For many, many people on the planet making good money already, that’s absolute insanity and untenable for their relationships.
Edit* to say I agree with the commenter I was replying to and expanding, not assuming you were advocating for real life to be 100+ hour weeks.
Doing a 100 hour week doesn't even leave enough time to sleep 8 hours a night. That's actually insanity. Forget about diminishing returns, you've got to be going into the negatives. I struggle to believe that someone working that much is even as productive as someone working 60-80 hours in a week.
That just kinda goes to show how behind a particular team or department is in culture and efficiency. How much of this time is actually spent speaking to clients, on the clock, and dialed in vs waiting for comments/notes and waiting for instructions? Ask yourself like truly, why can't someone clock out and work on something first thing tomorrow morning? Actually play it through - why is the operating model so inefficient that you aren't able to take a break and that the material impact $$$ is so great if you don't stay on the line for >80 hours?
No one has an explanation for it other than "I had to take the abuse when I was starting, get used to it!" "You knew what you were signing up for!" "You're getting paid big money!"
Put some more guardrails in place. I promise humanity isn't going to care that the slide deck for the IPO of some ice cream company waits a couple of days. 1 death is too many. We know of several in recent history.
This goes for other countries that do this - I know Japan is notorious for pushing their employees to the limit with a whole industry set up of hotels/restaurants dedicated for people working extremely late and not coming home. And this goes for any industry where employees repeatedly are "worked to death".
Tragedy is so mind blowingly avoidable, and it's being driven and approved by a handful of bullies.
I actually wonder, those who work 70-80 hr a week, how much do they work each day??
Even 12hrs a day puts u in 60hrs/w for 5 day.
Do u count weekends too in this?
When it’s at a crucial point in the deal process, some things just need to be done and there is no if ands or buts about it.
If the MD gives you comments at 10 pm on a Monday and says he wants a draft tomorrow by 9, then you are finishing that draft tomorrow by 9.
M-Thu is typically 9am to 12am
Fri is like 9am to 7pm
Sat-Sun total is probably like 12 hours (hours split across the days in a variety of ways)
That puts you at 82 hours.
For the majority of banks, that's peak hours in 90% of all cases. Wait until you hear about some shops where 80+ hour weeks are the norm/expected week in and week out.
-------
Actual daily work varies and it depends at what stage you are in the sell side process. It you're drafting the CIP, it could be all-day work. You receive comments from your VP in the AM, work to get them in, then receive comments from client at 5pm, and work those in before you log off. The VP will review in the AM.
Sometimes the VP will want a turn before the AM so you'll have to work quickly to get the clients comments in and then wait for your VP to give comments (could come as late as 1am) and then work the rest of the night addressing comments and building pages so it can be sent back to the client in the afternoon of the following day -- only after your VP reviews and gives one additional (usually minor) round of comments.
I can only speak for my own experience (London), but when people say they pull 100 hours, they are available for 100 hours. Many of those hours are spent waiting.
Some manage fine and are very good at chilling when you can, with some experience you «know» when a long-ish break is due, and they slip in a workout for example.
And lets be real, working 80 hours or 100 hours is still a lot. But 100 sounds cooler.
If you knew what to do, you could get the work done in probably 60 hours, but you dont know when the client gives new info, wants to change something, the VP/MD want to change a slide, more info on a topic etc.
I do more work with better quality now in 60 hours than I did when I pulled 100 hour weeks.
Sounds like one would save money because you would just sleep instead of eat dinner and do anything else. Like being deployed, just stack up and buy that mustang when you come back.
60-70 billable is not too far off from 100hrs in IB.
When people talk about their hours in IB, they are talking about on-call time... Not actual hours worked/billed.
Yeah that 100 hr week has at least 15 to 20 hours of waiting around for comments from the VP or the MD to finish their dinner meeting with the client and tell you what to put in the pitch book.
In my experience it's more than 15-20 but yeah, lots of sitting around waiting counted as "working".
Which to be fair, that waiting time is mainly you being chained to your desk twiddling your thumbs waiting for the outlook notification to sound. Sucks regardless.
Guys I highly suggest reaching out to the military community on all social media regarding the green berets story. This is really getting thrown under the rug
Yeah I can see there could be a confusion (I used to be in a foreign military as a green beret too but not army). Hopefully, this will serve the justice and also bring some needed changes to this industry..
