A summary of 6 weeks in a bank

A mildly warm Thursday morning. “Why am I working in a bank? I’m a programmer, a weaver of code, an artisan of digital functionality.” was my thought of the day. “I don’t belong here. I don’t even like wearing a suit. One can’t write code in a suit.”.

Meet some people I would be working it. Meet some FLDP grads. Meet my line manager. Meet my second line manager. Be surprised they’re actual friendly human beings as opposed to corporate zombies (I blame American TV for this preconception). Get some responsibilities. Make myself familiar with the work area. A productive day, one would say. “Why am I working in a bank?”.

Libor crisis hits. I have no idea what Libor is and why Barclays is being attacked by people left and right. I’m confused, entertained by the sudden drop in share price (because I like the stock market and its fluctuations) and I have reasons to talk to people and learn about it, under the guise of casual conversation. “At least it wasn’t a technical failure that stopped people’s salaries from getting through. I would have been ashamed to be in that tech team.” (for the unfamiliar, the Natwest system failure was just days before). “Why am I working in a bank?”.

Days go by, responsibilities come and go, presentation decks get done, conversations with a wide variety of people are had, spreadsheets with confidential data are filled. “Well, they are definitely trusting me with a lot of sensitive data.”.

I did not write a single line of code during these 6 weeks. But I learned so much about development, project management, stakeholder management and leadership. My programming skills will only have to gain from that knowledge. I have become a more professional person. Transferrable skills, they’d call them. I’d now call them vital skills. And I would not have learned about them without being in an environment like this one, here, at Barclays, on level 26 of 1CP. “Why would I not be working in a bank?”.

Although… I REALLY want to code something now.

Signing out,

Mihail Morosan, who, for 6 weeks, was somewhere he did not, 1 year earlier, envision himself to be.