Sunday, November 25, 2007
Monday, November 19, 2007
Tuesday, November 6, 2007
Monday, November 5, 2007
S.E.A.
literally 10 seconds after stepping off the plane, only 2 thoughts:
"I knew it" & "I told you so"
that sums up my entire trip, if only some other things in life were that simple :)
"I knew it" & "I told you so"
that sums up my entire trip, if only some other things in life were that simple :)
Tuesday, September 25, 2007
juxtaposed
is it possible that we can decisions in life that are so confident that we don't question the alternative? i find that i am quite proficient in analyzing and identifying the choices, but yet i find my self constantly stuck at the fork, unable to decide a side, because each side has it's good and bads, and give the good choice there is a 40% chance there will be a bad outcome or outcome not as good as the expected outcome, etc, etc, etc.
so how do we just make a choice? for some, i guess it's just a matter of "not looking back", for others maybe there was never an alternative -- the choice made = the right choice.
i had one of my best friends remind this weekend that some things in life are permanent, family & good friends. Some things are not, work. I guess for me, the answer should be blaringly obvious, but I just seem not to be able to make the decision and just find quit this job. But I am making an effort to look now, and I have given myself a deadline, end of Oct.
in many ways i want to rectify this career thing so badly because i want to get back to focusing on the real things that matter.
so how do we just make a choice? for some, i guess it's just a matter of "not looking back", for others maybe there was never an alternative -- the choice made = the right choice.
i had one of my best friends remind this weekend that some things in life are permanent, family & good friends. Some things are not, work. I guess for me, the answer should be blaringly obvious, but I just seem not to be able to make the decision and just find quit this job. But I am making an effort to look now, and I have given myself a deadline, end of Oct.
in many ways i want to rectify this career thing so badly because i want to get back to focusing on the real things that matter.
Friday, September 21, 2007
Thursday, September 13, 2007
Traders, Guns & Money
My favorite excert from my current favorite book
"Resentments between front and back office run deep. The back office is paid less and has old equipment, they resent having to fight for everything that the front office take as their due, they resent toiling unappreciated and without recognition. The fron office resents having to bear the cost of the minions in the back office who make no money but constant claims on what the traders make.
On a wet night in NY, I watched the double-parked limos outside the entrance of a bank. It was late, around 8pm; The traders and salespeople had called up limos on the firm's account to take them home. I watched the back office staff troop out into the rain to make their way to the subway a few blocks away knowing some of themw ould have a commute of an hr or more to get home. I observed the look on their faces as they watched their front office 'colleagues' get in the waiting cars"
It was raining yesterday -- I went home drenched & had a headache.
"Resentments between front and back office run deep. The back office is paid less and has old equipment, they resent having to fight for everything that the front office take as their due, they resent toiling unappreciated and without recognition. The fron office resents having to bear the cost of the minions in the back office who make no money but constant claims on what the traders make.
On a wet night in NY, I watched the double-parked limos outside the entrance of a bank. It was late, around 8pm; The traders and salespeople had called up limos on the firm's account to take them home. I watched the back office staff troop out into the rain to make their way to the subway a few blocks away knowing some of themw ould have a commute of an hr or more to get home. I observed the look on their faces as they watched their front office 'colleagues' get in the waiting cars"
It was raining yesterday -- I went home drenched & had a headache.
Saturday, August 4, 2007
Thursday, July 26, 2007
Friday, July 20, 2007
Wednesday, July 11, 2007
Wednesday, July 4, 2007
Tuesday, July 3, 2007
Not my resignation letter...but this is rhetoric at its best
Dear Co-Workers and Managers,
As many of you probably know, today is my last day. But
before I leave, I wanted to take this opportunity to let
you know what a great and distinct pleasure it has been
to type "Today is my last day."
For nearly as long as I’ve worked here, I’ve hoped that I
might one day leave this company. And now that this dream
has become a reality, please know that I could not have
reached this goal without your unending lack of support.
Words cannot express my gratitude for the words of
gratitude you did not express.