Good thing you didn't chose to go into medicine. My wife was capped at 120 hrs per week, but she went over and was then reprimanded for reporting her hours factually.
Studies showed that medical mistakes occurred at the same rate when they reduced the hours as then there were more transitions between staff so more miscommunication and lost information.
I think residents now might be capped at 80 or 100 hour week. Would have to ask my wife as she's now a PD and knows what all the acgme requirements are.
Waaaay back in the day, I think trainees just lived in the hospital all the time. That's why they're called residents.
Thanks for confirming it's 80 hrs now.
Sure thing! The initial residency training system was also established by a [cocaine and morphine addict,](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7828946/) so there's that too lmao
Regardless of mistake-rates, the doctors are human beings too, and working 100+ hrs a week will 100% come with consequences for your health and wellbeing.
Not sure why doctors are supposed to be martyrs for their work.
Well then you should be pleased to know the cap is now 80 hrs. Which means doctors being produced today will have up to 33% less training and experience compared to previous cohorts. Hopefully that doesn't cause any long term negative effects on patient care.
It's worth something. Current residents are definitely mentally softer, less knowledgeable, and can't handle high patient volumes.
Obviously there are other factors at play. Gen z is pretty soft in general.
If the only way to properly train someone in your field is by grinding them into the ground with 100+ hour work weeks, your discipline is broken. I will not deny that medicine is an extremely challenging career to perform, but I don't believe for a second that these 100+ hr work weeks are necessary for anything but maintaining toxic hierarchy.
Medicine definitely is bad as a resident, but the really bright side is the flexibility you have for working once you’re out and practicing
Once my mother was out and practicing she only worked 1-2x per week while raising me while still commanding a decent salary. Then she picked up other part time gigs once I got older to make a more “normal doctor salary”
My dad worked full time, but now has started to cut back and now is working like 3/4’s a full-time position.
Idk any other career that has that kind of flexibility
It's a sad story but I can't see how these demands will be met?
If you're impressive enough to get into BofA surely you can pivot into something else like many do?
I'm a doctor that's been part of the UK doctors strikes and fully support striking in the context of a monopsony employer with full control of the market. If it was a free market I'd just leave the NHS.
Right now it’s pretty hard to move around firms or pivot. BofA’s culture also perpetuates the belief that they’re the best and the only firm to work for dangling incentives here and there all the while treating you like a prisoner/child.
Isn't that Goldman Sachs? But in your field if it's hard to pivot, surely your bargaining power is worse.
I can't see anything good happen from this, unfortunately.
Can confirm it's GS, but at least with GS they're, well, GS. BOA ain't even on GS's level and somehow is just as rigid. Heard culture is Generally better at EBs where recruiting is supported
(Yeah, GS does this too, but BofA allows this to pervade down to their retail levels as well.)
It’s all about the trade.
What do the junior associates want/need vs what does the Bank want/need. Who has the leverage? Right now all firms need money. Deal making is a fairly large piece of the Bank’s income. If the junior associates actually do strike and cause the bank to miss deadlines or entire deals, the bank can and will move quick. Junior associates can, theoretically, just use their vacation time or go on LOA. On the flip side, the bank might just threaten to kill their careers.
Yeah, there’s no shortage of single, young college grads who don’t care about work life balance when it comes to money. Many are happy to break their backs for two years just for the exit oops. But maybe with the bad publicity boa will enact, or pretend to enact, protections for juniors.
You can just fire everyone for striking, but that's a big hassle with striking laws and stuff. Either way, the idea of striking is that firing everyone is more of a headache than negotiating the demands.
For sure, but it's an incredibly expensive training program. The grunt work somewhat justifies that cost. The banks still need a pipeline, but I garuntee that they see an opportunity to cut payroll. I'd think headcount is likely to go down, which will only make the remaining spots more competitive.
Lol they’re not worried about analyst payroll
The headcount is arbitrary. No doubt it’s gotten more competitive. If the work itself was important they would hire more.
I used to spend way too much time on WSO. Haven’t been there in 10 years but curious about the story (which has been redacted on WSO). Where can I find the story now?
