Credit Suisse Reviews in Raleigh-Durham, NC Area

Pros

Flexible, good benefits, decent pay

Cons

all stratehy driven from NY, politics

Advice to Senior Management

none at this time

Pros

CS is one of the few investment banks in the Raleigh area. and pay is very competitive. CS offers many philanthropy opportunities and lots of professional development classes.

Cons

Not many management opportunities in the Raleigh office. Most managers are brought down from NY office or hired externally giving little advancement opportunities for Raleigh employees in the RTP office. In order to move up you will need to wait a long time or move to another office.

Advice to Senior Management

Grow from within the firm. Allow Raleigh office employees to take their hand at management positions, and dont always hire externally for these positions.

Pros

good company in every aspect

Cons

limited development, poor salary, bad office environment

Pros

the band name is great

Cons

extremely long hours sometimes near quarter end

Advice to Senior Management

more rewards for the workers

Pros

Good work life balance
They treat contractors well, just like full time employee. This is the best part.
Flexible working hours, but working from home is generally restricted. You need to provide a good reason to work from home.
No micromanagement, You are given enough freedom to take day to day decisions.
Great cafeteria !

Cons

Recent layoffs creating confusion
Plan to move some employees to NY office is not clearly communicated. This creates lot of uncertainty among the employees as they could not plan anything long term like buying property etc.
Management dont update employees about the new developments. They all sit in NY office and there is communication gap.
Each managers have their preferred employees in their group and you can survive only if you are in a group.
Benefits and bonus are not great .

Advice to Senior Management

Communicate more often with the employees.

Pros

Depends what division you work in. If you work with financial products and the trading desk, it's a good ole boys club. If you support systems, it's much more inclusive.

The pay was excellent with great bonuses. I really liked how they conducted reviews and gave ample constructive feedback. They promoted a fantastic work life balance with different "fun" events to facilitate networking and relaxing during the long work day.

Cons

Incompetent managers. Seriously. I knew more than my direct supervisor and he would constently belittle me and keep me late to work on a project while he tried to figure out how to do the job.

The expectation that you stay late even if your work is done but your manager is still there.

Advice to Senior Management

Listen to the people doing the grunt work. They see the problems better than you do.

Pros

The benefits were good. The time off was better than average. There were no blackout periods for time off, which was nice.

Cons

Pretty much everything else. The work load was impossible. They expect you to work all hours of the day/night. I was asked to come in on Sunday nights to help with our Australian office (it's Monday to them). It was very cutthroat. People on your own team were willing to sabotage you to get themselves ahead.

Advice to Senior Management

I don't really know what to tell them. It take a very competitive attitude to be able to succeed there. On the flip side, that same competitive attitude causes some to take shortcuts and cheat to get there or make others look bad.

Pros

Great benefits and 3 weeks+ vaction from start date.

Cons

12-14 hour days are the norm, no lunch breaks, incompetent management, don't promote women, no work life balance whatsoever. They chew you up and spit you out for the next college graduate they can hire at 35,000.

Advice to Senior Management

Get a clue

Pros

The pay is slightly higher than other similar positions, but it has to be since the workplace is so completely dysfunctional.

Cons

poor management, shared cubicles, low cubicle walls mean lots of distraction from noise, very unprofessional meetings -constant off topic arguing among team members, schedules are a joke, collaboration is encouraged but very little collaboration takes place, too many managers directing work for a single project all with conflicting ideas and schedules. Managers deride team members even when they are performing well in a misguided attempt to whip them into performing more. Awful life-work balance, most people put in 10+ hour days.

Advice to Senior Management

Take some management training. Learn some people skills.

Pros

CS has a great brand name, decent benefits and cordial employees in RTP. The training that new hires receive provides a great general capital markets foundation, as well as area specific knowledge. There is a good team spirit amongst peers also.

Cons

Low pay, extensive hours, not a rewarding feeling at the end of the workday. Advancement within the firm dismal. You must be with the firm for years before you are eligible for a title upgrade, and when promoted your salary might cover inflation rates if you are lucky (2-3%). Upper management is solid, however most of the middle managers (and there are a lot) were lacking in leadership skills and were often inept. Mobility within the firm is encouraged, but often through lateral moves that hinder your chances for moving up.

Advice to Senior Management

Merit based promotions, higher pay, less CYA mentality