Macquarie Group Reviews in Sydney, Australia Area

Pros

Macquarie provides many opportunities to be involved in innovative new business lines, products and deals. They are very flexible with allowing movement around the business, and the organisational structure is flat and provides meaningful contact with senior executives. Performance review process is thorough and transparent.

Cons

Remuneration is off base compared with direct competitors. Constant changing of business lines and priorities as well as substantial staff layoffs has created significant uncertainity in recent years. Banks holds a lot of capital and is struggling to deploy it, putting downward pressure on bank ROE and hence bonus pool.

Advice to Senior Management

Need to be more competitive on base pay remuneration against competitors.

Pros

My experience was that Macquarie offers its employees opportunities to take on a lot of extra responsibility which enables career development. It also gave me the opportunity to fast track my career in the industry which was recognised strongly by other organisations when I was applying for roles. What I also loved about Macquarie was that you are surrounded by really capable and smart people which means you can learn a great deal.

Cons

Under-resourced which means long hours and that you have to do everything. Lack of support from management when it was clear that we needed more hands on deck. This meant that you are always doing things half-heartedly and become more operational and hence develop less than what you should be and just become really good and pushing things along but become burnt out and unhappy in the process.

Advice to Senior Management

Better support for strong performing staff (they will burn out!)

Pros

Brand recognition in Australia is strong.

Cons

Incredibly sub-par pay - think bonuses that are less than a quarter of what you would get at the equivalent level in another investment bank in Australia.

Advice to Senior Management

Seriously, fix the pay issue. All your good people at the junior levels will leave - and don't even dream that this won't get out. It's already out there - and more and more people will warn others against joining Macquarie.

Pros

- great career management
- if you work hard and get results, you will be rewarded
- opportunities for advancement exist, if you want to take them
- good profit share

Cons

-runs very lean, many teams are under-resourced as a matter of course
-can be difficult to manage very large work loads
-internal communication could be better

Advice to Senior Management

Improve internal communication and continue to provide great career opportunities and management.

Pros

Money. Looks good on your CV. Can be interesting work at times. You can learn a lot from the people you work with.

Cons

You have to work long hours. I find mgt can be somewhat unconcerned about the impact that work has on your personal life.

Advice to Senior Management

You should try to improve communications and synergies between the various groups in Macquarie. Additionally, I think you should introduce "you-days" like other companies do.

Pros

Very nice people to work with. They are all very smart and accomplished people and love their finance. However, it's not to the extent of arrogance as they are all laid back as well. Nice culture.

Cons

During the period I was there, there weren't many deals that went on, so a lot of the time was spent pitching, rather than live deals.

Advice to Senior Management

N/A

Pros

free parking on weekends
free alcahol at parties
easy location to get to

Cons

there seems to be alot of people doing nothing there. I dont know how they make money. I guess inflatting asset prices and borrowing to pay themselves "performance fees" is one good way. they are excellent at marketing themselves as the rocket scientists of the finance world in australia, but when you do the psychometric test to get in, they value sales skills over intelligence. So basically it is just full of very good sales people who really don't have a great idea. This may show in the long run. Also, the majority of people have either been there for over 10 years or under 3 years. So the old school make it very difficult for newbies to progress in fear there sweet little world may come under threat. very politically driven company. If your actually bright, go work somewhere else cause not only does this place suck to work if you are young and actually have a clue but I doubt it will survive weel into the near future due to the culture that has existed there

Advice to Senior Management

stop borrowing against uncrystalised bonuses ......oops .........too late.

Pros

Good location in central Sydney. Nice chairs, nice tables, good coffee. Phones work. Carpet nice. Lots of computers.
OK Career Opportunities, OK Communication, OK Compensation & Benefits, OK Employee Morale, OK Recognition & Feedback, OK Senior Leadership, OK Work/Life Balance, OK Fairness & Respect.

Cons

Disorganized IT group. Following oculd be improved:
Career Opportunities
Communication
Compensation & Benefits
Employee Morale
Recognition & Feedback
Senior Leadership
Work/Life Balance
Fairness & Respect

Advice to Senior Management

Need more follow-through. Also the tea isn't great.

Pros

IT at McBank was a fun place to be - relaxed and using best practices, newish technologies etc. The team i was with with all intelligent, fun people, and the hours were standard. I'd recommend a job here if you can get it! Geeze, as an employee you can even get free parking on the weekend in the city here!
Good parties, good attitude, good technologies... was anything wrong?

Cons

Yep.
Some of the senior managers were a bit iffy, and weren't up to speed on latest technologies, or even older technologies. This isn't a great look when you're managing it teams.
Only new-ish technologies. Banks are always late in jumping on these things because, well, they're a bank, new technologies aren't part of their business model.
If you're in IT and really like IT, maybe Mac isn't the place to be- but if you're in IT and half like technology? Gogogogogooo!

Advice to Senior Management

Always the same - watch promoting dunderheads who can somewhat get by by lying and cheating their way to the top.

Pros

They pay good rates to contractors, but only if you negotiate hard before you start. Rate rises are almost non-existent

Cons

Highly unethical company. I felt dirty working for them. Also, they seem to value length of service over competency, so many senior people are just sitting around doing no work waiting for the bonus cheques to roll in. The people who do the hard work rarely get any credit. Also there is a culture of blame, rather than trying to fix problems.

Advice to Senior Management

Focus on ethics and standards - there are none that I can see at the moment.