I would especially like to thank all of my managers both
past and present but with the exception of the wonderful
Saroj Hariprashad: in an age where miscommunication is
all too common, you consistently impressed and inspired
me with the sheer magnitude of your misinformation,
ignorance and intolerance for true talent. It takes a
strong man to admit his mistake - it takes a stronger man
to attribute his mistake to me.
Over the past seven years, you have taught me more than I
could ever ask for and, in most cases, ever did ask for.
I have been fortunate enough to work with some absolutely
interchangeable supervisors on a wide variety of
seemingly identical projects - an invaluable lesson in
overcoming daily tedium in overcoming daily tedium in
overcoming daily tedium.
Your demands were high and your patience short, but I
take great solace knowing that my work was, as stated on
my annual review, "meets expectation." That is the type
of praise that sends a man home happy after a 10 hour
day, smiling his way through half a bottle of meets
expectation scotch with a meets expectation cigar. Thanks
Trish!
And to most of my peers: even though we barely
acknowledged each other within these office walls, I hope
that in the future, should we pass on the street, you
will regard me the same way as I regard you: sans eye
contact.
But to those few souls with whom I’ve actually
interacted, here are my personalized notes of farewell:
To Philip Cress, I will not miss hearing you cry over
absolutely nothing while laying blame on me and my
coworkers. Your racial comments about Joe Cobbinah were
truly offensive and I hope that one day you might gain
the strength to apologize to him.
To Brenda Ashby whom is long gone, I hope you find a
manager that treats you as poorly as you have treated us.
I worked harder for you then any manager in my career and
I regret every ounce of it. Watching you take credit for
my work was truly demoralizing.
To Sylvia Keenan, you should learn how to keep your mouth
shut sweet heart. Bad mouthing the innocent is a negative
thing, especially when your talking about someone who
knows your disgusting secrets. ; )
To Bob Malvin (Mr. Cronyism Jr), well, I wish you had
more of a back bone. You threw me to the wolves with that
witch Brenda and I learned all too much from it. I still
can't believe that after following your instructions, I
ended up getting written up, wow. Thanks for the
experience buddy, lesson learned.
Don Merritt (Mr. Cronyism Sr), I'm happy that you were
let go in the same manner that you have handed down to my
dedicated coworkers. Hearing you on the phone last year
brag about how great bonuses were going to be for you
fellas in upper management because all of the lay offs
made me nearly vomit. I never expected to see management
benefit financially from the suffering of scores of
people but then again, with this company's rooted history
in the slave trade it only makes sense.
To all of the executives of this company, Jamie Dimon and
such. Despite working through countless managers that
practiced unethical behavior, racism, sexism, jealousy
and cronyism, I have benefited tremendously by working
here and I truly thank you for that. There was once a
time where hard work was rewarded and acknowledged, it's
a pity that all of our positive output now falls on deaf
ears and passes blind eyes. My advice for you is to place
yourself closer to the pulse of this company and enjoy
the effort and dedication of us "faceless little people"
more. There are many great people that are being over
worked and mistreated but yet are still loyal not to
those who abuse them but to the greater mission of
providing excellent customer support. Find them and
embrace them as they will help battle the cancerous
plague that is ravishing the moral of this company.
So, in parting, if I could pass on any word of advice to
the lower salary recipient ("because it's good for the
company") in India or Tampa who will soon be filling my
position, it would be to cherish this experience because
a job opportunity like this comes along only once in a
lifetime.
Meaning: if I had to work here again in this lifetime, I
would sooner kill myself.
To those who I have held a great relationship with, I
will miss being your co-worker and will cherish our
history together. Please don't bother responding as at
this very moment I am most likely in my car doing 85 with
the windows down listening to Biggie.
One!
As many of you probably know, today is my last day. But
before I leave, I wanted to take this opportunity to let
you know what a great and distinct pleasure it has been
to type "Today is my last day."
For nearly as long as I’ve worked here, I’ve hoped that I
might one day leave this company. And now that this dream
has become a reality, please know that I could not have
reached this goal without your unending lack of support.
Words cannot express my gratitude for the words of
gratitude you did not express.