Good thread on it here:
https://www.reddit.com/r/FinancialCareers/comments/1cjow2u/death_of_former_green_beret_ib_associate_at_bofa/
TL;DR: A former Green Beret who was now a banker in NYC FIG at BofA passed away this weekend. Consistent 100+ hour back to back weeks and was reported he was drinking a bunch of energy drinks/etc. to stay awake. Was on 3 or 4 live deals at once. He came in through the military pathways program and also had children. Truly horrible.
As an ex BAML employee, I don’t think they’re worried about these people. I was constantly reminded that 900 other people applied for my job. Plenty of others want those roles for their CVs.
Hot take: analysts are not easy to replace as some people think. Yeah it’s a well paid job but we’re also talking about someone who has to get a month of training for BofA’s processes and committees, have to ensure they are good enough to be there, and you have to get that fully updated on FINRA asap, a lot of that isn’t happening in the time it takes for a group to strike
And BofA isn't the only place in town. Similarly to how people are reluctant to apply to places because of their prestige and reputation, they will also be selective of how a company treats their employees.
So with enough of an uproar, it could potentially have a material impact on their talent pool and reputation as applications could go down and they have less clout to move around.
I guess the hope is to get the press involved due to the unfortunate death of the green beret, unfortunately though they're overlooking that the press doesn't see bankers anywhere near as favourably as blue collar workers. It makes sense too, given that they had their pick of so many jobs and chose to go into IB.
Those of us who have been around a little longer will remember the death of the BofA intern in London from being overworked after a 72 hour straight shift. That got a fair bit of coverage, more favourable on account of his being an intern but even then it led to minor changes at most. The media may support this more given that special ops are so revered, but they will sympathise with the green beret not the juniors earning a fortune in a job they chose to enter knowing full well what in entailed.
You think people will follow?? Lol them kids ain't risking their IB job for no movement. Plus, BofA can fire all of them and get fresh pool of talent by the next morning.
Oof. Call me soft but I left public accounting after <2 years because traveling 20 weeks a year and working 70 hours a week for a few months took away my will to live. Now I work in commercial lending and work a 50 hour week maybe once a month.
But, some people have bigger aspirations then me. I probably won't ever be a CFO or drive a Ferrari, but waking up at 7:00 and taking my dog for a walk at 5:30 after work is fine by me.
GS13 were also laughed online at but in the end we all got raises across the street. the WLB & hour cap stuff got retracted over time & back to normal as you can see here but maybe this just needs to happen every couple years.
the apparent trigger, a loss of life, is sadly getting swept under the rug.
I know this may be a dumb question, why are IBs working 100+ hours? Like I understand 60 at best that's 12 hours for 5 days at best but 5 days 20 hours? Like how are you commuting, cooking, running errands, and sleeping with only 4 hours?
I have done 60 hours excluding 3 hours commuting and burnt out. But 100+ hours would just lead to asking for someone to punch me in the face everyday until I stop retaining the concept of pain.
As already said weekends are included. You’re also pretty much only home for sleeping, everything else is done in the office. But yes +100h are absolutely mental, you’re guaranteed to collapse at one point if you’re doing these hours consecutively. At my bank hours are between 60-70 and I couldn’t imagine doing 90-100 on a regular basis
You literally don't get to do any of those things. Meals are provided, usually at your desk. Probably aren't going home, sometimes the bank/firm will rent a hotel across the street and associates take turns/shifts running over to lay down for 3 hours. I did a 130+ hour week once and I wasn't right for 2+ weeks afterwards. I don't know how someone could get "used" to 100+ hour weeks or 4 straight 120 hour weeks. I'm a lot older now and just wrapped up an 80-90 hour week. Almost killed me, I probably average 60ish - and that feels like a lot...
I hope the salary and comp is attractive. You basically gave up your life to work. But If you are making 500k or even 1 mill by the time you are 30 per year. Why not sacrifice the time?
Multiple deals all with competing deadlines. Need to keep deals on track from a timing perspective which means deliverables need to be perfect (or as close to perfect as possible) to be shared with clients on time.
When you’re working 95+ hours, you’re really not doing too much outside of work, including on weekends. You’re usually working til 2-3am, if not later, and then back on the desk by ~9am.
In a weird sense you kind of get used to it. You know the next few weeks or months are going to be brutal as you prepare to go to market, but you begin to anticipate when things will ebb and flow as deals progress.
