The Job (DA's contribution to the blog)

The primary reason we came to the U.K. was for the tremendous career opportunity I have been given with the bank. I have been on the job for one week and I absolutely love the job. I have around 90 people under me. Sixty are in the Management Information Group and 30 are on the Operations Finance Team. I have been extremely impressed with everyone I have met. They are very nice, knowledgeable, and seem eager for change. I have already identified numerous ways to improve the organization. I am still in the honeymoon phase, so I am spending my day getting to know the people, culture, issues, and opportunities.

It is an incredibly international organization. I sit beside an analyst from Sweden, my indirect Boss is German, my HR contact is Irish, and I have analysts from India, Spain, France, German, Switzerland, and Scotland. I can understand most of them. The French are the hardest to understand. They speak English with a French accent and talk very very fast. (I’m sure Francios loves the way DA says his name with a West Tennessee accent and a little Texan thrown in. Comes out more like “France wha?”)

I leave the apartment at 6:55 to catch the 7:04 train into Waterloo Station. At Waterloo, I catch the Jubilee line tube (subway) to the Canary Warf Station. I have about a 10 minute walk to the office. I am at my desk at 8:10. The Americans all arrive before 8:30. Everyone else gets there a little before nine. You take a thirty minute lunch. People start leaving at 5:00 and the Americans lock up around 6:30. Even though the Europeans don’t work as many hours, they work very hard while they are there and are dedicated. They will stay late if the need to; they just manage their time so they don’t. (See previous post, they have to leave early to go grocery shop before store closes at 5:30)

My team is spread across the U.K. I have a group on the southern coast in a town called Poole, a large group in Coventry (close to Birmingham), and group in Ireland, and a few other places. I went to Coventry last week by first class super train. It is a great way to travel. The train glides at about 100 mph, they served a full breakfast, and saw some beautiful countryside. Coventry looks like America. Since it was completely destroyed during WWII due to some tank plants in the area- Everything is new.

I can’t wait for our scale to get here. I am walking more than ever, climbing lots of stairs, and have cut my calorie intake in half (not all by choice). This is probably why you don’t see a lot of overweight people. They walk everywhere. It is true that many could use a visit to the dentist.

I will try to keep you posted as I get further settled in, and as I find out if everyone is just being nice to me because I am the boss.