Goldman Sachs

I worked for Goldman Sachs as a contractor through Saggezza. I joined in 2021 and worked for a period of 2 years.

The projects were okay and well-structured. I had to work with teams across various time zones – EST, GMT, IST, PST time zones, which means that you would be working different shifts throughout the day, from 7:00 AM to 6:00 PM and from 10:00 PM to 12:00 PM, to cope with expectations from different teams across various time zones. Emphasis was always on delivering working code. Quality, security, reliability, test coverage, and design were never important. Some of the observations I made were as follows:

Project Experience:

• Dealing with different cultures and expectations. For example, an IST time zone manager would feel long hours improve productivity, but managers operating in GMT, PST, and EST time zones would expect value-based work.

• Dealing with multiple reporting structures. Be ready to report to multiple managers across different teams. One manager's positive feedback would be another manager's negative feedback. So, you just focus on anything that adds value to the project.

• Get ready to be obedient to people who have been there for a couple of decades with little exposure to other projects/ecosystems outside of Goldman Sachs. Some of them are looked up to as gods. I understand and respect the expertise at the technical level, but equating them to gods and their presence in a particular project as a blessing is outright stupidity/dumb.

• Work-life balance is absent, which is widely accepted. The only way you could achieve a good work-life balance here is by constantly packaging and blaming your incapacities or project failures on other team members and bailing out your time, or just keep evading your main meetings by booking meetings with your junior employees in the name of training. You are expected to work on weekends and on vacation. I found myself working for about a couple of quarters on weekends. Do utilize this opportunity to negotiate quality work being assigned from your lead/manager.

• Advantage as a Full-Time Employee is that you could always blame your incapacities on contractors and use them as a barricade.

• A toxic environment is normalized. Gossips and backstabbing are common. I have heard everyone speaking negatively of everyone when spoken to in a private setting. It gets to a point where you accept that it's the norm. Coping with the environment would build your coping skills.

• Get ready to embark on an embarrassing email CC channel where your mistakes would be showcased and mocked in a CC channel consisting of many teams and divisions who are not even in your project. This is intimidating at first, but then you get used to it and accept it because you see everyone else also getting mocked along. Think about this like walking naked in a restroom – it's okay as there are others in the same setting.

• If you are pregnant, have a life event, or any kind of emergency, it is better to negotiate a sabbatical with HR or resign instead of convincing your immediate superior for some time off. I used to see some women employees who showed up the next day after giving birth.

• Vacation cancellations are quite common. Planning for vacation and then canceling it is very much appreciated here, as you are putting the work first. Managers have a very good habit (sarcasm intended) of creeping into your personal life buffer, which means that if you have a planned vacation, then expect a production defect/emergency or a feature/component that you might have to deliver during that time.

• No opportunities to convert to Full Time.

Administration Observation

• 5% performance cuts every year.
• Unanticipated budget cuts end of the year.
• Random team shuffling end of the year.
• No endorsement policy (No references/endorsements for contractors).
• No trading policy for employees (Only ETFs, 401k investments allowed).
• No overtime pay.
• Holidays on tragic occasions. Some workers in Asia-Pacific died to keep the servers running, and thus the leadership declared some time off with a condition to be on call if production defects kick in.

Cons: Personal shocks observed during the following situations:

An employee who is pregnant. A female employee informs her senior about her pregnancy and requests to keep the information private, as it is personal. The next day, in front of 20 people over a Zoom call, the person says the following:

Goldman Sachs Seniors: "Hey, how are you feeling? I think you must be having trouble hitting these sprint goals since you are pregnant." (Ouch, I think that information should be private, Ha ha ha).

An employee who announces that he will be on leave to go visit his ailing mother. Goldman Sachs Seniors: "Are you willing to work this weekend since we have a code freeze next week?"

An employee (single) who has plans for long weekends. Goldman Sachs Seniors: "Hey, why do you need a weekend? You are only single. Only people who are married should have weekends."

An employee who discloses plans to get married and doesn't respond on weekends. Goldman Sachs Seniors: "I don't know why this person stopped responding on weekends. He must be busy f***ing his girlfriend, Ha Ha Ha."

A 10-year experienced employee who focuses on code quality and other software metrics. Goldman Sachs Seniors: "I could outsource your job to a high school Asian and increase the delivery rate." (Statement delivered in front of an audience of 20 people).

Final Verdict: If you don't have the luxury of choice, go with it. You will learn to cope with the toxic environment. I promise you, if you can tolerate Goldman Sachs, other environments will be a breeze. You will feel no pain. The culture cannot get worse than this.

Deny, depose, delay. Ha ha ha.