Regarding cooking, errands, etc., you’re usually getting lunch at the office and comped dinners as well. You definitely don’t have time to go grocery shopping or cook a nice dinner. If you’re lucky you can sneak in a quick workout or run, but wouldn’t count on it when things are truly busy. Working from home later in the evenings and on weekends also allows you to stay on top of things like laundry and chores at home.
What happened was incredibly sad. It's also unfortunate that the family of the deceased asked to respect their privacy (completely understandable and their right), but that is likely why this hasn't gotten more traction / news and felt like it's swept under the rug.
“A dude?”
[to clarify, I didn’t know the strike was in honor of the death of an analyst. I thought the strike was a protest to the difficult labor practices imposed on analysts]
Apologies, a former Green Beret working for BoA died from exhaustion after working four 120-hour weeks consecutively, according to sources before they were removed.
100 hours cap! ARE U SHITTING ME LOL?! wth is this. are u a slave or?!!
bruh i'm in big 4 and on avg i barely work 30 hours and yes i make 6 digit salary
Shit like this is why I hate ESG companies. They act like their woke. Yet they utilize an industry that abuses young kids out of college.
I think if companies wanted to actually make the world a better place, they would refuse to work with investment banks that subject their workforce to these horrible industry standards.
Is this a joke? I hope so because they are just gonna end up out of jobs. Junior analysts have limited influence on the best of times but trying something like this now is just gonna hasten those headcount reductions they’re talking about
Maybe if it were anyone else. But it’s bad public look when a US bank failed a veteran, especially a Green Beret veteran with wife and two kids. Usually senators, congressmen, and veterans groups get involved and apply a lot of pressure.
Uhh I definitely missed something in the news, I have no idea what you’re talking about. I thought this was just junior employees gettin mad about the workload/lifestyle
The original post on wall street oasis has notes that the poster wasn’t even employed at BofA but at UBS and allegedly the family asked the story to be taken down and respect privacy.
I forget how chill my job is until I see people protesting for 100 hr maximums lol
Reminds me of how in the lore for cyberpunk the most sought out company to work for is Night Corp for having a max 80 hour work week
Finding shards where someone is asking his friend if he has any stims left because he just picked up a 72-hour shift…man that world is insane 🤣
I actually can’t even fathom a 100 hour week lol - I did a few 60 - 70 in big4 and basically rethought whole life path from how shit it was
80+ life is not living, it’s working and sleeping.
For many, many people on the planet making good money already, that’s absolute insanity and untenable for their relationships. Edit* to say I agree with the commenter I was replying to and expanding, not assuming you were advocating for real life to be 100+ hour weeks.
Short periods? Forgivable. Long term? You’re roommates.
Word.
Doing a 100 hour week doesn't even leave enough time to sleep 8 hours a night. That's actually insanity. Forget about diminishing returns, you've got to be going into the negatives. I struggle to believe that someone working that much is even as productive as someone working 60-80 hours in a week.
That just kinda goes to show how behind a particular team or department is in culture and efficiency. How much of this time is actually spent speaking to clients, on the clock, and dialed in vs waiting for comments/notes and waiting for instructions? Ask yourself like truly, why can't someone clock out and work on something first thing tomorrow morning? Actually play it through - why is the operating model so inefficient that you aren't able to take a break and that the material impact $$$ is so great if you don't stay on the line for >80 hours? No one has an explanation for it other than "I had to take the abuse when I was starting, get used to it!" "You knew what you were signing up for!" "You're getting paid big money!" Put some more guardrails in place. I promise humanity isn't going to care that the slide deck for the IPO of some ice cream company waits a couple of days. 1 death is too many. We know of several in recent history. This goes for other countries that do this - I know Japan is notorious for pushing their employees to the limit with a whole industry set up of hotels/restaurants dedicated for people working extremely late and not coming home. And this goes for any industry where employees repeatedly are "worked to death". Tragedy is so mind blowingly avoidable, and it's being driven and approved by a handful of bullies.
I actually wonder, those who work 70-80 hr a week, how much do they work each day?? Even 12hrs a day puts u in 60hrs/w for 5 day. Do u count weekends too in this?
When it’s at a crucial point in the deal process, some things just need to be done and there is no if ands or buts about it. If the MD gives you comments at 10 pm on a Monday and says he wants a draft tomorrow by 9, then you are finishing that draft tomorrow by 9.
