Barclays Global Investors Reviews

Pros

Smart, motivated people
Good product/service
High energy work environment
Good compensation

Cons

Longer hours than other Bay Area companies
No perks outside compensation

Advice to Senior Management

Make the merger work with BlackRock so that we can combine the best of both companies

Pros

BGI was a nice place to work (it has now been taken over by BlackRock). There was a good work/life balance culture and decent compensation and benefits package.

Cons

There were people there who didn't do very much but still got paid well. Basically they rewarded tenure as much as they rewarded performance.
Also lots of politics need to be played to advance your career.

Advice to Senior Management

Cut out the political games and recongise people for what they achieve.
Don't let the new BlackRock culture completely take over from what you had at BGI.

Pros

Smart people, good products, great benefits, good pay if you are among the "in"s

Cons

Performance and reward don't seem to always go hand-in-hand. The jokes around the firm were the like of "Speak the truth as long as it's what they want to hear", or "Brown nosing is the favorite sport"...

Advice to Senior Management

Too many people get paid way too much for doing nothing but creating meetings!!!

Pros

Great teamwork - everyone willing to take the extra time to do the job right.
Everyone works hard and plays hard
Offices are located in some of the very best travel destinations.

Cons

Often work excessive hours and difficult to get that work life balance

Advice to Senior Management

Have senior management (the ones managing the budget) be in the 'trenches' with the employees every now and then.

Pros

High caliber employees only - no dimwits!
Collegiate atmosphere, consensus approach to all planning and problem solving.
Highly creative and progressive management structure, allows room for personalities while maximizing effectiveness of good ideas and creative energy.
Highly educated, cosmopolitan and energetic workforce adds to BGI's unique vibe.

Cons

Collegiate atmosphere prone to clique-buildup.

Advice to Senior Management

It's a pity the BlackRock buy-out will shed so many SF jobs.

Pros

Hire high quality staff, very good compensation in good times, good compensation in bad times, successfully run company, benefits are quite good, interactions of staff are quite good, keep on top of technology improvements, stable in good and bad times

Cons

A large portion of the compensation is tied to the bonus pool and only paid annually which can make it difficult to budget, the KTO is a bit overbearing

Advice to Senior Management

Ensure that you listen to your employees, especially if they are leaving, don't waste time on unnecessary "keep the management busy" projects

Pros

BGI has always been a good place to work, employing smart, friendly people who are motivated to be all that they can be. A lot of that is due to it being a "west coast" firm, head quartered in San Francisco. Now we've become BlackRock we're an "east coast" firm, head quartered in New York. How will our culture change?

My experience on integration so far is that on a person level, we're all much the same, and a lot of the fear we've all had about losing our culture - our "niceness" - is groundless. That said, it does appear decisions are taken at a much higher level at BlackRock than BGI, and it'll be interesting to see if at a corporate level we become more JFDI than consensual....

Cons

We work long hours, but hey, we're in the city so that's par for the course.....

We're not great at keeping our employees informed on whats going on. And we've reached a size now where often the left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing (there are lots of bits of BGI heavily siloed, doing essentially similar things without looking for synergies)

Advice to Senior Management

Keep the BGI culture going post BlackRock integration!

Pros

1) Great people to work with
2) Culture is great
3) Good pay
4) Interesting work
5) Great work life balance

Cons

Red-tape can be a problem sometimes, especially with IT. Its about to be taken over by BlackRock so things are likely to change.

Advice to Senior Management

You are doing a good job.

Pros

It is great place to work for software engineers. Huge IT department with a lot of talented people. People are nice and team work oriented.

Cons

The company is becoming very large as a result of the merger with BlackRock. Role for each individual may become smaller.

Advice to Senior Management

none.

Pros

Nice office building with well-equipped conference rooms comes to mind first. Solid communication from upper upper management on direction, strategy. Regular group celebrations at macro level.

Cons

Don't expect much recognition or praise for your contributions. Middle management is unsophisticated in motivating teams with strong tendency towards tactical execution and not forward-thinking strategy.

Advice to Senior Management

There is a lot of important work being done in eBusiness Management that is taken for granted and not publicized. Bonus amounts were largely down this year and everyone's working like dogs. Something has to give.