HSBC reviews

3.8

72% would recommend to a friend

(28,244 total reviews)
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Georges Elhedery

69% approve of CEO

66% positive business outlook

HSBC has an employee rating of 3.8 out of 5 stars, based on 28,244 company reviews on Glassdoor which indicates that most employees have a good working experience there. The HSBC employee rating is in line with the average (within 1 standard deviation) for employers within the Finanzas industry (3.7 stars).

Reviews by job title

28K reviews
3.0
Aug 17, 2014
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Good reputation, good name to have on CV. Good work life balance. Great location

Cons

Total lack of process (investment process, risk analysis, etc) - as a result you have to constantly watch you back. I worked as a quant analyst. Was constantly asked (verbally rather than in writing) to tweak models so that they output what the senior management wanted to tell clients, rather than telling clients what the model said and overlaying that with their own expectations & views. If something goes wrong somewhere down the line, this back fires because you made the changes to the model. This is not in writing so you can't prove your innocence. Eventually i resigned. This was something many people across the board complained about. White papers written with no clear guidance on who the intended audience is, so you cannot really gauge what to write. most of the time papers sit in somebody's outbox - very demoralising. Its a big, old company, with a lot of old, political people. If you are good at playing politics its a good place. During my time there, i saw all the good people left very soon, hangers on hun on in the hope of a good severance package...

2.0
Jun 17, 2014

From the heights of the Household acquisition to the depths of DPA....

Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

I won't mention the business unit, but I am a current U.S. employee. Benefits are average for a gargantuan entity; promotions are for the favored (like so many other companies); personal growth has been good, but not something necessarily attributable to this particular firm; plenty of vacation time...6 weeks + 10 holidays; work from home is embraced by corporate and loathed by much of management; performance reviews are provided but are worthless with personnel rankings predetermined by management; there are annual bonuses even for the lowly but range wildly within/across teams depending on budget and personalities; senior management changes and direction spin like a roulette wheel which provides ample opportunity for do overs; opportunity for travel exists as well as meeting interesting people; salaries are excellent compared to the general population and middling compared to other financial services firms. Yes, these are the pros compared to the cons.

Cons

Let me just state that the DPA of 2012 wasn't surprising given the far flung, year after year shenanigans at the bank; the feds velvet hammer triggered an internal shotgun response where a scalpel was/is needed. In the past my response to 'where do you work?' was met with 'what's that?' Later some would say 'oh I had my mortgage with HSBC' (not happily I should add)....now, I respond by just saying 'computers' and leave it at that. I can not hear the word 'mistake' again without screaming. Oh the shame. Btw, because I am employed in the U.S. (I won't relocate to to snows of Buffalo) I expect my position to be eliminated as the further building of 'low cost' engagements elsewhere further the institutional rot.

2.0
Nov 17, 2013
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Good salary, good bonuses and the physical environment is good. There is a significant element of ongoing "on the job" training

Cons

The appraisal system in place actively discourages people from working as a team. During the 3 years I worked for them it was unusual for anyone to help anyone out because if someone else had a problem it meant that they were likely to get a poor appraisal. The more and bigger problems other people had the better your chances of bigger pay and bonuses. The fact that you were essentially isolated from people you worked with means that any team player will find themselves out on a limb.

Viewing 115 - 117 of 28,244 Reviews

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