going to stop because someone didn't re-insert oxford commas for the fifth time on a meaningless footnote in page 86 of the appendix
Or the VP that has 8-10 beers before going back it, what's wrong with that?
Meh, I’d beg to differ.
Are seriously proposing that you want your VPs in their seats at night reading the news rather than going home to enjoy their free time? Or that they can't take an hour at 7pm to eat dinner but should immediately be responding to emails???
The one hour dinner thing or one hour workout class sounds reasonable except stuff needs to go out tonight and then I'm reviewing an hour later and everybody is working till 9 instead of 8 or 10 instead of 9. Workout in the morning
This is an interesting comment. Based on the situations you're describing (if I'm understanding your point), it sounds like you're taking exception with anyone not devoting 100% of their waking hours to the job. We all know this job often requires that, but I'd personally rather have that be dictated by the workload at the time as opposed to it being a general philosophy of my MD, a young MD at that.
No. My point is:
There are many VPs that manage to perform great, have a partner, go to the gym, watch sports, etc. - it’s not about the hours. On the margin though, spending the extra hour reading deal news after you are “done” with your day helps. Some people can do that from home, others can’t
This is a bad take and I’m confused by all the upvotes. I hope interns / prospects who read your post take it with a grain of salt. Criticizing someone for spending an hour to eat dinner with their partner at 7pm is laughably out of touch even in an investment banking environment. I’d give you a pass if you meant during a fire drill or with a deliverable due the next day, but I think it’s clear you disapprove of any of these scenarios during the average day.
I'm kind of with you on this one. A few bad apples type of situation. You're always going to have the top decile of juniors that can go home at 6pm and CRUSH it. You're also always going to have the bottom decile that slack off (tell me you don't know of at least a handful of people that threw on TV or jumped into a Warzone lobby mid-day during COVID). Then you'll have the middle chunk that will perform consistently. Fact of the matter is the top decile just can't offset the hit you take from the bottom decile. You give people an inch and some are bound to take a mile.
That's all just on a productivity basis. Now layer onto that the fact that VPs / MDs can't always easily tell who falls into what decile on the margin and it results in compensation differences across the group, etc.
I think it is a combination of just boomers set in their ways and them doing the calculus above and thinking "why in the fuck would I make an active effort to shift the culture to that scenario"
Probably not a partner. And if you are fuck off you know exactly how IC weeks/weekends are somebody's ass is getting kissed and the associate / vp can't be wasting time at 8-9pm or you get pissed and keep asking for the memo draft
The thing is, MDs don't really care to take much time to pin down who precisely is responsible for exactly what failing. If something goes wrong they're just going to be frustrated with the whole program. Ie, it only takes one person that is WFH to mess something up and your MD is going to want everyone back in office.
this job is really just "can you eat shit with a grin on your face?" Showing face is part of playing the game. Your knowledge of finance and excel is likely shared by millions of other people.
In banking my favorite parts of the day were after 6/7 when seniors went home / out for client dinners, Bullpen loosened way up and we would fuck around throwing nerf footballs or roll out the putting green in between work and shoot the shit. Comradery strengthened and from my perspective if I have to grind on some bullshit til midnight I'd rather do it with a bunch of my peers where we can talk shit about our VP's than in my bedroom alone. Then occasionally the cool MD is in there late with us and busts open a bottle of wine or scotch and passed it around the bullpen. Idk about y'all but being busy on calls/meetings majority of the 9-5 workday to just go home and plug in at home til midnight everyday sounds pretty shitty.
Couldn't agree more. Nevermind that we were regularly leaving the office ~midnight, at least we could largely count on being able to forget about work until the next day. There is already minimal work/life separation but WFH absolutely decimated whatever was left. Commiserating with the bullpen is the only thing I miss about banking.
Rolling out the putting green to play at Augusta for the Greenshoe while waiting for comments is paradise
Having been in the business for over 20 years, I can tell you that I am part of a movement to help shine a spotlight on all this nonsense that the "old guard" still preaches which in 2023 is not practical any more especially in our industry. We are coming with more viable solutions otherwise our industry will continue having a difficult time attracting and retaining top talent such as yourselves and it will at some point be reflected in the bottom line of these organizations.
Unless there is cultural change where hierarchy is de-emphasized and there is a more progressive way of leadership then you all will have to contend with issues such as useless " facetime". I will say in some cases it's necessary, but discretion has to be used rather than strict guidelines that always apply.
I am absolutely aware of the challenges you all face and I can tell you there are people out there like myself that are actively trying to do something about it, not only for the sake of our employees today but for our next generation.
Shut up pledge.
J/k. Totally agree with OP. FaceTime is ridiculous.
Wow! Did I really just read an MD post like he was all cool and then start whining about a Jr banker taking an hour to have dinner with his damn wife before logging back in to address emails.
You are the reason everyone hates banking and hates most mds. Most ridiculous thing I have ever read here!
this. absolute trash take from that guy
Nothing is black and white. But it adds friction and generates delays in the production.
