Banking & Financial Services Salary Survey - Hudson

2011
salary
guide
Financial Services
As an industry, we found ourselves entering
2010 with anxious optimism. Organisations
were keen to utilise their newer, slender
structure imposed upon them by either
excessive write-downs or more strategic cost
cutting exercises. Recruiters were hastily
developing their knowledge of specialist
growth areas including regulatory reporting,
projects/change and also cost decision
support roles.
Early 2010 started where December 2009
left off setting a steady pace for the rest of
the year. Projects and “change the bank”
roles were expected but the amount released
in January alone surpassed expectations,
with the trend heavily towards business
analysts with accounting qualifications.
As in 2009, 2010 also saw an increase in
basic salaries, with newly qualified salaries
rising to as high as £60,000 for a handful of
firms and the majority rising to the £58,000
mark. It became increasingly more difficult
to secure an assistant vice president for less
than £70,000 and senior vice president level
salaries within product control rose as high
as £115,000.
At the newly qualified end of the market,
rising salaries in practice and increased
competition for the best candidates played
the biggest role. Practice firms were paying
the price for making drastic redundancies in
2008. Because of this and the decreased
graduate intake in 2009; there was a
depleted pool of resources. Again at the
assistant vice president level, firms that had
either made redundancies or just not hired at
the newly qualified level in late 2008/2009
had a lack of resource at the newly promoted
assistant vice president level. There has been
a dramatic increase at the vice president
level. This is due to there now being a vice
president bottleneck emerging in a number
of firms with more people waiting to take
the step to director. We feel this increase
will continue creating either an unclear
division between vice president and director,
or director levels will need to increase
accordingly.
So far this year we have seen that the
European banks are the more aggressive.
Banks that had previously focused on offshoring
are starting to re-hire critical roles
in the UK at more junior levels. This is not
the first time that the quality of production
in off-shore locations has been brought into
question. The appetite for newly qualified
candidates is set to continue. Experienced
assistant vice president candidates within
the product control space that have had
exposure to process/systems improvements,
but can still be hands on and manage the
daily PNL process appear to be most in
demand. Valuation experts in the credit and
rates space are a close second and IT cost
specialists with the ability to support the
business were also highly requested. At
least four tier one banks looked for senior
specialists in this area in Q1 alone.
With bonuses across the board lower than
even the most managed of expectations,
potential earnings and bonuses are now
playing less of a deciding factor when
candidates are moving. A common statement
heard when speaking to candidates is “my
bonus is low, but no one is paying high
bonuses so where would I go?” Candidates
are now taking more of an interest in
company culture, development opportunities,
team structure and the work life balance.
They are far more upfront in what they
expect from their career experience. With the
softer side of the process highlighted to such
an extent we suggest the return for more
informal additions to the interview process
to make more of an impact on a candidate’s
decision. For example coffees, team drinks
and tours of the office will make a bigger
difference now than at any other point in the
past three years.
10 Banking & Financial Services | Salary Guide 2011