Pros: I've grown so much in my career and as a person at Monzo. It's been fantastic experience the journey Monzo has been on and the opportunities that growth has afforded me. Monzo's mission of making money work for everyone is still talked about and aligned around which is great after 4 years of it being our mission. It's great to see how well that mission has been sustained through wholesale change of the executive team, including the CEO and that it wasn't dependent on the founders sticking around. Broadly Monzo hires smart, ambitious and decent people who make working here really enjoyable and some of the challenges easier to take. For me, coming to work with people I enjoy spending time with and I can learn from and be challenged by is very important for me in a job and that's definitely the case at Monzo. In engineering there's regular compensation reviews against market and my salary is a lot more competitive than it was 4 years ago when I joined. I've got a nice chunk of stock options too. So when we get to IPO and if it goes well, should be a very nice reward.

Cons: It is challenging, especially if you're stretching upwards and taking on challenges/responsibilities that are new to you or you're from a different culture or way of working. This is great for growth and if you want it, you will be stretched but that's not something that is everyone's cup of tea. In places Monzo has been lax about maintaining a high bar for performance (I see this more outside of the engineering/tech disciplines) but I have seen positive progress on restoring that bar more consistently across the company recently. Monzo is a bank and that comes with a lot of regulation that has to be understood, interpreted and demonstrably complied with and that can take its toll at times, especially for people new to working for a bank.

Pros: People really care deeply about the product and the customers. I feel like my opinion is respected and that I'm taken seriously. We have long ditched the "move fast and break things" approach and are focused more on building sustainably. The people are genuinely lovely. In web, we're encouraged to share our ideas about system design and technology - it's a group effort. Flexible working hours. I can leave the office at 5:30-6 and switch off from work - I'm encouraged not to have Slack on my phone. We have on-call engineers to deal with problems out of hours, and on the one occasion I've had to deal with a problem I could take time off in lieu. We can take mental health days as well as sick days. Monzo is a very open book when it comes to mental health which is so important. As for benefits: annual learning budget, free lunch twice weekly, subsidized health insurance.

Cons: You need to be quite outspoken if you want to make an impact. I think the fast paced environment can be off-putting for some, but rather than saying "it's not for everyone" we should be addressing how we can make it more inclusive. Diversity is not bad for gender (could be better, especially in engineering) and we're great at LGBTQ+ representation but we are quite poor in terms of BAME representation. We've just hired a Head of Diversity & Inclusion though and I'm excited to see how she can help. I've had a few different managers in the time I've been here which has been a bit disruptive but they've all been good!

Pros: You'll work with incredibly smart and hardworking people and learn a huge amount.

Cons: Quite intense meaning it's not for everyone.