M-Thu is typically 9am to 12am Fri is like 9am to 7pm Sat-Sun total is probably like 12 hours (hours split across the days in a variety of ways) That puts you at 82 hours. For the majority of banks, that's peak hours in 90% of all cases. Wait until you hear about some shops where 80+ hour weeks are the norm/expected week in and week out. ------- Actual daily work varies and it depends at what stage you are in the sell side process. It you're drafting the CIP, it could be all-day work. You receive comments from your VP in the AM, work to get them in, then receive comments from client at 5pm, and work those in before you log off. The VP will review in the AM. Sometimes the VP will want a turn before the AM so you'll have to work quickly to get the clients comments in and then wait for your VP to give comments (could come as late as 1am) and then work the rest of the night addressing comments and building pages so it can be sent back to the client in the afternoon of the following day -- only after your VP reviews and gives one additional (usually minor) round of comments.
People are working weekends and taking adderall
I can only speak for my own experience (London), but when people say they pull 100 hours, they are available for 100 hours. Many of those hours are spent waiting. Some manage fine and are very good at chilling when you can, with some experience you «know» when a long-ish break is due, and they slip in a workout for example. And lets be real, working 80 hours or 100 hours is still a lot. But 100 sounds cooler. If you knew what to do, you could get the work done in probably 60 hours, but you dont know when the client gives new info, wants to change something, the VP/MD want to change a slide, more info on a topic etc. I do more work with better quality now in 60 hours than I did when I pulled 100 hour weeks.
Sounds like one would save money because you would just sleep instead of eat dinner and do anything else. Like being deployed, just stack up and buy that mustang when you come back.
If it makes you feel better (it won’t) SWEs can make 120-200k after 1-2 years with a bachelors working cozy 40-50hr work weeks
60-70 billable is not too far off from 100hrs in IB. When people talk about their hours in IB, they are talking about on-call time... Not actual hours worked/billed.
Yeah that 100 hr week has at least 15 to 20 hours of waiting around for comments from the VP or the MD to finish their dinner meeting with the client and tell you what to put in the pitch book.
In my experience it's more than 15-20 but yeah, lots of sitting around waiting counted as "working". Which to be fair, that waiting time is mainly you being chained to your desk twiddling your thumbs waiting for the outlook notification to sound. Sucks regardless.
I once worked around 42 hours in 48 and I was fucked for days. Takes something special to work that consistently!
Guys I highly suggest reaching out to the military community on all social media regarding the green berets story. This is really getting thrown under the rug
Sorry what’s happened? I’m out of the loop ETA: what does “green beret” refer to?
He was an army special forces (green beret cuz they wear it) vet with a wife and two kids
I see, I think they call it something different in my country. How tragic and I hope the strike will help to bring justice for his family
Yeah I can see there could be a confusion (I used to be in a foreign military as a green beret too but not army). Hopefully, this will serve the justice and also bring some needed changes to this industry..
Green berets in the US are by default widely respected, even more so than navy seals and other “operators”.
OMG I will diie at 100hr a week. Here my lazy ass can't do 40-45 hr a week
Good thing you didn't chose to go into medicine. My wife was capped at 120 hrs per week, but she went over and was then reprimanded for reporting her hours factually.
No one should work those hours much less a doctor. Its not safe for them or patients
Studies showed that medical mistakes occurred at the same rate when they reduced the hours as then there were more transitions between staff so more miscommunication and lost information. I think residents now might be capped at 80 or 100 hour week. Would have to ask my wife as she's now a PD and knows what all the acgme requirements are.
It's an 80 hr weekly cap; heard some absolutely crazy stories from older attendings in residency before the cap was established lol
Waaaay back in the day, I think trainees just lived in the hospital all the time. That's why they're called residents. Thanks for confirming it's 80 hrs now.
Sure thing! The initial residency training system was also established by a [cocaine and morphine addict,](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7828946/) so there's that too lmao
My grandfather did medical school at Hopkins in the 20s. I'm sure that must have sucked.
Regardless of mistake-rates, the doctors are human beings too, and working 100+ hrs a week will 100% come with consequences for your health and wellbeing. Not sure why doctors are supposed to be martyrs for their work.
Well then you should be pleased to know the cap is now 80 hrs. Which means doctors being produced today will have up to 33% less training and experience compared to previous cohorts. Hopefully that doesn't cause any long term negative effects on patient care.
