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Founding a startup with zero revenue is better than working for Goldman Sachs

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Re: Founding a startup with zero revenue is better than working for Goldman Sachs

#131

Post by ericd »

jrockway wrote: post #77
VolatileVoid wrote: post #27

So. This is funny. I actually work at Goldman, work in the system he talks about, and have been doing so for 5 years. You can get numbed by the experience of working here, but you don't have to be. I've become friendly with some of the best hackers I know, and for us, finance always takes a backseat to writing amazing code. Sometimes we succeed. Sometimes we fail, but we try to never say, "Meh. Good enough." Wall Str…

I also work at a bank, but don't like people who think it's just a job . They make my life more difficult and make it harder for the bank to make money. Our department doesn't hire people like that. (Also, pretty much nothing in the article applies to most banks these days. Sure, someone may have a burger-eating contest from time to time, but it's not like it's work-sanctioned. It's just a bunch of dudes with too muc…

It's very much not silly to count on the bonuses. 20% extra? Try 100-300% or more in most of the positions on the trading floor. As you rise in the ranks, it's much, much more. The bonus at every level above Analyst is easily larger than the base, which, as Antonio says, is generally not that impressive. This is true at every big bank on Wall St.

Among my friends, we represented every large investment bank in NYC and many of the smaller hedge funds, so I'm sure it's representative.

Not sure how compensation is in the IT depts. at those banks, though, if that's what you're talking about. IT is probably not representative of why people go to work on Wall St, though, since it's viewed as a cost center in most banks, and it's not what Antonio is talking about in the post.

Re: Founding a startup with zero revenue is better than working for Goldman Sachs

#132

Post by bryanh »

jrockway wrote: post #77
VolatileVoid wrote: post #27

So. This is funny. I actually work at Goldman, work in the system he talks about, and have been doing so for 5 years. You can get numbed by the experience of working here, but you don't have to be. I've become friendly with some of the best hackers I know, and for us, finance always takes a backseat to writing amazing code. Sometimes we succeed. Sometimes we fail, but we try to never say, "Meh. Good enough." Wall Str…

I also work at a bank, but don't like people who think it's just a job . They make my life more difficult and make it harder for the bank to make money. Our department doesn't hire people like that. (Also, pretty much nothing in the article applies to most banks these days. Sure, someone may have a burger-eating contest from time to time, but it's not like it's work-sanctioned. It's just a bunch of dudes with too muc…

You can have the attitude of "just a job" and still be a valuable asset to a company. To some people, work is "just work" and sometimes the "just a job" mentality is an extension of that.

If you ask me, its called life balance. It's just a job. It's just school. It's just money. That's just life.

Re: Founding a startup with zero revenue is better than working for Goldman Sachs

#133

Post by Psyonic »

hugh3 wrote: post #128
Psyonic wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't have to worry about them over-glorifying Google either. The general attitude on this site is that you're either working on your own startup (by far the best option), working for an early-stage startup (ok, but still second best, since its not your own thing), or you're basically wasting your time (working for "the man"). I find it offensive, actually, but so it goes.

Again, everybody likes to justify their own decisions. And the more they secretly suspect the other possibility might actually be better, the more they feel the need to poop on it. I don't feel the need to loudly proclaim how much it must suck to be a garbageman, but I do feel the need to loudly proclaim that I sure am glad I'm not earning six hundred thousand dollars a year at a big hedge fund.

Fair enough. I wouldn't mind except reading it so often gives me anxiety about my decisions. This site can be like Cosmo for nerds... I can't stop reading it, but its not uncommon that I walk away feeling 10 pounds fatter.

Re: Founding a startup with zero revenue is better than working for Goldman Sachs

#135

Post by SkyMarshal »

nearestneighbor wrote: post #114

In fact, we were basically the trader’s little bitches, and any quant who’s honest with himself realizes that. I wonder what it is that traders do that they can't be replaced by software? How do they manage to generate more value than quants?

I think it's a matter of being book smart vs being street smart. There's still room for both.