I would especially like to thank all of my managers both
past and present but with the exception of the wonderful
Saroj Hariprashad: in an age where miscommunication is
all too common, you consistently impressed and inspired
me with the sheer magnitude of your misinformation,
ignorance and intolerance for true talent. It takes a
strong man to admit his mistake - it takes a stronger man
to attribute his mistake to me.
Over the past seven years, you have taught me more than I
could ever ask for and, in most cases, ever did ask for.
I have been fortunate enough to work with some absolutely
interchangeable supervisors on a wide variety of
seemingly identical projects - an invaluable lesson in
overcoming daily tedium in overcoming daily tedium in
overcoming daily tedium.
Your demands were high and your patience short, but I
take great solace knowing that my work was, as stated on
my annual review, "meets expectation." That is the type
of praise that sends a man home happy after a 10 hour
day, smiling his way through half a bottle of meets
expectation scotch with a meets expectation cigar. Thanks
Trish!
And to most of my peers: even though we barely
acknowledged each other within these office walls, I hope
that in the future, should we pass on the street, you
will regard me the same way as I regard you: sans eye
contact.
But to those few souls with whom I’ve actually
interacted, here are my personalized notes of farewell:
To Philip Cress, I will not miss hearing you cry over
absolutely nothing while laying blame on me and my
coworkers. Your racial comments about Joe Cobbinah were
truly offensive and I hope that one day you might gain
the strength to apologize to him.
To Brenda Ashby whom is long gone, I hope you find a
manager that treats you as poorly as you have treated us.
I worked harder for you then any manager in my career and
I regret every ounce of it. Watching you take credit for
my work was truly demoralizing.
To Sylvia Keenan, you should learn how to keep your mouth
shut sweet heart. Bad mouthing the innocent is a negative
thing, especially when your talking about someone who
knows your disgusting secrets. ; )
To Bob Malvin (Mr. Cronyism Jr), well, I wish you had
more of a back bone. You threw me to the wolves with that
witch Brenda and I learned all too much from it. I still
can't believe that after following your instructions, I
ended up getting written up, wow. Thanks for the
experience buddy, lesson learned.
Don Merritt (Mr. Cronyism Sr), I'm happy that you were
let go in the same manner that you have handed down to my
dedicated coworkers. Hearing you on the phone last year
brag about how great bonuses were going to be for you
fellas in upper management because all of the lay offs
made me nearly vomit. I never expected to see management
benefit financially from the suffering of scores of
people but then again, with this company's rooted history
in the slave trade it only makes sense.
To all of the executives of this company, Jamie Dimon and
such. Despite working through countless managers that
practiced unethical behavior, racism, sexism, jealousy
and cronyism, I have benefited tremendously by working
here and I truly thank you for that. There was once a
time where hard work was rewarded and acknowledged, it's
a pity that all of our positive output now falls on deaf
ears and passes blind eyes. My advice for you is to place
yourself closer to the pulse of this company and enjoy
the effort and dedication of us "faceless little people"
more. There are many great people that are being over
worked and mistreated but yet are still loyal not to
those who abuse them but to the greater mission of
providing excellent customer support. Find them and
embrace them as they will help battle the cancerous
plague that is ravishing the moral of this company.
So, in parting, if I could pass on any word of advice to
the lower salary recipient ("because it's good for the
company") in India or Tampa who will soon be filling my
position, it would be to cherish this experience because
a job opportunity like this comes along only once in a
lifetime.
Meaning: if I had to work here again in this lifetime, I
would sooner kill myself.
To those who I have held a great relationship with, I
will miss being your co-worker and will cherish our
history together. Please don't bother responding as at
this very moment I am most likely in my car doing 85 with
the windows down listening to Biggie.
One!
Wednesday, June 27, 2007
a (good) day in the life of a product controller
so, i've tried to keep this as objective as possible.
if you have a friend or know someone that wants to know what a day in the life of a product controller is like, read this.
9:20 am
- come into the office
- 30 new emails, 25 deleted
- check a morning report, make sure the systems properly ran their batch jobs last night
- need to setup a new curve for the trader who wants it asap
- there seems to be a break in the numbers between one system in London and one locally here, but not on the front end, only on the back (whatever the hell that means). need to post a reversal entry on the backend to sort it out.