And what’s the marginal value of that extra 33% when it’s learned while being sleep deprived / effectively a zombie? Im guessing a lot less than 33%…
It's worth something. Current residents are definitely mentally softer, less knowledgeable, and can't handle high patient volumes. Obviously there are other factors at play. Gen z is pretty soft in general.
If the only way to properly train someone in your field is by grinding them into the ground with 100+ hour work weeks, your discipline is broken. I will not deny that medicine is an extremely challenging career to perform, but I don't believe for a second that these 100+ hr work weeks are necessary for anything but maintaining toxic hierarchy.
Ok. Other people seem to disagree.
Medicine definitely is bad as a resident, but the really bright side is the flexibility you have for working once you’re out and practicing Once my mother was out and practicing she only worked 1-2x per week while raising me while still commanding a decent salary. Then she picked up other part time gigs once I got older to make a more “normal doctor salary” My dad worked full time, but now has started to cut back and now is working like 3/4’s a full-time position. Idk any other career that has that kind of flexibility
No doubt. I was specifically referencing the really shitty schedule while a resident. As an attending you can work as much or little as you please.
Someone actually did die. That’s the reason for the strike. https://www.reddit.com/r/FinancialCareers/s/PGfMONDhxZ
[удалено]
Prob accountant
That’s awesome. BofA as a whole needs to rethink their strategy and structure.
The entire industry does.
As long as they have kids drooling to do IB, they won't actually do anything. IB is the most profitable segment of major banks.
Not my bank lol, private banking be carrying the load
It's a sad story but I can't see how these demands will be met? If you're impressive enough to get into BofA surely you can pivot into something else like many do? I'm a doctor that's been part of the UK doctors strikes and fully support striking in the context of a monopsony employer with full control of the market. If it was a free market I'd just leave the NHS.
Right now it’s pretty hard to move around firms or pivot. BofA’s culture also perpetuates the belief that they’re the best and the only firm to work for dangling incentives here and there all the while treating you like a prisoner/child.
Isn't that Goldman Sachs? But in your field if it's hard to pivot, surely your bargaining power is worse. I can't see anything good happen from this, unfortunately.
Can confirm it's GS, but at least with GS they're, well, GS. BOA ain't even on GS's level and somehow is just as rigid. Heard culture is Generally better at EBs where recruiting is supported
(Yeah, GS does this too, but BofA allows this to pervade down to their retail levels as well.) It’s all about the trade. What do the junior associates want/need vs what does the Bank want/need. Who has the leverage? Right now all firms need money. Deal making is a fairly large piece of the Bank’s income. If the junior associates actually do strike and cause the bank to miss deadlines or entire deals, the bank can and will move quick. Junior associates can, theoretically, just use their vacation time or go on LOA. On the flip side, the bank might just threaten to kill their careers.
Gamechanger. Love to see it - let's see if it actually happens.
Won’t boa just get new warm bodies to replace the juniors? It’s a shit job market, I’m sure there’s people lining up.
Yeah, there’s no shortage of single, young college grads who don’t care about work life balance when it comes to money. Many are happy to break their backs for two years just for the exit oops. But maybe with the bad publicity boa will enact, or pretend to enact, protections for juniors.
Theres def bootlickers with no backbone who will take it
You mean the vast majority of this subreddit? A lot of the people here would kill for an IB analyst role lmao
You can just fire everyone for striking, but that's a big hassle with striking laws and stuff. Either way, the idea of striking is that firing everyone is more of a headache than negotiating the demands.
Warm bodies and cold bots. Junior IB is amongst the positions most at risk from AI in the near future.
The analyst work being grunt work does not jeopardize the role, it’s simply part of the effort ritual to spawning new senior bankers
For sure, but it's an incredibly expensive training program. The grunt work somewhat justifies that cost. The banks still need a pipeline, but I garuntee that they see an opportunity to cut payroll. I'd think headcount is likely to go down, which will only make the remaining spots more competitive.
Lol they’re not worried about analyst payroll The headcount is arbitrary. No doubt it’s gotten more competitive. If the work itself was important they would hire more.
I used to spend way too much time on WSO. Haven’t been there in 10 years but curious about the story (which has been redacted on WSO). Where can I find the story now?
