When the head of my team spoke to me earlier this year to give me my bonus number (a derisory amount!) and the usual thank you/congratulatory chat, this time supplemented with an update on how the bank and team is doing, I very gently raised my hand for voluntary redundancy.

I asked him if there were upcoming redundancies in the team. “No, I assure you, there are none planned for now. And if the bank and team continues to perform as expected, there are no more cuts planned in IBD (the already announced cuts being in other parts of the businesses)”, he assured me. But in fact, I fully expected more cuts to come. So I said, well, I’m only asking because, if there are cuts in future, I would appreciate if you spoke to me first, because, while I remain committed to team and will continue to do good work while I am here, I don’t really have any financial commitments (wedding plans, mortgages, children), unlike some other members of the team, and wouldn’t mind taking some time off (of course with no guarantee of employment when I return to Banking) to travel. I was quite surprised that the head of my team, who is a lovely man that I respect, looked quite surprised at my softly-softly offer to be made redundant. I had expected more people to have raised their hand (as happened in other teams, as I later found out).

Predictably – and one didn’t even need my (self-acknowledged) level of seer-like clairvoyance – we’ve announced cuts, and, almost as predicably, much larger cuts than previously announced (*yawns*).

Rumours have been rife in the team. And there have been many quiet coffees and chats that have taken place between people at various levels, between levels, with differing degrees of secrecy, with contents of discussions being shared and passed on, and intelligence and tactics being discussed.

Apparently some seniors have been trying to sound out who will “take the package”, who might leave voluntarily (only relevant for Analysts) post July bonus (hah!), to work out how many to fire, and who to fill the slots. The Boy has put a message to one of the MDs who is he is close to that he would “consider” taking the package depending on the package. In actual fact, he is dying to leave and would quit if not made redundant. So it would be better to leavel with severance at least.

Before I left on holiday, one of my seniors spoke to me to see why I had volunteered and if there was any way to retain me. I was very open with him (I have a personal project I want to pursue, my client is difficult, I find work mind-numbingly boring and the pyschological effort I need to do good work is getting too much for me, I don’t really aspire to what he – some one 4 or 5 years senior to me – does), and his conclusion that I was unretainable. So I thought I was good to go.

Then, while I was on holiday, the de-facto controlling MD called me for a chat to further sound me out. He wanted to understand my motivations for wanting to leave, the level of my commitment to the team etc. I was very, very careful with him. To his mind, he is not inclined to give packages to people who volunteer because they are essentially unworthy and asking for a “free lunch”. Whereas, the other MD that the Boy is close to thinks (and rightly, in my view) that packages should be given to those who would leave anyway. Otherwise, the team is exposing itself to the risk of being short-staffed after firing and then losing additional staff through attrition. So now I’m not sure where I stand.

I’m probably in one of worst-managed and most irrational teams in the bank. The de-facto controlling MD is reportedly against giving package to people he dislikes. I recently found out that the MD dislikes one guy in the team in particular, who has badly damaged the team spirit by doing no work, often coming in at 10am and leaving at 5pm, and has spent the last year constantly interviewing (apparently unsuccessfully) for other jobs. And yet, instead of firing the f*cker, the MD has refused to make him redundant in the last round (hence giving him, an admittedly very generous package, which will not be the case for this round), which has allowed the f*cker to remain, like a parasite, in the team, further demoralising the other hardworking team members. And there we were all thinking that the MD loved the little f*cker and he was protected, and were speculating which worthier person would be fired instead of him. How twisted is that. I wish I was in a more rational team.

Internally, we are expecting the death-list to be published in early May/late April (potentially as soon as this coming Wednesday). So let’s see what goes.