The exceptionally high salaries paid to employees have caused me to compare American Express to a ruthless drug dealer. They lure you in with the sweetness of the salary and benefits addicting you to the "high", but once you are "hooked" they begin to turn the screws demanding more and more output. The incremental increases in compensation tends not to keep up with the pressure, resulting in a growing personal dissatisfaction. However, you cannot leave because you are unable to find comparable compensation elsewhere.
Senior Management follows the same communication cycle every year: 1st quarter - Last year was a banner year, however, this year will be one of our worst. Everyone needs to buckle down, cut back and prepare for the worst. 2nd quarter/3rd quarter - Results have been better than expected! We're up where we should and we're down where we want to be. Let's stay on course and try to finish the year strong! 4th quarter - Wow! It was one of the best years ever! We're killing the competition and profits were amazing. Then it repeats all over again. As an employee, you cannot tell when there truly is a reason to be concerned about any given year during the first quarter. It always made me feel like the Senior Management did not "trust" employees with the true information about the current environment. It would be much better to say that the company operates extremely conservatively during the 1st & 2nd quarters of the fiscal year. I'm not a child. Please don't act like you need to "shield" me from the operating philosophy and performance of MY company.
Amex operates so conservatively as to be inefficient. The company does not want new and innovative ideas that may incur cost, even when that incremental cost could have huge returns. A prime example is the condition of the technology at Amex. It is outdated, difficult to maneuver, and extremely inefficient. The systems used by customer-facing reps are so dilapidated and outdated it is embarrassing. These should be priority 1 for upgrade and redesign, without delay. The restrictions on technology development are so overbearing that it feels useless to suggest any new ideas or changes. And this feeds into the internal culture of "we'll make it ridiculously difficult for you to make any progress so eventually, you'll stop bothering with your nonsense".