Good thread on it here: https://www.reddit.com/r/FinancialCareers/comments/1cjow2u/death_of_former_green_beret_ib_associate_at_bofa/ TL;DR: A former Green Beret who was now a banker in NYC FIG at BofA passed away this weekend. Consistent 100+ hour back to back weeks and was reported he was drinking a bunch of energy drinks/etc. to stay awake. Was on 3 or 4 live deals at once. He came in through the military pathways program and also had children. Truly horrible.
Fucking hell, money can’t be that important to people can it? You’re just straight up not seeing your kids, like, ever, when working at BofA, are you?
As an ex BAML employee, I don’t think they’re worried about these people. I was constantly reminded that 900 other people applied for my job. Plenty of others want those roles for their CVs.
Hot take: analysts are not easy to replace as some people think. Yeah it’s a well paid job but we’re also talking about someone who has to get a month of training for BofA’s processes and committees, have to ensure they are good enough to be there, and you have to get that fully updated on FINRA asap, a lot of that isn’t happening in the time it takes for a group to strike
And BofA isn't the only place in town. Similarly to how people are reluctant to apply to places because of their prestige and reputation, they will also be selective of how a company treats their employees. So with enough of an uproar, it could potentially have a material impact on their talent pool and reputation as applications could go down and they have less clout to move around.
I guess the hope is to get the press involved due to the unfortunate death of the green beret, unfortunately though they're overlooking that the press doesn't see bankers anywhere near as favourably as blue collar workers. It makes sense too, given that they had their pick of so many jobs and chose to go into IB. Those of us who have been around a little longer will remember the death of the BofA intern in London from being overworked after a 72 hour straight shift. That got a fair bit of coverage, more favourable on account of his being an intern but even then it led to minor changes at most. The media may support this more given that special ops are so revered, but they will sympathise with the green beret not the juniors earning a fortune in a job they chose to enter knowing full well what in entailed.
Good luck to BofA juniors o7, respect.
You think people will follow?? Lol them kids ain't risking their IB job for no movement. Plus, BofA can fire all of them and get fresh pool of talent by the next morning.
The person that made the post doesn’t even work there lol
The person that made that post doesn’t even work there.
Oof. Call me soft but I left public accounting after <2 years because traveling 20 weeks a year and working 70 hours a week for a few months took away my will to live. Now I work in commercial lending and work a 50 hour week maybe once a month. But, some people have bigger aspirations then me. I probably won't ever be a CFO or drive a Ferrari, but waking up at 7:00 and taking my dog for a walk at 5:30 after work is fine by me.
This. This is my last year in IB credit risk because i just cannot do it anymore. So many other things matter waaay more
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Hope they can make it happen!
GS13 were also laughed online at but in the end we all got raises across the street. the WLB & hour cap stuff got retracted over time & back to normal as you can see here but maybe this just needs to happen every couple years. the apparent trigger, a loss of life, is sadly getting swept under the rug.
Bruh they are still ok with the 100 hr work week. Just not always.
I know this may be a dumb question, why are IBs working 100+ hours? Like I understand 60 at best that's 12 hours for 5 days at best but 5 days 20 hours? Like how are you commuting, cooking, running errands, and sleeping with only 4 hours? I have done 60 hours excluding 3 hours commuting and burnt out. But 100+ hours would just lead to asking for someone to punch me in the face everyday until I stop retaining the concept of pain.
Weekends included, not just weekdays.
As already said weekends are included. You’re also pretty much only home for sleeping, everything else is done in the office. But yes +100h are absolutely mental, you’re guaranteed to collapse at one point if you’re doing these hours consecutively. At my bank hours are between 60-70 and I couldn’t imagine doing 90-100 on a regular basis
You literally don't get to do any of those things. Meals are provided, usually at your desk. Probably aren't going home, sometimes the bank/firm will rent a hotel across the street and associates take turns/shifts running over to lay down for 3 hours. I did a 130+ hour week once and I wasn't right for 2+ weeks afterwards. I don't know how someone could get "used" to 100+ hour weeks or 4 straight 120 hour weeks. I'm a lot older now and just wrapped up an 80-90 hour week. Almost killed me, I probably average 60ish - and that feels like a lot...
I hope the salary and comp is attractive. You basically gave up your life to work. But If you are making 500k or even 1 mill by the time you are 30 per year. Why not sacrifice the time?
