Goldman Sachs Reviews in New York City, NY Area

Pros

People are nice, intelligent, helpful
Compensation internship wise is a great deal
NYC is a great location
Management is great if you get with the right team

Cons

Compensation full time is not as competative especially for NYC
Not if you want to work in low-level/systems stuff

Pros

- Great learning opportunity (amazing training program)
- Surrounded by smart, motivated peers
- Opens doors for career advancement both within and outside the organization

Cons

- Hours are long, but you know that going into it
- Hard to balance work and life at first, but gets better as your progress

Advice to Senior Management

Less hierarchy and more productivity. Give analysts the same opportunities to attend meetings as the rest of the team. It helps them grow and learn the ropes.

Pros

Challenging experience where you will learn a lot. You will be doing real work that a normal employee would be doing.

Cons

Might get stressful at times with work overload.

Advice to Senior Management

Acknowledge that interns are just interns

Pros

There are plenty of smart people working in technology and you get to learn a lot from them. People get along fine within my area. Excellent overall benefits package.

Cons

Tends to build a lot of software in-house, should leverage open-source software where possible.
Long stressful hours should be no surprise to anyone.
Overloaded with too many smaller tasks, hard to focus on core development tasks.
Continuing to move tech jobs out of NYC area.
Comp is slightly above average, just slightly better than other fin companies. Don't expect to make the news reported avg employee comp of $500K+.

Advice to Senior Management

Improve comp for technologists. Work life balance.

Pros

You will have wonderfully talented colleagues and the opportunity to learn from internal as well as external thought leaders -- it's a great place for someone who is motivated by learning. Expectations are high, and you will be challenged over and over to learn, teach and lead. Teamwork is generally the norm, and everyone is expected to adhere to a pretty tough suite of policies and procedures, regardless of your practice area. Starting salaries are high, and the benefits are very good -- if you make it a point to save and invest, you would be hard pressed not to accumulate wealth, even at an early stage of your career.

Cons

Goldman Sach's drive for excellence is legendary and while there is a great deal of commentary on achieving work/life balance, the scales always tip in favor of doing a great job. While part-time and flexible work arrangements can be negotiated, it's almost never a good deal because while you give up a fixed percentage of salary and benefits, the work almost never is decreased in equal measure.

More distressing is the 360 review process, which gives the appearance of fairness, but in reality leaves a great deal of latitude in the hands of managers, who have budgets to meet, and who therefore tend to "manage to the middle". The evaluation process is politically motivated and treacherous, while under a veneer of "meritocracy" Thus, the performance of more experienced, higher paid employees is downgraded to put more in the pot for favorites who may not perform any better, and who may not coincidentally be white, male and younger employees.

Pros

- very ambitious people
- Compensation
- benefits

Cons

- very political
- 360 Reviews
- Work life balance

Advice to Senior Management

The leadership at GS is good however managers need to receive feedback from their subordinates to further strengthen their leadership abilities

Pros

The environment is such that you are always encouraged to reach your potential and continually progress your skills and knowledge.

Cons

A great deal is expected of you as an employee, work-life balance is very difficult to maintain during the week

Pros

I've been at GS since well before the firm went public in 1999. Over that span of time its culture has remained remarkably strong and enduring. Indeed, although there have clearly been ups and downs along the way, all the primary reasons for starting and building a career at GS remain just as relevant today as they have been for years. Namely:

1. Strong culture of teamwork and collaboration. People help each other out. There is a significant focus on helping people succeed, and on nurturing and developing talent. This, in turn, drives some important aspects of the interviewing and hiring process. Conceit is the enemy of collaboration. If you are too convinced of the veracity of your own point of view, you will tend to undermine he team-oriented environment and the objective of getting to the best outcome on any given issue or decision. Therefore, a healthy measure of humility, balanced with a proper level of self-assurance, are key traits for successful candidates.

2. Training and Professional Development. GS has a very extensive range of formal training offerings, although in this regard it does not differ materially from other large, leading organizations. The more important element - and the one that will tend to play a much more relevant role in your career advancement - is the wider culture of coaching, mentorship and apprenticeship that exists in the firm. It is a central element of the way GS works that people take an interest in teaching and developing those beneath them, or even in other areas to whom they have only tangential connections. While there are formal mentoring programs for summer interns and new permanent hires, the more enduring mentoring relationship are the ones that grow informally - and GS is very fertile ground for this. Although the firm is now over 30,000 people, it retains the feel and intimacy of a much smaller firm.

3. Long term career platform. I've worked in multiple divisions and regions with the firm. Most managers' initial instincts are to fill open roles with talent already under the firm's roof. Generally speaking,hiring is on such a scale that there is plenty of need to hire new people from outside the firm. However, the central point is that as an employee, you have access to a very wide variety of opportunities within GS and most people who've been at the firm for any length of time have typically been in a number of different roles or have moved around geographically. Does it work perfectly? No - but an unusual effort is made at all times to get the right people into the right seats.

4. Working with the best. There really are some remarkable people at GS. In many cases, people you work with are the most renowned at what they do in the world. It will take your game to a new level. I've worked personally with hundreds of GS people over time, in all kinds of functions and all kinds of places. Contrary to popular external perception, the people are friendly and the atmosphere collegial. While remarkably talented, people are also remarkably normal. The kinds of people you would be pleased to have a beer with.

Cons

The firm is generally very thinly staffed. When it works well, it provides for a rich and intense experience, rapid learning, great advancement in exposure and responsibility, and fewer people among whom to carve up the spoils. Rapid career advancement is more possible here than at many other places for this same reason. When it does not work well, people are simply asked to do more than they are able to, which can lead to reduced morale and engagement. The kinds of people hired by GS are those who strive for excellence. When they are in such a position as to limit what they can accomplish to the merely ordinary, the drag on morale can be significant.

Although this aspect has improved over time, the firm still has a tendency to keep certain long-tenured senior managers for several years beyond their expiration date - well beyond the point where their contribution is particularly meaningful or positive.

Advice to Senior Management

Be very careful about resource levels. The longer term cost to the organization from stretching people too far will far outweigh the near term savings gained from lighter staffing.

Pros

Smart people, good infrastructure, ability to move around internally

Cons

comp not tied to individual performance, has decreased yoy

Advice to Senior Management

n/a

Pros

Big name. Looks good on resume.

Cons

Low pay.
If you are junior, expect to be paid 30%+ less than other places, especially technology firms.
The management takes pride in keeping people for the least pay possible, which is disgusting.
VP+ people seems generally satisfied with their pay though.

So advise: get to senior level in tech firms then jump to GS.

Advice to Senior Management

Change the pay structure. Give proper pay to junior developers.