HSBC reviews

- Training at HSBC is nil. You do get the usual web-based training modules but those are all so that HSBC can claim they've trained all employees on ethics, anti-money laundering etc. The training you need to be successful at your actual job simply doesn't exist. You need to figure it all out on your own and you need to figure it out very quickly. - Management politics completely obscure the ability to be truly successful. Middle, and I suspect upper, management spends inordinate amounts of effort and time managing up instead of taking care of the people who report to them. This is not isolated as I both saw and experienced this phenomenon across roles and across different departments. Middle management is mostly concerned about presenting a good story as opposed to managing the issues. Real business problems and correspondingly, real business opportunities go unresolved because it's more important to spin a good tale than to actually move things forward. - Because of management politics, motion is mistaken for progress. As long as you can show that you're "busy" you'll generally be OK. But actually accomplishing things is of relatively minimal importance. - Again, because of management politics, coming up with a good tale to make your boss look good is of paramount importance. With an attitude like this, it's really no wonder that HSBC has been plagued by scandals and multi-million and sometimes multi-billion dollar fines from regulators. If you think HSBC is operating above board on everything, you're completely off base. People are working to show that they're adding profit at any cost. So long as the profits roll and so long as no one is caught, that's perfectly OK. - Your immediate supervisor will be given wide latitude over your progress at HSBC. If you get a good boss, you're golden. If you get a bad boss, you could end up in a very bad situation. This is made possible because HR is completely non-existent at the employee level. There is little to no local HR support. Calling HR gets you to a call centre in the Philippines where you can "press 1 for ...". Once you get to a live agent, you generally get some useless answer. - I called HR once for an issue I was trying to deal with. The agent gave me the name of someone I could email. When I looked that person up, it turned out that I was being referred to the Senior VP of HR in my country as opposed to an HR business partner which is what I asked for in the first place. (I did not email the SVP and my HR issue was never resolved.) - Management politics (are you seeing a theme yet?) means that senior management tend to treat certain geographies as stepping stones. So they parachute in, do their tour of duty for 3-4 years, then move on to bigger and better things. This leads to a somewhat short-term focus on (the illusion of) results as opposed to tackling real business issues. It's the old focus on quarterly benefits instead of looking to play long-term. - The time off policy is bizarre. You get say, 20 days off which sounds great. But if you're sick, that counts as a day. So you really have to manage if you should call in sick or if you should drag yourself in to work just so you can save a day off. - HSBC is huge on security. You can't print without swiping your passcard. Everything you do with HSBC equipment is highly monitored. I get it that it's company equipment and the company reserves the right to check up on things. But the degree to which HSBC takes this is, in my opinion, extreme. Certain documents for example, cannot be printed without filling out a security requisition form. Again, in some cases I get it but in many cases the degree of security becomes a barrier to doing your job effectively. - As a result of the focus on security, the ability to just talk to your colleagues about various work issues is curtailed. Some projects are code-word only and employees are forced to sign very strict NDAs. Of course, once the project is implemented everyone learns about it. I never did see a project implementation that I felt justified this level of internal security. Certainly there are some things you don't want the competition to find out ahead of time, but internally I think things can be handled differently. - There is a high level of entitlement at HSBC. If you've been there x number of years, there's a general attitude that you're due a promotion or some level of benefits. Earning your benefits is secondary to time served. - In part because HSBC is such a giant beast, and in part because HR is essentially non-existent at the local level, employees are treated as assets. Which is to say, they are used in the production of various bank services, and they are depreciated over their useful life span. At the end of their life span, they are written off then disposed. In other words, don't expect any corporate thanks just because you may have done a good job.

Two faced management , say one thing to staff , different story to their line manager, glory seekers. Customer are just a way of getting your targets with no thought of whats best for the customer "just flog em something" No benefits with the role