eFinancialCareers

You may be busy, but are you in control? Now’s the time to get a grip, says ex-author and banker David Charters. It’s back to work time. The holidays are over, the end of year celebrations long forgotten, and the only thing that’s certain in everybody’s mind is that there’s an ambitious budget for the year ahead. However well (or badly) you did last year, this year has to be better.... Read more

Whether your bonus is big or small, it is at least a kind of closure, says David Charters. Make the most of this. Everyone is smiling. In the words of the song, it’s another year over, and you’re smiling through the hangover from the team Christmas party, trying vaguely to recall if you really did say to the cute girl from the presentations team what your friends are swearing you did,... Read more

You’ll turn your boss off with slavish devotion and turn him on by doing his bidding. It’s a hard life, says ex-banker and author David Charters. Life at the bottom of any corporate food chain is tough. In investment banking it’s particularly so. Brownie points are hard to come by; excellence, timeliness and hard work are taken for granted. Beneath the gloss of high pay and high living, investment banking has a... Read more

Don’t underplay your achievements, says ex-banker and author David Charters. And don’t high five your boss when your bonus is less derisory than anticipated. It’s that time of year again. Team leaders, senior managing directors and members of the Management Committee are huddling together in glass-walled meeting rooms at the edge of the trading floor, poring over lists of names and numbers. From time to time they pause and look up,... Read more

Once upon a time, the people at the top of the banking hierarchy were nice, says ex-banker and author David Charters. Not any more. What kind of people make it to the top in investment banking? As an industry it certainly produces great egos. Everyone who makes it to managing director is either a star or a super-star; if in doubt, just ask them. But are they good leaders? The rewards in... Read more