Is working at a smaller firm better?
In my relatively short career I’ve worked at two global firms with 200k+ employees. I’m sick of the endless bureaucracy, being a number, endless BS meetings about nothing, corporate propaganda, and just feeling like another cog in the machine. Is working at a smaller firm (like an EB, or any firm with sub 200 employees) better? What does it feel like? Do you feel like you have a bigger stake in the work that you do?
It depends. there’s massive pros and cons to both. I think both ultimately boil down to if the people you work close to are smart and not terrible when combined with your work style and values it’s a great experience. If otherwise, life is brutal.
Some small firms the people are just really stupid and they are small for a reason, others it’s great. Some big firms leave lots of room to hide and there are a ton of stupid people and bureaucracy, others have small groups with a large amount of autonomy. My experience having worked at 2 large firms and a small firm with all smart people:
1) the bank was an EB and “smaller” there still were people who hid and clown mba associates, but way fewer than the friends I know at BBs, which were bigger.
2) The PE shop was smaller and less people hid, but the people running it really weren’t smart. They thought they were and they were in terms of being credentialed, but they weren’t academically honest. Good ideas didn’t win, the female partner who had an hbs degree was always right and at tips analysis was done for the sake of analysis over common sense prevailing. It had major office politics and lacked common sense all over. It was well known and this forum slobbers all over it. I hated it and was working a ton doing work I didn’t find fulfilling.
3) the family office/hedge fund is tiny from a headcount perspective and the guy who has all the money runs the show, so his word is law. He can be a pain and a little abusive, but he’s actually smart and pays well so I’m ok working here. Also, there aren’t politics—he thinks everyone that works here has special needs and asks why he pays us until we come up with an idea and he then lets us know “that’s a good one!” with a child on Christmas enthusiasm. He has quirks that have resulted in a lot of people leaving, but it’s honestly a little like working for Ari gold. I find some humor in it now and I think most the people that stay here do as well. Eventually you realize he’s just a little off and he doesn’t hold grudges even though he says things that aren’t really appropriate. He just has no filter but cares about making money.
It’s a little weird because I have way less colleagues than my other firms and no one has ever heard of my firm so it can be discouraging and lonely to work here at times, but work just has no social component in my life anymore. This is weird, because I still work a lot, but it’s all intense business. I like that.
I used to have happy hours with coworkers and now I go hang out with my wife. I don’t deal with office politics and love love love that. My manager also doesn’t micromanage and I can do what I want when my old firms I had bosses on bosses filtering anything I did. I used to say where I worked and people were impressed, now if I say where I work bankers or PE professionals act like it’s a no-name mutual fund when the work we do is hyper legit and way more complex than anything someone in IB or PE could even fathom.
I think part of going through a career is learning if you are a big company or small company guy. Big company guys love name dropping where they work or when people raise their eyebrows at their professional pedigree. They can’t stand being surrounded by people that aren’t smart/ credentialed, love rules and systems, and are content/ ok with some level of office politics. They also are risk averse.
Small Company guys detest office politics to the point of sacrificing earnings. The sharp elbowed and political attitude of banks and PE where MD’s/ partners could say nonsense things and VP’s would agree with them made me want to puke. The cuck sycophants are economic rent extractors that add no value to society. I personally think most middle managers are like this and the closer I got to middle management the more unhappy I became. Put another way, I actually didn’t have the ability to be a senior PE professional. I wasn’t political enough. I could do the role and I think was a better investor, but it didn’t matter. The job wasn't about that. So now I work for a no name firm, with no colleagues my level, I don’t manage anyone, and a sorta abusive boss who absolutely runs the show. But, I’m way happier. My paradise would have been my old vps hell—I think we both found the right place for us.
Thank you very much for your thoughtful response. Working at a corporate is so dehumanizing. I’m tired of the bosses upon bosses and Employee ID numbers. I’m only an analyst so if I feel like this now, I think perhaps moving to a smaller firm would be better
The above was really more of a bathroom stall rant. Me being more balanced:
Theres a lot of value to working at both imo. The level of professionalism and the standards at large firms are no joke. Large firms almost always have decades of experience in training people and creating formats for best practice that is really hard to get at a small firm. I do think they are great early in one’s career. However, once you get that training, a lot of people just don’t have the personality for the politics and lack of risk. The counter point to the above rant I had:
you can coast in a lot of big companies with a lot of job security and earnings understanding. I had MD’s at my EB who worked from analyst to MD. They were pretty secure at their firm, made a lot at every step of their career, and have known everyone there for decades. Plus the job eventually was really pretty easy for them because they were the ones who built many of the systems and processes and the trust they build internally was enormous. People sleep on being a career banker—the right group and person can have a hell of a cool career doing that job. Just wasn’t for me.
I am a huge proponent of leaving a job if you are unhappy. Gotta be smart and not burn bridges on the way out, but usually if you leave a firm respectfully you can come back and you will be happier because you learned your firm wasn’t that bad with the perspective of another firm.
Xxx
The specific tasks you do are going to be similar between larger and smaller firms, but the deals you get to work on and the companies you get to work with are likely different. One reason that some people choose to go into banking is to work on meaningful projects – working on important deals and supporting industry leaders. In my opinion working on meaningful projects makes the grind easier. Fewer smaller firms have opportunities to take on these significant projects – you'd have to be an EB, not some no-name boutique to work on those
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