April 2021 – “Make sure you take me where they have the good meat!” she said, buckling her seatbelt. It was a brisk Saturday morning in April, halfway between the bitter cold of winter and the smooth warmth of summer. The sounds of South London filled the air; mixed dialogue of distant tongues drifted over the car, pierced by sirens and the occasional blast of a horn. “Yes, Mum, I’ll take you where they have the good meat.” I pulled the car out of our estate and started routing toward, according to my Mum, the only butchers that mattered in London… a full hour drive away. “You back there, have you got your seat belt on?” My Mum shouted to my adult sister; I had taken her along because, well, if I had to go to the butchers, then so did she. “Yeah, do you have your seat belt on?” I quipped as well, smirking as I looked back through the mirror. “Shut up PB…” she mumbled, shooting me a sideways look whilst buckling her belt. I chuckled as I turned the corner, my Mum monologuing about the inflation of lamb prices and how we mustn’t forget her Yorkshire Tea. I waved an older across the road and rolled slowly up to the traffic lights. I looked back at my sister as I rolled through the traffic light across the junction into the next street. She was staring pensively out the window, her earphones glued to her head, music bleeding out into the car as we approached a line of traffic.

“Why’s there all this traffic?” my Mum asked, taking a break from her speech. “I’m not sure. Maybe someone has broken down.” I responded. I opened my window and perched out slightly, the chill wind attacking my face as I looked down the hood of the car. I counted three cars, and a cyclist wedged in front of us, but the 4×4 at the front was stopped for no apparent reason. I looked at my rear-view mirror where cars had now joined the queue, impatient horns ringing out. “Why are these people not moving?” my sister asked. I didn’t respond as I took another look at the car holding everyone up, a tirade of abuse erupting around it. Just as I did, the door swung open violently, as though responding to everyone’s grievances. From it emerged a darkly clothed, hooded youth, wearing a balaclava that hid his features but not his ill intentions. As he stepped onto the road, he pulled a blade out the size of his arm, brandishing it towards the cyclist, who promptly dismounted his bike as he realised what was going on. “Ahh shit.” I cursed in a low voice.

“Oh my God, a knife!” My Mum screamed, fear cracking her voice as she looked on in shock. The cyclist started backtracking as he looked behind him, his braids flicking against his head as he opened his jacket and brandished a weapon that wouldn’t be out of place on a farm cutting cane. He waved it as he stepped back cautiously. This was happening two streets from my house, with my Mum and sister in the car. It was a Mexican standoff on an uncaring South London Street. I looked back at cars ringing their horns, not seeing what was happening. My sister had her hand over her mouth, and my Mum whispered prayers as the two youths stepped closer towards the car. The cyclist was trying to keep his distance, eyes wide with fear as he slashed with the panic of a man that was quickly running out of space. His aggressor was walking him mercilessly down the narrow street. He looked experienced, deliberate, bearing the look of someone who’d done this before. They reached the car in front of us when, it seems out of desperation, the cyclist went to open the door of the vehicle in front. The shrill scream of the driver was muffled by her grey metal vessel, yet the terror in her face was clear to see, eyes bulging as she instinctively grabbed her door to counter her intruder. Yet, at that moment, her panic had shifted to the cyclist. He desperately tried to open the locked door, but the loose pull of the handle wouldn’t yield and give him the freedom he yearned for. His attacker seized his chance, throwing his weight through his shoulder as he swung his sword at the cyclist. There was a flash of metal cutting through the air on its way to extending another chapter of this South London street’s bloody tale.

April 2021. The Monday after – “So PB, how was your weekend? Get up to anything exciting?” A metal glint in the Spring sun, my mum muttering prayers and the aghast look of my sister all raced through my mind. “Nah, Steven. Quiet weekend for me, pretty chilled. How was yours?”…

