... your last review was not good. Most banks are either in the midst of, or are about to undertake, performance reviews with the express purpose of a) working out who to chop, and b) allocating the ever-diminishing bonus pool. If you come off badly, feel scared. Goldman regularly culls the bottom 10% of performers. This year, headhunters say most banks are planning to put 15% to 20% of staff out of their misery.
... your boss is blanking you. “The more conversations you have with your boss in the run-up to being made redundant, the more opportunity there is for him to say the wrong thing,” says Graham Ward, ex-banker turned author and coach. “For example, if he walks over and says ‘How’s it going?’ and you tell him you made £100k today and he says ‘That’s great,’ you can quote that back at him when he sacks you next week.” Ward says most bosses try to steer clear of this minefield by saying nothing at all to people with a limited corporate lifespan.
... you’re the most recent joiner on your team. The Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR) is widely quoted as saying that half of all the City jobs added in 2007 will be taken away in 2008. We’re not entirely clear whether this means the jobs that were added will be the ones that go, or whether it’s a question of statistical equivalence. Either way, it’s a good sound bite.
... you’re surfing the internet more than is strictly healthy. If you’ve poked assorted childhood friends via Facebook and have purchased a coterie of secondhand sporting equipment on eBay, chances are you are not doing much in the way of work. “The best job security anyone can have is being able to show how many deals you can close in the next three months,” says ex-Citigroup banker Peter Hahn. eBay deals don’t count.
... you don’t know the name of your boss’s wife and child. In times of crisis, it helps to have a rapport with your boss. That way, says one ex-investment banker, you’re more likely to find yourself reassigned to another team than terminated. “I used to be in bonds for medium to investment grade bond deals,” he reflects. “When the cycle changed we quickly got turned into bond restructurers.”
... the IT department are looking at you funnily. The head of HR at one US bank says people in IT are often told first who will be going so that they can prepare to obliterate all record of them from the system. If a techie person looks at you like he/she has seen a ghost it’s therefore a good indication that something’s up.
And if none of these omens have come to pass? Don’t assume you’re safe: “We generally do everything we can to ensure that people don’t know what’s about to happen until it does,” says the head of HR at one US bank.
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