10:20 am
- new curve has been setup by my outsourced teammate in manila, however there is an error, one of the data fields needed to be entered by the trader is empty. i chase the trader, trader doesn't know it & doesnt think it needs to entered. i tried telling that to the system, it didn't care. error persists, now must contact IT for further assistance.
- we have to approve the accounts we manage every month by "signing off". for some reason, one of our accounts has been incorrectly assigned to another team, i need to fill out the form and transfer the account. however, no one is here to sign the sheet, and the acting manager that is around, wants no part in this - doesn't want to pick up any more liabilties....smart man.
11:20 am
- went down to operations/middle office to pick up some structured notes packages to review the cashflows that are hitting the accounts I manage.
- reviewed some packages to confirm amounts and will let these packages hit the daily p/l
- curve is still not setup, IT simply doesn't want to help, tells us to "wait for Moscow to wake up"...if I were a Trader requesting this, trust me, he'd be fixing the issue as well as providing me a "happy ending".
12:20 pm
- reviewed and confirmed structured trade's cash flow amounts from the trade tickets, even drew a diagram.
- checked p/l that was produced by outsourced teammate in manila, sent it off to the traders.
- IT still not helping yet
- off to lunch
2:20 pm
- continue to verify cashflows
- got a long email from trader, he's being asked to check some catagorization of a curve from London, he doesnt want to deal with it,says one line to me "could you plss amend?", that's it.
- got an email from middle office asking me (6 months BAC) and another VP on another product desk (10 years) how to book a trade. VP doesn't know and doesn't want to fix it, he's waiting for me to deal with it, and it's his own book. This lady didn't even know he was the controller for that desk because he's been avoiding her calls all week, he's been here for 10 years. He used to, to kill time, have the p/l generated from a system & then do the p/l by hand, just to check/kill time.
3:20 pm
- finished cashflows reviews, going to release and reserve certain amounts. sent out a detailed email to front office, middle, and back on the amounts to be taken upfront and over the life of the trade.
- chasing IT on two issues now
- uploaded the flash figures for yesterday's performence (T-1) to London
- now going to pick up transfer pricing form colleague who will be leaving the firm in 2 weeks. Eyes open, mouth shut...Transfer pricing is the act of transferring revenues/costs from regional location to another. People wanna get REVENUE for doing work for other offices, those same people don't want COST for someone elses work. So it's a fun game of back/forth.
- almost forgot, another trader gave me a call,1 year older, debated about an upcoming party, about home, the OC, unfortunately had to interrupt him from his free thinking and joyous spirit, had to get back to reviewing his trade tickets and chase London on a misbooking for him...
4:20 pm
- went down to Koots for a cup of green tea for 20 mins
- came up to do Transfer pricing. Spent an hr matching up the mtd amount for various accounts to our ytd amount - yes, manually.
- IT has claims that the curve has been setup in a different curve system and must be reverted to the correct one
- colleague has come up to me and told me he will resign by next Monday, yesterday it was October, tomorrow he'll probably say this Friday...
5:20 pm
- called another new grad controller in London to compare our day-to-day
- p/l as been confirmed and signed off for the day
- IT has provided a solution to the curve issue, I am now asking manila to amend it.
- IT has called me if I use treasury allocation method for treasury bonds (i have no idea what he has just said, i said no)
- chasing london on a loss booked in one of my trader's books that my trader does not agree with
- chasing manila on the progress my backend system break
- got a call from London asking about a product granularity issue with the system, because there is field that is left blank that needs to be filled in for a particular book or else there is an error in system that causes a break, etc ,etc ,etc...it wasnt my book.
6:20 pm
- going home, i'm on exit mode while the rest of dept. stays until 9-10pm.
now go make your judgement
save me
if you have a friend or know someone that wants to know what a day in the life of a product controller is like, read this.
9:20 am
- come into the office
- 30 new emails, 25 deleted
- check a morning report, make sure the systems properly ran their batch jobs last night
- need to setup a new curve for the trader who wants it asap
- there seems to be a break in the numbers between one system in London and one locally here, but not on the front end, only on the back (whatever the hell that means). need to post a reversal entry on the backend to sort it out.
