Commonwealth Bank of Australia Reviews in Sydney, Australia Area

Pros

Good work Balance
Training
Learning
good
good to work

Cons

Hierarchical
Politics
Beuracracy
POlitical
Hard and managment some times difficult to deal with

Advice to Senior Management

Flexible

Pros

Being a large company, getting into the right team is critical for a successful career, as each team is like working for a small individual company.
A fair company to work for that recognised good employees if you have the right boss.
Pay was according to industry standard. They provided good training and willing to spend money on the right technology.

Cons

Being a large organisation at times there could be red tape when trying to do ones task so knowing the right people will help. Making changes is slow and cumbersome.

Advice to Senior Management

Had few managers, all were was good except for the last one was a poor outside hire which introduced many internal conflicts, bullying, and work politics after their probation. Need to tighten up on the manager hire so properly skilled and "qualified" individual are selected for the job.
Get some staff to have an opportunity "interview" their prospective managers , or better still promote your talents at CBA you have many of them.

Pros

Pay is good
People are generally very friendly, supportive and helpful as is management.
There is a good culture of valuing employees and helping them in their professional development.
Generally a good work life balance, however I was a contractor. For some of the permanents there did seem to be periods when overtime and weekend work was necessary.

Cons

As a very large company, half (or more) of your job is spent tracking down information. Youf most important asset is the network of contacts you have established. This can be frustrating when first starting as the documentation is often limited or outdated.

Also, in a large organisation employing a lot of people, your role is very sharply defined and segrated from other roles. Essentially your are pigeon holed into doing a very specific job - there is no crossover (this can be good or bad depending on your preference).

The pace is very slow. Even the smallest things take a long time to get done. There is a six month release cycle so if your project is large, you will be stressed. If your project is small, you will be bored. Or if you're working on more than one, you will go up and down sporadically. Be prepared for a LOT of meetings, going over the same minutia over and over without necessarily ever implementing anything because someone eventually decides the project isn't worth it or the budget is too big, or they've changed their priorities etc etc.

Very difficult to do anything new or fresh as so much business relies on so many legacy systems that are so complex and so tightly integrated with other systems. Change is slow and difficult. It's more about making the best of a bad situation.

Pros

Very professional people to work with.
Great work life balance.
Continuos skill learning opportunity via online, internal and courses.
Above market pay.

Cons

I have been working in the Bank for a few years. Experience with five managers varies in a great deal. So yes, you really need to be in the right team as team culture is very diff from one to another. I found two managers extremely supportive with my career development and they encouraged me to do my best from day to day basis, the others have issues with even delivering their own work and attend regular team meetings they scheduled.

Another issue is with the promotion, ususally knowing the right people makes a huge difference, and young talent with great delivery result is sometimes not treated as equal in terms of promotin compared to the colleges with longer service in the Bank.

Advice to Senior Management

Changes implemented by Ralph has a great impact to remove the "Sino" culture in the IT space, more work is needed to retain young talents however. But yes, things are changing to the bright side, esp with the delivery of the Core Banking platform.

Keep up the good work CBA!

Pros

- Huge company with massive potential for personal growth and promotion (if you are able to prove yourself)
- From my perspective, very decent pay
- Flexible in terms of work/life balance (i.e. managers making sure you don't work too late and have an appropriate workload)
- Flexible working practices - many people working flexibly or part-time. Lots of opportunities to work from home if you can prove yourself
- Ability to progress quickly
- Ralph Norris - one of the best CEOs Australia has seen and Ian Narev - probably will change the way we all look at Bank CEO's - amazing leadership.

Cons

- As with any large, segmented organisation, the CBA has its share of crappy teams and managers. Always try and get a feel for the 'lie of the land' as some teams and areas are intensely political and can grind you into the ground. Having experienced roles in a wide variety of teams, I've had very poor experiences with terrible managers and awesome experiences in teams that felt like my family. The trick is to find those high performing teams.
- Although you can progress quickly if you have the right support network, I've witnessed many people not promoted who should have been - who even directly had a career development discussion with their manager - to be told they're not ready. Said people often were hired by competitors at their desired level.

Advice to Senior Management

Promote on capability, not tenure. Ensure company culture and performance expectations are consistent across the Bank - there are too many underperforming teams with toxic managers.

Pros

First class technology and systems; focus on employees and engagement; great work/life balance options; very large organisation with good culture and great facilities.

Cons

Seems to be a focus on external hiring for senior level roles; can be harder to move up in role status by working your way up internally than if you leave CBA and then return to higher level position on re-entry (this breaks continuity of service and benefits, etc).

Advice to Senior Management

Fully utilise the talent already within the CBA; develop talent profiles of internals in such a way that they are actually used when succession planning and filling internal roles. There are some brilliant people that sometimes fall through the cracks and sit in the same role for too long then go elsewhere because they are invisible beyond their line manager and may be based at different locations than the senior leadership roles they feed to.

Pros

Big company and involved in many areas of banking from retail, mid market to institutional clients
Lots of opportunities for horizontal progression
Competitive salary
Good on the resume
Friendly people to work with
Management seeks to support development

Cons

Too many managers and old people who have been in the job for 20, 30, 40 even 50 years.
Lots of failed projects
Evident Bureaucracy

Advice to Senior Management

Cut down management if they want to cost cut.

Pros

Job Stability and some limited flexibility to move within other areas of the bank.

Cons

Expected to work on some systems which lack documentation.
Always pushed to complete tasks in short timeframe.
Some managers have attitude that staff are expendable.

Advice to Senior Management

Treat staff as not being expendable workers.
Stop the stupid idea of just focusing on the profit margin and outsourcing jobs to India.
Outsourcing causes many more problems, including cheap Indian contractors.

Keep jobs in Australia for Australians!

Pros

Good work culture in the bank

Cons

Rigid work system in some divisions

Advice to Senior Management

Encourage cross functional oppotunities

Pros

Work life balance, flexible working arrangements if neccesary and available, an ok culture, laid back team. I enjoyed working with the company for the first 18 months, after that i no longer felt challenged and the work became repetitive.

Cons

Seems to be alot of complacent people not working to their ability, which is a shame, as alot of talented people arent realising there potential from fear of leaving there comfort zone.

Advice to Senior Management

The leadership seems to have good intentions, but some senior managers are setting a bad example of how to treat problems, instead of leading by example.