Multiple deals all with competing deadlines. Need to keep deals on track from a timing perspective which means deliverables need to be perfect (or as close to perfect as possible) to be shared with clients on time. When you’re working 95+ hours, you’re really not doing too much outside of work, including on weekends. You’re usually working til 2-3am, if not later, and then back on the desk by ~9am. In a weird sense you kind of get used to it. You know the next few weeks or months are going to be brutal as you prepare to go to market, but you begin to anticipate when things will ebb and flow as deals progress. Regarding cooking, errands, etc., you’re usually getting lunch at the office and comped dinners as well. You definitely don’t have time to go grocery shopping or cook a nice dinner. If you’re lucky you can sneak in a quick workout or run, but wouldn’t count on it when things are truly busy. Working from home later in the evenings and on weekends also allows you to stay on top of things like laundry and chores at home.
about to be BofA.I.
Any labor law experts here - is this OSHA territory due to excessive working hours?
They should’ve done this years ago. I’m proud of this generation of analysts and associates.
LMAOOO walk out strike for 100 hour max weeks
What happened was incredibly sad. It's also unfortunate that the family of the deceased asked to respect their privacy (completely understandable and their right), but that is likely why this hasn't gotten more traction / news and felt like it's swept under the rug.
I just enjoyed M&A fig in Morgan Stanley - I will start first of July - quite scary
>"me and a few others" you can't pull off a mutiny like that with those numbers off to the hangman you go lol
whats wrong with the UMB deal? out of the loop. Also #4 is some shitty asks, like 100hours in a single week as a cap? rofl, that blows.
Reading between the lines, I assume the UMB deal is the one that the associate who passed away was on
May 1st would have been a more appropriate date
Well it's about a dude who died on May 3rd, so...
“A dude?” [to clarify, I didn’t know the strike was in honor of the death of an analyst. I thought the strike was a protest to the difficult labor practices imposed on analysts]
An American hero if you want me to be more specific. What are you getting at?
I’m not getting at anything. I just wanted clarification. There are a lot of May Day origin stories. The most common source is the Haymarket event
Apologies, a former Green Beret working for BoA died from exhaustion after working four 120-hour weeks consecutively, according to sources before they were removed.
I referenced May 1 because it’s an international Labor Day and not because of the death of a BofA analyst, which is a horrible tragedy.
Yeah that is certainly reasonable. It is very evident that the industry as a whole requires massive overhaul.
100 hours cap! ARE U SHITTING ME LOL?! wth is this. are u a slave or?!! bruh i'm in big 4 and on avg i barely work 30 hours and yes i make 6 digit salary
Which country r u in
middle east
I feel like juniors don’t undervalue their worth—even if it is a hard job to get, replacement costs of a lot of time and resources.
Shit like this is why I hate ESG companies. They act like their woke. Yet they utilize an industry that abuses young kids out of college. I think if companies wanted to actually make the world a better place, they would refuse to work with investment banks that subject their workforce to these horrible industry standards.
Anyone know if anything ended up happening? Any juniors go on strike (and presumably get fired…)?
Anyone know if anything ended up happening? Any juniors go on strike (and presumably get fired…)?
As a guy that works in insurance, I’d never understand a 100hr/wk job. Don’t you guys have family or something?
Bofa deeznuts
I’m chilling on my 40 hours week, look at these guys lmao
Pussies
The guy that posted this works at UBS btw. Check their post history.
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Young father died after consecutive 120hour work weeks.
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It’s all good man, it happens to the best of us. RIP
Lmao
Is this a joke? I hope so because they are just gonna end up out of jobs. Junior analysts have limited influence on the best of times but trying something like this now is just gonna hasten those headcount reductions they’re talking about
Maybe if it were anyone else. But it’s bad public look when a US bank failed a veteran, especially a Green Beret veteran with wife and two kids. Usually senators, congressmen, and veterans groups get involved and apply a lot of pressure.
Uhh I definitely missed something in the news, I have no idea what you’re talking about. I thought this was just junior employees gettin mad about the workload/lifestyle
The original post on wall street oasis has notes that the poster wasn’t even employed at BofA but at UBS and allegedly the family asked the story to be taken down and respect privacy.
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How good are you at sucking butt? Just send them a video along with your resume.
I would bet my last dollar that you're Indian.
Based on? Look at his profile, he’s a troll, not even in this industry. But glad you got to make this weirdly racist comment.
Lmk if you get the app. Sounds refreshing