Story 36

I am an ethnic minority female millennial whom worked in the Citi London office for 4 years at analyst level in the 2010s. After being in my original team for 1.5 years, I was asked if I would like to move into another team in the same department which was to support a new fast growing business which I accepted. What I found out after I joined the new team was that the new manager had told the team in a meeting that I was “being thrust upon them”.

Soon after joining the team, the new manager who was a Caucasian British male soon began unfairly treating me. He would loudly berate me on the floor for small things in front of other colleagues to the point where my old manager who sat behind us pulled me in a room one time to ask if I was OK. I was expected to work 7am-9pm or 9am-11pm shifts despite only working in an operations role and my contract saying 9am-5pm whilst he would leave the office between 5-7pm. I was effectively being paid less than minimum wage and my annual bonuses were 3 figures which with hindsight I realise to be appalling.

One time I came in 3 minutes late (I had bumped into an old teammate in the office lobby and had a short catch up) and he got so angry with me that he was foaming at the mouth when shouting. If I dared to answer back he would either gaslight me by telling me to stop being defensive, or come up with some twisted punishment. Once he made me write down what I was doing every 5 minutes for a week when I had the “audacity” to tell him I don’t have the capacity to do a task he had asked, other times he would make me come in at 7am despite being scheduled to start at 9am. I was often made to take on projects/tasks which he did not want to despite not having the knowledge or training. I was never once put on a performance plan as he knew he had no grounds to do so – I was completing all my work to a high standard and client & colleagues from the business we supported always spoke highly of me.

I later found out he had not wanted me to be part of his team as he had cheated on his fiancée with a female colleague in our department whom I was friendly with and was worried she had told me and it would get out.

His mistreatment was not only limited to myself, he directed it to the other only female on my team (she left after 6 months) and the only other male colleague who was older than him whom had both joined at the same the team the same time as me. He was nice and never raised his voice to the other younger male colleagues of our team. When he go angry, he would throw objects like his headset or pends around the office and often over asserted his authority to other stakeholders in the firm in an unpleasant manner.

I never raised it with senior management as there was an old boys club in our department consisting of all the MDs (whom were all male) and most of middle management. Our HR contact was a female, based in Belfast and when she visited she would never speak to any of us, only the MDs and was always sucking up to them, going for lunches and dinners etc. I feared that if I did raise it to her, I would be fired. Also this was my first proper job out of university, I just assumed this was the way it was in the trading and markets industry.

After nearly 18 months of this, the older male colleague had had enough of his bullying and complained to the MD and also raised that I was being bullied as well. The MD pulled 2 other of my male colleagues into a meeting where they confirmed this was true. Eventually, he then asked me for a meeting where I told him what was going on. The male colleague had also raised it to HR and was internally transferred to a better job – more pay and normal working hours to not take it further. I was not offered anything apart from my manager being told “not to speak or look at me again as all he did was make me cry”. He left the firm a few months after this.

I was physically and mentally exhausted by this point and felt like I had nothing left to give to this role. My breaking point was at the next annual comp day. I was disheartened to see that yet again, I received no pay rise and another meagre “bonus”. I complained to my new manager and MD. shortly after, I was told I was at risk of redundancy by another MD who had flown in from the US and whom I had only previously met once before and had starred at my chest area during our introduction.

I was then made redundant 6 weeks later which I feel was the one bonus Citi gave me – a month later I found a new job at a buyside firm and have not looked back since. I will never work for a bank again, the way I was treated at Citi has scarred me for life.

This industry is long overdue its “Me Too” movement. The lack of diversity, equal pay and the poor treatment of women is shocking and it is unbelievable that it is still happening in the 21st century.