.NET Finance/Banking vs General .NET

[JRMurdoch]

Hi,

From what has been said there appears to be the most demand at the moment in the Finance/banking sector for .NET development

It has also been said that without previous Banking/Finance experience this is a very hard market to break into.

Question:
Whats is different about working in Finance/Banking?


Thanks,

[Bright Spark]

Long hours, Ability to cope with mentally ill people, strong business and
product knowledge especially area your working in ie cds, equities derivatives
this is most important bit, also ability to commute to london, deliver solutions quickly, knowlege of other systems used in banks ie Fidessa, Bloomberg API, reuters and lastly track record of working in banks.

[Hex]

Long hours, Ability to cope with mentally ill people, strong business and
product knowledge especially area your working in ie cds, equities derivatives
this is most important bit, also ability to commute to london, deliver solutions quickly, knowlege of other systems used in banks ie Fidessa, Bloomberg API, reuters and lastly track record of working in banks.

Work without a spec.
Put up with people shouting at you
Fix problem issues quickly
Baby sit the traders
Work long hours (I know people getting in at 7 and leaving at 6 or later).

Not all of the above apply to all roles.

[ChimpMaster]

Add to the list:

• having to work with incompetent people
• having to work with offshore teams who are even worse
• drinking loads as per city culture
• becoming a city drone like all others here who lack personality
• aging before your time as city life and pollution take their toll
• boredom, regression of your career and skillsets

Must admit though I've gotten used to it

[frankjj]

Long hours, Ability to cope with mentally ill people, strong business and
product knowledge especially area your working in ie cds, equities derivatives
this is most important bit, also ability to commute to london, deliver solutions quickly, knowlege of other systems used in banks ie Fidessa, Bloomberg API, reuters and lastly track record of working in banks.

I have most of them (derivatives at phd level) and long hours is the best thing of this job, delivering solution to critical production issues.

But still couldn't get an interview with a bank.

[Le Rosbif]

Pocketing 600+ per day while making the manager believe that you care about the project but actually don't give a monkey about it.
Spend a lot of time learning and trying to impose new technologies, WPF, MVVM, Prism, TDD, IoC, mocking, etc... and having fun in the process.
Bulltulip your way from meeting to meeting, coming in at 9, leaving at 5.30 and pubing at least once a week with fellow contractors.

Anybody contracting in finance and not experiencing this is indeed a muppet and should turn permie.
Anybody telling you it's tough and mindless is jealous.

... The same way a permie will always tell you that he's better of perm than contractor.

And now... I'm going to get a lot of bashing...

[hgllgh]

yeah i don't get it either.
what they should be doing is producing proper specs that a developer can then work from ... regardless of industry experience. i guess they just can't be arsed...

[Hex]

yeah i don't get it either.
what they should be doing is producing proper specs that a developer can then work from ... regardless of industry experience. i guess they just can't be arsed...

Who's "they"? You're not going to get a Trader sitting down and writing a "proper spec".

[HairyArsedBloke]

Who's "they"? You're not going to get a Trader sitting down and writing a "proper spec".

[hgllgh]

Who's "they"? You're not going to get a Trader sitting down and writing a "proper spec".

so how does that industry sector define their systems at all? A trader giving you a cock n bull verbal description whilst buying and selling with a phone in his hand?