"I left a top US bank for a European rival and it was pitiful"

1 June 2026

3 minute read

a banker with a moustache in a tweed suit standing next to a Goldman banker

Don't go there

I spent most of my career working for a US investment bank. It was one of the US investment banks that everyone wants to work for, but after two decades and a role running a major team, I took a call from a headhunter. He was offering me a chance to take a bigger job at a well known European bank that was expanding in New York.

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It seemed like an interesting proposition. I took the job. I have regretted it ever since.

When you are used to working for a US bank, European banks are completely different. When I moved, it was like night and day, with the European bank as the dark of night.

People at the European bank had no sense of urgency. At the American bank, you would never dream of booking a dentist appointment at 4.30pm or leaving the office at 5.01pm. At the European bank I worked for, this was the norm. People there had no urge to be the best; they just wanted to be enough. It was pitiful.

It became incredibly frustrating. US banks are like the special forces. They push you to use every single brain cell that you have. They hire the best people they can and they want to make them the better. Most people don't make the grade, but US banks can sniff out good people. Many people stay for 30 years. They are amazing places - the training, the development, the culture. Everything works. My days at the US bank were fabulous from start to finish.

I left because I wanted to push myself. I wanted to see if I could deliver in the bigger role and to know how I would function away from that well oiled machine. When you go somewhere that is less functional, you learn all the pieces that you don’t have in your jigsaw puzzle.

What I instead found was that the puzzle I was moving into was not a fit for me. The bank was not set up for someone used to working at my pace. I hired various colleagues from my former US employer and we all found the same thing. The atmosphere was so stifling that none of us could achieve anything.

We have all left again. I am currently out of the market. I made a terrible mistake. US banks are the creme de la creme. If you have a job with one, trust me that you must never be persuaded to leave.

Sidney Jordan is a pseudonym

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AUTHORSidney Jordan

Insider Comment

N_
N_R
7 June 2026
I feel for you. I'm in a job that in many ways is terrific, and I'm trying to not succumb to the siren song that may lead me to sing "you never know what you've got 'til it's gone". For me, too, it's the nagging sense of lack of challenge that knaws at me. But my firm, in my business line, has fine-tuned the work process for maximum satisfaction, maximum deal odds, and minimal hassle and administrative burden, and it's the best place I've worked. And yet...the repetition, even of essentially satisfying work, wears on me. I long for some novelty. I'm coping by redoubling my time and energy investment in my network, to help me appreciate what I've got, and recognize what a truly stellar (can't-miss) alternative looks like. It could be that the connecting with your network that you're doing while job-hunting could lead you ultimately to a much better place. After all, growth areas are the ones most likely to be hiring, and that might get you in on the ground floor of the next big trend.
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Fr
FredBanker
5 June 2026
Interesting and there is a portion of truth here. But obviously you don't know special forces, and it is not my experience of either US bank (most probably the one you are describing) or European bank... I led a team in an European bank and managed to get a 25% market share as per Coalition, with almost double what US competitors had (the best of them)... and it was neither a niche nor a secondary business...
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SO
SOFRagette
2 June 2026
someone got brainwashed into thinking banking is something more than just a job you do to have a nice life outside of work. you were never in the "special forces", your work never mattered. you are just a regular office worker like hundreds of millions of other people(including myself). the only difference is we make a bit more $ than most of the others.
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GM
GMoncada
1 June 2026
Hardooooooo
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TS
TS100
1 June 2026
Just because people want a slightly balanced life doesn’t mean they lack ambition. Not everyone wants to work in a sweat shop. Working and earning is a means to be able to enjoy other things in life other than work. But if you want to work just to then enjoy more work, the only person pitiful is you. I do want to pick up my kids at 6pm , I do want to take care of my health. Doesn’t make me use less of my brain cells or lack ambition. There is nothing wrong in you wanting to be in a sweatshop. But undermining those who don’t , is really pitiful!
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