A horrendous place to work, both professionally and personally
Pros
[Depending on your role] you can be reasonably well-paid (caveat: if your management chain wants you to be - see cons)
Cons
1. Total absence of senior-level leadership, none. 2. Seemingly no collaboration between senior managers - often blatant hostility. As a result more junior team members have to force cooperation and results from other teams without senior management buy-in and often will be openly blocked. 3. The culture at Barclays is driven by job retention, earnings, and fear of exposure among the senior executives, meaning that cronyism, patronage, and bias is rampant. 4. Ability, impact, and quality of work is irrelevant. All that matters is how your management decides your face fits during the notorious consistency meetings. 5. If your face doesn't fit you can expect to be managed out (by lack of patronage, zero career development support, slashed bonus). 6. Bullying is pandemic and brutal - and can be shockingly open. Instances of whistleblowing being openly discouraged and warned against by senior managers. HR not trusted. 7. Staff dissatisfaction and turnover is massive - everyone in my team, and many others who I worked closely with, were looking for jobs elsewhere all the time. We celebrated those who succeeded. 8. Air of total depression among middle management (B5-B7). 9. Everyone acknowledges the total stagnation which has come about through the impenetrable defensiveness and politics within the business - so many good ideas and beneficial strategic decisions are blocked due to senior politics and personalities, along with constant 'playing with the numbers' to twist reports to meet the desired conclusion, even if factually untrue.
