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By Dhara Ranasinghe, Saikat Chatterjee and Scott Murdoch
LONDON/HONG KONG, April 29 (Reuters) - It wasn't the
introduction to high finance that Adi Patel had once
anticipated.
The stage fright of walking into the imposing offices of a
$607 billion asset manager in the heart of a historic financial
district? Pandemic era: a five-day induction on Microsoft Teams.
The rip-roaring intensity of the trading floor replete with
sharp-suited money managers? Not quite - hunched over a laptop
with comfy clothes in a flat-share. Client lunches, and perhaps
swapping stories after work with fellow graduates embarking on
first steps in finance? Not likely.
The pandemic has put paid to many initial expectations of
the financial industry's Class of COVID-19.
That group includes new recruits at finance firms around the
world, such as 22-year-old graduate analyst Patel and two dozen
or so others hired by Aberdeen Standard Investments.
Six months on, Patel has only been in the office in central
Edinburgh a handful of times; like many companies in Britain and
beyond, Aberdeen has kept employees largely at home since last
March.
"I wasn't worried that the training was virtual, I was just
upset that I didn't get to go into the office. Because as a new
joiner, as a grad, we want to make those connections," he said,
adding that the virtual training went smoothly.
"It's that little social chat that matters. It's very much
that sort of thing we've missed out on."
His worries are unlikely to have been soothed by the words
of David Solomon, a titan of finance as CEO of Goldman Sachs,
who called working from home "an aberration".
Working from home may be here to stay for many finance
workers, to a greater or lesser extent.
Reuters interviewed executives at 14 financial firms,
including some of the world's top banks and asset management
companies. Most said that, while about 80% of their trading
floor staff were back in the office, flexible working was in
place with employees spending some days at home.
FEAR OF MISSING OUT
On the surface, remote working has worked well in the
industry. Deals turnover hit a record $2.4 trillion in the
second half of 2020 according to Refinitiv data, while Goldman
Sachs, Citigroup and many others reported stellar first-quarter
earnings.
But for the star rainmakers and fund managers of tomorrow,
the change is disconcerting. And senior executives are worried
about these juniors missing out on important experience that
could constrain their careers or see them leave for rivals.
Traditionally, new starters learn on the job, observing
deals being clinched and performing tasks under supervision.
Industry events and client meetings, often in other global
finance hubs, offer opportunities to network.
Yet banks such as HSBC and Standard Chartered
say they may shed up to 40% of their premises. Drastic
cuts to international travel are likely.
Kunal Shah, global head of emerging markets trading at
Goldman Sachs, said that while trainees learned by performing
tasks such as compiling reports, booking completed trades or
writing commentary, senior traders were forced to take back many
of those responsibilities during lockdown.
"It is much harder to ask the junior to help with a task
when you are sitting at home," he added. "We had to remind
managers to put the juniors in such situations so they can
learn."
When lockdown restrictions have been relaxed in Britain,
many junior traders wanted to return to the office "because they
learn from that apprenticeship culture".
VIRTUALLY FALL BEHIND
One key concern is that screen-sharing and video meetings,
however helpful, may be a poor substitute for in-person
training, especially for those keen on a trading career.
"There's a reason that trading desks have evolved as
a centralized hub at the heart of investment teams," said Tom
Stevenson, head of EMEA equity trading at Fidelity
International.
"You can't get away from the fact that doing it virtually is
perhaps not as productive as being all together physically."
JPMorgan's committee for the development of junior markets
employees has held video calls to enable trainees to chat with
global team members, said Sophie Warrick, EMEA equity research
head and co-head of the committee.
Others such as UBS and Deutsche are using a hybrid approach.
In Hong Kong, UBS' 49 graduate trainees can mostly go into the
office, but in many other centres around the world the training
programmes are virtual, according to Maria Chan, the bank's
Asia-Pacific head of human resources.
That could create a two-track system.
Warrick said employers would need to wait and see how
somebody who had been virtually trained went on to develop in
their role, "having not had the in-person training that someone
else has had".
At Goldman Sachs, according to Shah, managers tried to
virtually replicate the trading floor vibe for the benefit of
younger staff.
"So many teams had a rolling Zoom across trading and sales
teams where people were just talking in the same way they would
if they were in the office," he added.
Some such as Credit Suisse hope more money will
help; it plans a $20,000 "lifestyle" allowance for junior
members of its capital markets and deals teams to maintain
morale.
BRIGHT MINDS, BIG PAY
Despite pandemic predicaments, finance does not want for
bright graduates.
Demand for fresh talent at banks in Britain is at its
strongest in years, according to figures compiled for Reuters by
recruitment specialists Morgan McKinley and Vacancysoft.
There were 429 vacancies advertised for interns in the first
three months of 2021, the highest quarterly number since the
beginning of 2018, and about double the levels seen in 2019,
before the pandemic struck, the study shows.
The pay packets are part of the draw.
A UK-based investment banking intern can earn around 49,000
pounds ($68,000), rising to 200,000 pounds after a decade on a
trading floor, according to Glassdoor, a website where users
anonymously submit and view salaries.
Yet it's been tougher to learn the ropes. The leader of
currency trading at a global multinational firm, who declined to
be named, spoke of the need in the job for "understanding risks,
managing risks and managing human behaviours".
"A new grad joined us just before the pandemic and we made
it work, but do I think he's got the full worth of his graduate
assignment having left university? No."
Finance firms also have a duty of care to safeguard the
mental health of younger staff, in particular.
The industry is under scrutiny following reports about
overwork and burnout, underlined last month by a memo about the
95-hour working weeks endured by some junior Goldman staff in
New York.
Some new starters, accepting that a five-day office week may
never return, are getting creative.
Patel and his Aberdeen cohorts use bi-weekly "lunch and
learn" meetings to catch up with other graduate hires, the peers
who will form the basis of their future professional networks.
"You know, you can't just go for coffee in the middle of the
day if your boss lives 20 miles south of the office," he said.
($1 = 0.7197 pounds)
(Reporting by Dhara Ranasinghe and Saikat Chatterjee in LONDON
and Scott Murdoch in HONG KONG; Additional reporting by Lawrence
White and Elizabeth Howcroft in LONDON; Editing by Sujata Rao
and Pravin Char)
