BofA List
Used to work at BofA, but left. Given what's going on, BofA is probably reading everything so we may as well let them know where they are falling short...
- Overworking your associates to the point of no return (see latest news, obviously)
- Over-hiring on A&As - 60+ per group (70 in some instances) and only 20 of them are actually functional (and those are the ones that do everything cause the remaining 45 are shit and just come in for dinner and 5 are nepo hires that are also shit - this imbalance actually ties to #1). The pool of A&As in some groups are larger than full teams at competing banks
- Shit pay. The last three years were horrendous. When you add it all up, most of the Associates made more in their Analyst years. Most of the VPs made more in their Associate years, and most Directors made more in their VP years. Why do you think all your good guys are leaving to MS, GS, JPM, etc? If they aren't leaving already, they will soon when the market finally recovers
- Way too many MDs. How much of them are actually generating deals? Why are the deal teams like 1/2 MDs?
For those of you at BofA or recently left, add on...
Agree 100% with OP.
Adding the fact that BofA refuses to fire underperforming associates, so the pool of knuckleheads keeps getting larger and larger every year. The competent associates, who are already not getting paid, need to pick up the slack for the low quality ones which kills morale. OP is exaggerating but it’s not wild to say ~1/3 of associates are not capable of doing the job currently. They are too dumb/don’t have enough deal experience to leave, so they hang around collecting ~200k doing nothing (since no one wants to work with them). Morale at the associate level is dead.
IB is such a small part of BofA, so they likely don’t know, or don’t care, about these issues.
100% agree. Feels like they hire way too many under performers at all levels and don’t fire or hold them accountable. Feels like 80% of the work is being done by 20% of the people. Not just at associate level - seems as if there are large numbers of VPs / Directors that don’t understand what’s actually needed and give sloppy guidance or create unnecessary work for the juniors . Many MDs appear to bring in almost 0 M&A deals and create work that feels meaningless
I don’t work at BAML. But this is certain at the EBB I work for.
Yep. Point of focus has been on the associates, but I’d argue MDs are most at fault actually. There are SO MANY MDs that have brought in 0-1 M&A deals in the time I’ve been there. They create a bunch of (non-fee generating) work for juniors, which is why so many need of them need to be retained
Completely agree. Worst offenders are the MDs with no PnL that have ppl up late working on new creates and bs analysis that clients could care less about. You can see their eyes roll back into their head when they see it.
Controversial take, but in my opinion these diverse candidates that BofA hires are particularly vulnerable to abuse. The bank gives fellowships to select veterans or diverse hires which can be upwards of $80,000 in addition to the regular sign-on bonus. The stipend is generally used for tuition reimbursement. In these cases, if you quit or are fired for cause, there is a big clawback for someone just starting their career. In the event people experience extreme working conditions, or other events I’ve seen where women are assaulted on the job, these people are reluctant to come forward and say anything to their group head or HR, as the clawback period is two years and would put them and their family in financial strain. They can’t quit.
Not a controversial take at all. Completely makes sense and is a solid take. Damn, can’t believe I missed this pov
What people are saying is that they shouldnt have to quit because they never should have been hired in the first place...
Well spoken
Wow the anti-diversity crowd is hating on veterans now too? Sick.
I don’t necessarily mind them getting opportunities but why are they paid close to 100,000 lmao
Is that even possible to be such a bad analyst/associate to just come for dinner, do some basic work and leave early while collecting full paycheck every month? Not in IB but this sounds crazy, too good to be true from the perspective of those underperforming hires
It’s unfortunately common at BofA at both the Analyst and Associate level. If you’re bad at your job, nobody will want to staff that person on their work. The bank won’t fire any juniors if they work 40 hours per week and meet minimum working expectations. So the good people get burned out and end up leaving, and then the less talented ones stay. For some reason this is more common post-COVID now that deal activity has slowed down. In the past, everyone had their plate full. Now it’s not uncommon to see 3rd year associates with no deal experience.
I’ve seen this with several analysts and associates at BofA and it’s been echoed by colleagues in different groups. Maybe doing more than 40 hours a week, but generally being useless.
The worst part is these are the ones that don’t leave.
Can confirm. It’s more present in certain groups vs others. But every group has a subset of people who do some light bitch work til ~7pm, get the dinner and Uber, and call it a night. They make the same base and a lower bonus, but when it’s $40k while the competent associates getting cranked are receiving $70k, seems like a good deal to me.
Common theme across the Street these days. A lot of banks are over hiring on the A&A level, so you have people come in to "chill", produce poor products, and earn 200k+ a year while doing nothing.
Sad part is that when there's no deal flow, these people think it's a major W to collect free money and do 0 work or have no deal experience. Of course coasters hurt their deal team.
Who the fuck doesn’t want to clear $400k and not do work, you sound like a stupid bootlicker.
Fuck the banks.
Honestly, yes. If say the incompetent A&As (> 1/2) go on strike and there are cases where the team still delivers and they realizes "Hey, we actually don't really need Tim - his work was dog shit anyway and we turned out just fine this time without him" - I don't see why they wouldn't cut. BofA knows VPs and the competent A&As have been picking up after shitty A&As are unhappy and looking for the exit. This is a great opportunity to cut the fat and use that $ to actually pay people. It costs $175k just to keep the lights on for these useless MBAs... Not saying I agree with everything, but if I were BofA and I needed to cut - this would be it.
It depends on how many people walk. This is why union are so powerful. Yes, long-term all labor is replaceable, but if everyone walks out at once in a public way, you can't fire all of them at once. There would be literally nobody left to do the work.
Also I don't know why you assume the compentent workers wouldn't also walk. If anything, they have a greater incentive to walk and put pressure onto BoFA to fix the culture that's destroyign them rn
Unfortunately yes. The bank has too many associates. If you walk out and it’s disruptive to work, you can be let-go as an at-will employee. For the strike to work, it would have to be street-wide. The sad irony of the situation is that the associate passed away in part because he didn’t stand up for himself with his deal team from fear of how it would impact his career; and we aren’t standing up for him in fear of putting our careers in jeopardy, too.
Agreed with point #2 on hiring. Over hiring so many undeserving candidates. Sick of having to tell my analysts not to annualize a balance sheet like it's a freaking income statement. Some don't even know what a DCF is a year into the job. Some are still using a mouse on Excel ffs. The nepotism is also off the charts.
Who tf is out here annualizing balance sheets
That’s crazy lmao
Where do you work, your people sound cooked
EGRC too - wtf is that. It’s like they took all the knuckleheads in IBK and put them in one group. Zero caliber. Zero deals. They just tag on to industry deal teams and do literally nothing but take fees.
It was a good idea in theory but was executed poorly. The juniors literally don’t do anything and the seniors are basically just RMs with no knowledge of the client/industry, so IBK does all of the work anyways.
They just tag along and steal bonus money
Is it a good group to perma stay? 40 hours work week with sick pay and bonus
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