Below a day in life for both scenarios:
Scenario 1
The ANL/ASO send stuff out to the VP at 6.30pm. The VP sees the email at 7pm as he’s getting off the subway. Walks 10-15 minutes from subway to home, gets home 7.15pm. Talks 30 minutes to wife, gets changed, food arrives at 8pm, have dinner together. 8.30pm he’s back online. 30 minutes reading/responding emails received in the last 90 minutes. 9pm he opens the file. Reviews for 30 minutes, sends an email with questions and comments to the ANL/ASO. Emailed received at 9.30pm. They are, too, working from home at this point. The ASO freaks out with some of the comments and calls the ANL at 10pm to review some stuff, sources of information, and why the model outputs look weird. At 10.30pm they both call the VP to discuss the markup. Hang up at 11pm and get to work with clear instructions. Send revised to VP at 2am. VP emails at 11pm to MD saying juniors are delayed, that just hanged up with them and that they’ll send a revised tonight to him and if everything is ok he’ll send that to MD by noon. MD says ok and asks if he should push the meeting date. VP says he’ll let him know in the morning. At 9am VP reviews in the office, gives minor comments to ANL who arrived at 10am (ASO is nowhere to be found), and send to MD by noon.
Scenario 2
The ANL/ASO send stuff out to the VP at 6.30pm. The VP is in the office, prints the copy, marks it up and seats down with ANL/ASO to walk over the markup. They go back and forth live on what’s realistic, what’s not, etc. 7.30pm they are done with discussing. ANL/ASO are both in the office and finish the comments by 9.30pm. VP is still around, takes a look at stuff at 9.30pm, gives some comments live to the ANL who implements them and send the deck to MD at 9.45pm.
The same thing I just described, multiplied by 4-5 books being produced at any point in time has an impact. Meetings canceled/pushed because materials are not ready. Meetings with poor materials. Etc.
What I’m describing is well researched. Certain aspects of Investment Banking are better done with synchronous communication. Being all in one place (the office) facilities that. Being hybrid promotes asynchronous communication, which adds friction.
When does hybrid work better?
You complain about friction, yet you just wrote a 2,000 word essay while the junior team has probably been waiting around for your markup.
Is there a ranking for which banks/groups are worst/best for FaceTime? It seems like all of the banks, except maybe GS and JPM, don’t care about face time.
God forbids a VP who watches Netflix at night. Shame! Shame!
Should be at his desk reading the news!! lol
Well said man. Boomers gonna boom, hopefully this phases out soon
You are probably the type of MD that clients really only use to execute, but don't really care about you or have a personal relationship with. Basically, just a commodity to them (like calling IT to fix your computer).
If you truly wanted to be a well connected advisor, you WOULD be talking about "The Crown" with clients, taking them to Yankee games, blowing off steam together at bars chasing girls, wife swapping (if thats your thing) etc. Building a true relationship with people.
I mean, I'm sure you can make a decent living just being a commoditized IB contact to people, but you will hit a glass ceiling at some point.
I wish investment banking was like that. It would be more fun. Most of fee payers are institutional type of clients. They want (1) insights (which is not a commodity), and (2) execution.
There’s the occasional dinner, drinks, golf, and overall entertainment like taking someone to the corporate box or going to the US Open.
Having said that, the best MDs at my bank, the type that are consistent high-value producers, are not the ones that rely on entertaining or golf. They are just permanently bringing good ideas and covering the client.
Being an MD is a sales job. Personal relationships matter, but you build them off the base of good work and idea generation, not partying.
Sage Kelly in da house
This stuff is dead. The clients ie my bosses aka the partners of our fund don't give a shit anymore. They barely socialize with bankers, it's all very pc, and they only value bankers who pound the pavement with proprietary ideas and angles. That's all anyone cares about anymore -> $$$$
I'm totally here for this. Analysts shitting on MDs to get their retribution. Gangs of analysts.
helps that they're making far better points than this MD who is wayyyyy out of touch with reality. Agreed that he must be an execution monkey. I wouldn't trust this guy's discretion at all
Unfortunately and depending on the bank you have to do FaceTime or what they say pay your dues. So if your bank is this way then I suggest you use that time to learn a new solution or create a new tool… something that makes you stand out from the pack then maybe with time they won’t mind you are not around at a set hour.
However if you are feeling burned out then maybe try to leave the office for say a 20 minute walk and come back for your FaceTime.
If this doesn’t go with you at all and you are feeling burned out then look for other teams with a better culture.
Taking laps outside is nice and refreshing, but I was moreso alluding to late night stays during slower days where you could definitely use the time to be productive outside of the office (e.g. gym, laundry, general errand running, mealprep, etc.).
Any tips on how to gauge other group’s facetime culture situation via networking? Unsure if it’s a convention to ask bluntly
Aw totally get it. I know some people use their kids or dog or charity as an excuse to leave for a few hours then go back.
In conversation with other teams ask if MDs leave early to pick up their kids or dog lol or if everyone is chained to the desk. Often you get a reaction… if they laugh then run. Or if they say oh yes when it’s slow we leave at 6 etc.
Hope that helps and sorry they are making you sit around for a show
It's dumb as fuck - FaceTime is the worst part of this job. I want to go home and hang out with my roommates not chalk it up with some dinosaurs in the bullpen eating our shitty Seamless orders every day
Why is this MD even on WSO lmao. Go read the news
Yea god forbid someone who knows what they're talking about would try and help random kids. They should be banished. It should only be clueless kids here
ahahhha underrated comment
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