10:20 am
- new curve has been setup by my outsourced teammate in manila, however there is an error, one of the data fields needed to be entered by the trader is empty. i chase the trader, trader doesn't know it & doesnt think it needs to entered. i tried telling that to the system, it didn't care. error persists, now must contact IT for further assistance.
- we have to approve the accounts we manage every month by "signing off". for some reason, one of our accounts has been incorrectly assigned to another team, i need to fill out the form and transfer the account. however, no one is here to sign the sheet, and the acting manager that is around, wants no part in this - doesn't want to pick up any more liabilties....smart man.
11:20 am
- went down to operations/middle office to pick up some structured notes packages to review the cashflows that are hitting the accounts I manage.
- reviewed some packages to confirm amounts and will let these packages hit the daily p/l
- curve is still not setup, IT simply doesn't want to help, tells us to "wait for Moscow to wake up"...if I were a Trader requesting this, trust me, he'd be fixing the issue as well as providing me a "happy ending".
12:20 pm
- reviewed and confirmed structured trade's cash flow amounts from the trade tickets, even drew a diagram.
- checked p/l that was produced by outsourced teammate in manila, sent it off to the traders.
- IT still not helping yet
- off to lunch
2:20 pm
- continue to verify cashflows
- got a long email from trader, he's being asked to check some catagorization of a curve from London, he doesnt want to deal with it,says one line to me "could you plss amend?", that's it.
- got an email from middle office asking me (6 months BAC) and another VP on another product desk (10 years) how to book a trade. VP doesn't know and doesn't want to fix it, he's waiting for me to deal with it, and it's his own book. This lady didn't even know he was the controller for that desk because he's been avoiding her calls all week, he's been here for 10 years. He used to, to kill time, have the p/l generated from a system & then do the p/l by hand, just to check/kill time.
3:20 pm
- finished cashflows reviews, going to release and reserve certain amounts. sent out a detailed email to front office, middle, and back on the amounts to be taken upfront and over the life of the trade.
- chasing IT on two issues now
- uploaded the flash figures for yesterday's performence (T-1) to London
- now going to pick up transfer pricing form colleague who will be leaving the firm in 2 weeks. Eyes open, mouth shut...Transfer pricing is the act of transferring revenues/costs from regional location to another. People wanna get REVENUE for doing work for other offices, those same people don't want COST for someone elses work. So it's a fun game of back/forth.
- almost forgot, another trader gave me a call,1 year older, debated about an upcoming party, about home, the OC, unfortunately had to interrupt him from his free thinking and joyous spirit, had to get back to reviewing his trade tickets and chase London on a misbooking for him...
4:20 pm
- went down to Koots for a cup of green tea for 20 mins
- came up to do Transfer pricing. Spent an hr matching up the mtd amount for various accounts to our ytd amount - yes, manually.
- IT has claims that the curve has been setup in a different curve system and must be reverted to the correct one
- colleague has come up to me and told me he will resign by next Monday, yesterday it was October, tomorrow he'll probably say this Friday...
5:20 pm
- called another new grad controller in London to compare our day-to-day
- p/l as been confirmed and signed off for the day
- IT has provided a solution to the curve issue, I am now asking manila to amend it.
- IT has called me if I use treasury allocation method for treasury bonds (i have no idea what he has just said, i said no)
- chasing london on a loss booked in one of my trader's books that my trader does not agree with
- chasing manila on the progress my backend system break
- got a call from London asking about a product granularity issue with the system, because there is field that is left blank that needs to be filled in for a particular book or else there is an error in system that causes a break, etc ,etc ,etc...it wasnt my book.
6:20 pm
- going home, i'm on exit mode while the rest of dept. stays until 9-10pm.
now go make your judgement
save me
"per our conversation"
in my 24 years on this earth, I have never used this phrase, I must have been sick that day at school. My japanese colleagues love it...basically it translates to: "it's not my fault because i have already rid myself of any liability from this situation by pushing it to you"
learn something new everyday
learn something new everyday
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
