Culture difference between Internal Audit (BO) and Commercial Banking (FO)

I was in Internal Audit for a large bank for about a year and a half. Came in as an intern, then came on full time and I HATED IT. Mundane work, not finance related at all, and read policies all day (reading policy is the bane of my existence). Anyways, I was able to network my way out and I am currently in commercial banking with the same bank. The culture difference is CRAZY to me, and here are a few things that I've noticed between BO and FO cultures (feel free to chime in).

  • BO is super awkward and have no social skills at all. Obviously FO all have great personalities and are generally very nice and friendly. FO can actually hold a conversation for longer than 5 seconds.

  • BO people are out of shape and a lot of them are actually very obese. Is it odd that I notice this? haha. But yes, in BO I would say that about 80% of the people were overweight/obese. In my office, I was one of the most in-shape people, which is sad (lol).

  • BO people loved to talk about how busy they are, even though a lot of the time they were'nt at all. You would think one manager was doing 10 peoples job, but in reality, it was not that bad. FO people are actually busy with clients all the time, and if not clients they are preparing things for the next client, going to meetings, and networking.

  • FO people seem like they want to be here, as opposed to the BO counterparts who seem like they are forced to be there.

**I hope I don't sound like I'm shitting on the BO peeps out there. Just some things that i have experienced and noticed first-hand. **

Feel free to chime in!

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