While HSBC is a strong international bank, its reputation in North America is pretty weak, especially on the West Coast . A lot of people still remember that HSBC was once the troubled Household bank and they want no part of it. Career advancement is pretty standard but it probably will help if you know your senior management pretty well. Once you become a manager though it's pretty hard to move up unless you are willing to pull extra 15-20 hours a week. Sometimes the perception is that those who worked (or forced to work) are the ones deem to be the better workers (which is not always true!)
