Optiver

• Mission: We have a clear directive: Improve the market. I love the focus that mission brings, in combination with its moral undertones. We only pursue strategies which actually add value to the world’s financial markets. And I see this play out every week as well. In meetings, questions like “why should we be paid for this?”, “is this a fair strategy?”, and “is this money we should leave on the table?” are constantly asked. It is so refreshing to work for a trading company which takes its duty to ensure stable, fair, transparent markets seriously.

• Teamwork: The camaraderie, sense of togetherness, and practical outworking of the company structure are incredible. Within our office in Chicago, it feels like everyone is part of a tight-knit team that works together as true partners, with no second-class citizens. Between offices, there is a wonderful sense of friendly competition (every office wants the best results) balanced by the knowledge that we all share in each other’s success, which motivates everyone to constantly share technology, strategies, and learnings.

• Humility: Why are the most successful people at Optiver successful? Speaking for IT, the key is humility: being self-critical, proactively looking for critiques and advice to help yourself improve, and looking for your own faults before others. Our most senior people are the first ones to take the blame for something going wrong and push those around them to help learn from those mistakes and grow.

• Intelligence: You can’t be a great company in this industry without incredibly smart people. And in addition to being some of the most humble, hardworking people I know, my colleagues are also incredibly smart. If we were ever to decide “let’s cut the person with the lowest IQ,” I’d need to start looking for a job… Thankfully, I know we’ll never do that. :)

Professionalism Training: Because most new hires are fresh out of school, there is a need for and lack of training in “professionalism.”

• How to make a business case.
• How to produce meaningful statistics and not gibberish.
• How do you create, plan, and run a meeting.
• How do you stay organized and not drop the ball?
• How should you behave in a meeting?

Etc. That many new hires don’t know these things is not a problem. The issue is the lack of internal development and mentoring in these areas.

Focus: Optiver has a lot of intelligent people, high-quality traders, and opportunities to grow. But it feels like we’re at a giant buffet where every food option looks incredible. We’re half-way through the line, and we have a full plate and a choice: do we grab a second plate and keep moving or step back and re-evaluate what is best for our long-term health and short-term digestion? It often feels like we go for the second plate when we should ask: is that chocolate pie really going to be that good? We’ve tried it three times before and never been satisfied. Why do we think it will be good this time?

Keep improving on the learning and development side, and step back to re-evaluate if that chocolate cake is actually a good idea.