M&T Bank Reviews

Pros

Pros: Good Management, Ability to shift into different careers, emphasis on people being nice to each other. M&T Bank is a great place to work. In the Cybersecurity organization, the leadership gets it. They understand the role is to support the business and enable them to make risk based decisions. They are very supportive of their employees and employee growth. Other organizations that I've worked with, such as commercial, also understand they are supporting the business. As a result, everyone tends to row in the same direction. They also get that the business is about relationships with the customer. The exception that I've seen is Technology organization. It is political, morale is low, leadership does not listen to their staff, and there is a lot of fear due to constant reorganizations and firing of staff based on politics - not performance. So if you avoid this part of M&T, you should be good.

Cons

salary raises are typically around the rate of inflation

Pros

Good pay. Generous time off benefits, PTO for volunteering, good people.

Cons

Work-life balance sucks. We are in meetings all day every day, we all joke that M&T stands for Meet and Talk. Agile project management hasn't helped that. Managers average 55 - 65 hours per week, and are now being asked to start earlier in the day and work weekend hours to support the People's United acquisition. Frequent performance management and nine box meetings on employee performance at all levels of technology. If you work on a struggling project, work in an operations position, or aren't known by other managers, then you are at risk of job elimination. This has a serious negative impact on culture. Funny thing is that some of our management tells employees they have to relocate, even from other cities, but they won't do it themselves and still work in places where M&T doesn't even have a footprint. All employees are required to relocate to the new Technology Hub, our CIO's pet project. Senior management won't listen to concerns about quality of life, family issues, transportation, and other issues that come up. Team management will defer to senior management, who defer to the Admin VPs, who defer to the GVPs, who defer to the CIO and say 'if they don't like it then they can find another job'. He wants to hire college graduates, but that dream hasn't worked out yet either. The developer tech hub isn't delayed by Covid, it is delayed by reputation and mismanagement. We have lost hundreds of great employees over the past two years. We have eliminated many critical positions, eliminated some of the best leaders, and are now scrambling to get things done. We all need the same resources for multiple projects and when that one person leaves we are dead in the water. The culture is to only report good news on projects so we hide the bodies until it is too late. The only thing we hope for is the project will be reassigned before anyone finds out what the hold-up is. I have seen so many people change over the past few years. They are not happy or excited. We were (quietly) asked to create positive reviews for the company to offset negative ones. I will probably get put in the 8 or 9 box if tie this back to me but I really don't care anymore. I see how much happier my coworkers are in other companies and think that might be the best thing for me and my family. It was so much better a few years ago. I am currently looking for a new job, but am paid well enough that it is tough to find a management job at that level of pay in the Buffalo area. The last one I interviewed for went to a friend of mine at M&T, they had 4 candidates from M&T besides me too. I wish I had someone at M&T to share this with, but my manager doesn't care and either does her manager. They are upwardly focused even though they talk about Servant Leadership and how focused they are on employees. They aren't.