Get your financial house in order or it's going to continue being harder and harder to ever get out of WF voluntarily. The hooks (that keep you there) continually deepen with the salary, the PTO, the benefits, the thought of all the severance you're supposedly accruing for each year of service if they ever lay you off, etc.
You'll find yourself middle aged and being paid a bizarre amount of money for a role that has no real purpose and your diminishing skillset no longer transfers to the outside world.
I'm so glad I left the place voluntarily several months ago. No plans to get back in this industry with any other big banks. Its all the same.
Most of you aren't needed. Let's be honest. If your pushing spreadsheets, preparing recurring decks for standing meetings, and worse....holding weekly update meetings as your primary job function, you aren't needed by the company. AI will soon replace you. Your only saving grace is that your manager may need you, because he/she is so inept and can barely open an email without assistance that he/she may keep you around and waste company money on you while you mentally go insane.
Advice is to make plans to leave. I was there 20 years and nobody was thrilled with working there. People may have been thrilled with the money, but they were selling their life away and mostly miserable.
New grads and people looking at current openings --- find something else to do besides big banks. Its a miserable career. 8 positions in 20 years across 3 different departments.....starting at 30k and ending at 200k.....trust me, I know. Do something else, you're future self will thank you many times over.
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@OP I could have written that myself... except i'm still miserable holding out for severance. Great advice.
@OP, from a working-at-WF perspective, you're spot on. Advice to young grads: don't lump all banks together with WF. WF is a toxic work environment that breeds fear and abuse. Not every bank is like that. When considering a job, analyze the role in the context of the company culture. Ask yourself: does this place genuinely support team-based agile environments, or is it just lip service? You can even use AI to dissect the job description and gauge its agility. I've noticed many new engineer and lead job descriptions don't even mention the word "agile" anymore – wonder if WF's 5-year-old agile transformation project has been all but forgotten.
If you're creative and value autonomy, look beyond salary and benefits to understand the organization's spirit. Compensation matters, but it's not everything. Don't get su-ked in by a big paycheck if the work environment is draining your soul.
I've seen colleagues get trapped in the WF cycle, and it's hard to escape. The longer you stay, the more hooks you've got to cut through – salary, PTO, benefits, and promised severance pay. It's a vicious cycle that can leave you feeling stuck.
The writing's on the wall: automation will replace many roles involving repetitive tasks like spreadsheet management and report generation. Don't wait until it's too late to make a move. If you're considering a career change, now's the time to take control and make your own plans. Your future self will thank you.
I am planning, for Shart to pay me my severance. Nice try OP.
Is this written by wf trolls with attempt to save money (not pay displacement/ severance)?
I will say you are accurate though.
this is true for any company, not just WF.
This is about the truest thing I have read on this board in a long time. We are better off taking control of our careers and making our own moves.
Sounds like the bank gave you an upper middle class existence for very little work and you still managed to bi--h and moan about it.
@OP amen