Company: J-P-Morgan
Date: 2014-09-28
Overall rating: 2/5
Employment status: current
Experience level: Junior

The Behemoth is losing steam
Pros: - Lateral moves: several people are able to move from support function (IT, operations) to FO analyst (in the A2A program) or to the non-IT project team. Risk and Compliance roles are also great opportunities.
- 30-something, even 20-something are a majority of the workforce. Many opportunities to meet and discuss with other departments after work.
- Age is not a factor for promotion to a manager. Some people manage others  that are more than 10 years older.
- Good Brand on the CV. (is what they will tell you when they propose 20% less than Geneva market rate)
- Nice networking opportunities. VP to ED are really accessible, even more so if you join one of the JPM sport team.
Cons: - Technology is a huge pain to deal with, most employees mention technology as THE pain point in their every day life.
- J.P. Morgan seems to value face-time over productivity.
- High turnover at all positions, bankers, operations, IT.
- Salary for support functions is below Geneva standards.
- Bureaucracy, inertia and lack of vision: J.P. Morgan processes are a patchwork of workarounds and temporary solutions that became permanent.
- Heavy focus on metrics that are poorly constructed.
- J.P. Morgan does not invest in technology. 7500 were let go recently even in performing LOB.
Technology people are near-shored in Scotland or off-shored in India. The company invests a lot in client-facing people though (3 people per client instead of usual 1 per client).
- Most jobs in Private Bank are mind-boggingly repetitive (do a report, check the data, validate. Rince and repeat)
- Most tasks are not automated due to politics (oh if it's automated they will reduce our headcounts).