Re: Founding a startup with zero revenue is better than working for Goldman Sachs

#136

Post by j2d2j2d2 »

ezl wrote: post #110
jrockway wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another issue the other banks (and maybe GS, who knows) have is "internal arbitrage". This is what happens when each desk has their own pricing system; they go out of sync, a trader notices, and then sells from his desk to another desk with an out of date price. The bank loses money, but his desk makes some. For that reason, creating a system like SecDB is a high priority these days.

@jrockway: I'm curious about this, do you have any links to texts you've read about this or is this from personal experience? In my experience there are all sorts of reasons why different desks WANT to price things differently. When 2 internal desks cross markets, they trade with each other instead of the broad market. Its advantageous for both internal desks because if the order is crossed internally, they don't hav…

Trading to move deals to particular books/desks is not the same as making money off internal groups. I suspect you're conflating these two points.

Re: Founding a startup with zero revenue is better than working for Goldman Sachs

#137

Post by martin »

ericd wrote: post #131
jrockway wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I also work at a bank, but don't like people who think it's just a job . They make my life more difficult and make it harder for the bank to make money. Our department doesn't hire people like that. (Also, pretty much nothing in the article applies to most banks these days. Sure, someone may have a burger-eating contest from time to time, but it's not like it's work-sanctioned. It's just a bunch of dudes with too muc…

It's very much not silly to count on the bonuses. 20% extra? Try 100-300% or more in most of the positions on the trading floor. As you rise in the ranks, it's much, much more. The bonus at every level above Analyst is easily larger than the base, which, as Antonio says, is generally not that impressive. This is true at every big bank on Wall St. Among my friends, we represented every large investment bank in NYC and…

I worked in IT at GS for a couple years. 15-20% was about right for bonuses there, on average. In 2006, I got almost a 50% bonus, but that was an exceptionally good year.

Re: Founding a startup with zero revenue is better than working for Goldman Sachs

#138

Post by xyzzyb »

VolatileVoid wrote: post #98
forensic wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or maybe he's saying that access to his wife is dependent on the Goldman Sachs job. If he loses the 20-factor-job he loses the 100-factor-wife.

Definitely not. :) I'm just saying that - to me - a job is just a means to some end. That end (for me) is providing for my family adequately. That I happen to enjoy what I do is an extra bonus. I'm just saying not to lose sight of why we do what we do. If you start placing too much importance on a job, you let your job define you. IMHO, it's much more empowering to remember that your job is just a tool like any other…

Agreed. My job is a means to an end, not a personal definition. I'm a husband and father first. I love the job I have now because it's just a job. I do interesting programming. I work 40, zero overtime. My time is flexible, I can come or go as I please as long as I put in the time. I can take a vacation day with zero notice.

I purposefully got a job that really is "just" a job so I could not only put food on the table but be there to enjoy it as well.

Re: Founding a startup with zero revenue is better than working for Goldman Sachs

#139

Post by xyzzyb »

jrockway wrote: post #97
rdouble wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

there would be a lot of startups and not a lot of Goldman Sachs. There are a lot of startups and there is only 1 Goldman Sachs...

That's quite a literal reading of my statement there. What I meant to convey was the number of employees that Goldman has (a lot), and how many similar companies there are (BAML, JPM, Citi, ...). A lot of people have chosen the "peon at a big bank" position, and it's probably not because they think that it will make their life less enjoyable.

Or even peon at a big university. Better hours, less pay.

Re: Founding a startup with zero revenue is better than working for Goldman Sachs

#140

Post by mdda »

hugh3 wrote: post #129
known wrote: post #48

An average salary of $633,000 turns you into a paranoid because of job security fear.

Only if you're dumb enough to live like you're earning $633,000 a year. If you lived like you're earning $100K and put the rest into a savings account, you could quickly overcome all your financial worries. I doubt anyone is that clever, though, especially if you're surrounded by other folks earning $633K and feel the need to keep up. Entire industries exist for the benefit of those who make $633K and can't think of…

I don't see why you doubt that anyone who earns $600k is clever enough to live cheaply : Banks prefer to hire smart people...

But there's also an element of management preferring their employees to live at/above their means to some extent, just so they have to keep putting in the hours... (This is really true : I employ sales people in a trading room, and it's easy to see that they react to financial pressure by making more money).

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