Today – It’s been over a year since the widespread outrage and condemnation of the murder of George Floyd in the US. In the following months, I watched as companies globally put out strikingly similar statements (are they all using the same PR people?) regarding the longstanding systemic oppression of black people and the rapidly incoming changes to their recruitment and diversity goals. I’ll be honest; I was initially very sceptical of the whole thing. I fobbed it off as knee jerk reactions by firm’s whose hands were forced into making statements because the company next door did. As I was pulled into meetings with operating people and directors regarding: “how we go about fixing the problem”, I stressed that even if the firm had good intentions in hiring a wider variety of people, there was still one glaring issue. How does one build an inclusive corporate workplace, and an environment where more people feel like they belong, which brings me back to my story. Now, I like Steven; we get along well. We often chat about a range of topics, share details about our families, I even went to his wedding, but I couldn’t bring myself to tell him what I’d seen that weekend. Why? Well, aside from it being a pretty heavy topic on a Monday morning, it’s a stark reminder of the chasm between myself and Steven in where we came from and what’s commonplace in our communities. The stabbing of a kid half my age around the corner from my Mums block isn’t something that happens to bankers. It doesn’t stack up against the overpriced brunches and cocaine-fuelled nights in Annabelle’s that fill other bankers’ weekends. This is why retention is so hard because many people from non-traditional backgrounds hide their weekends and personal lives like they’re shameful in the workplace. We conceal our realities because they don’t fit into the polished archetypes of the corporate world. Our lives can seem too vulgar, too distasteful to mention to colleagues, and that’s an exhausting task, so before you know it, we quit. Often this happens before we’ve had a chance to make an impact and (even more sadly) without ever being ourselves and bringing our true potential to the workplace. That is a big shame. The question is, has anything improved since BLM went global? Does it look like there’ll be a genuine change in the culture and setup of the corporate landscape? I’ll attempt to unpack some of this during the post.

To understand the extent of the challenge movements like BLM face in improving inclusion at an institutional level, you must first understand how the issue operates. One of the overriding problems is fragmentation in the corporate workplace. Honestly, trading floors in Finance have more cliques than the Mean Girls and are just as petty. Because of the way banks have hired historically, the firms are lined with people with similar life experiences and socio-economic circles. People generally have a greater affinity toward helping those of a similar background and are more incentivised to enable each other to achieve their common goals. Among other issues, this gives rise to the infamous game that is workplace politics. Despite its shenanigans affecting everyone, the problem is that minorities are often at the worst end of it; you need only look at the gender and ethnicity pay gaps to validate this. Side note, the problem doesn’t only span ethnicity; it spans social class. As I’ve mentioned previously, working-class white individuals can often traverse a similar path. This draws even deeper divisions between people you don’t immediately identify with in the first place and eventually creates an overall feeling of resentment towards the establishment you work for. Now the pressure of BLM has forced some immediate responses. There have been waves of mandatory sensitivity training, targets set for diversity hires, and more people are careful of what they say than I ever remember. But whilst these are welcome changes, it’ll take time to see whether this actually manifests in hiring, pay, and progression metrics improvements. There’s another angle I wanted to address with inclusion, one that feeds into many of the issues I’ve just mentioned.

There’s a social aspect to most jobs that dictates a reasonable amount of your career progression. If you can’t bring your “full self” to work, you can’t really connect with people in a meaningful way. This limits your ability to build relationships with people essential for your career progression, act as sounding boards when you have issues, and generally make you feel welcome and encouraged in the workplace. Despite it being a tricky job, companies have a responsibility to educate themselves in the different socio-economic backgrounds of the people they hire and implement a culture that ensures people can bring as much of their life experiences to work as possible. To be clear, this doesn’t mean employees have to all be best friends, but I see little point in hiring from diverse backgrounds if employees then don’t feel like being themselves. This is still a massive issue for me even with the current BLM fervour because corporates need to undo decades of status quo for a changing demographic of employee. Now, as cultures in the UK become more intertwined and agendas like BLM push on, the hope is that employees of different backgrounds work their way up the corporate ladder into more senior positions. This should ultimately provide a reference point for others that being and bringing your entire self to the office can be done without affecting your career prospects. Before I wrap up, there’s one final point I’d like to touch on.

Finance can be an aggressive place. You have hyper-competitive personnel who are ultimately in the game to maximise their pay. I’m acutely aware of this dynamic, and in fact, it’s one of the reasons I enjoy it, given I love competition. However, I am also highly cognisant that I’m a black man. A tersely worded email, a legitimate refusal to do pointless work outside my mandate, a debate over something I think is nonsensical. These can all come across very differently from a black man than anyone else. Being right is the default for many people who come into the corporate workplace; they’ve spent most of their lives being told they’re the shit. To be told otherwise by a black man, Asian woman, or anyone they have rarely been told they’re wrong by can seem blasphemous. Unfortunately, I’m aware that as a black man, I can be seen as coming across as quite aggressive or rude by some people if I deliver a message with the same tone that I might give my boy if he tells me Arsenal are a top team. I realise that even on apparent issues of incompetence from other people, I cannot react in the same way many others may do, well, because I’m a black yout and acting wild at work will make me look like a crazy black yout. I’ve had conversations with girls where there is a similar dynamic; there is a feeling that if they are too pushy or aggressive, they are perceived as “a bitch”. Now, this is Finance specifically, so there will be a level of aggression and forwardness that doesn’t exist in other industries. However, the pressure built amongst myself and colleagues to maintain a cool front despite wanting to be more forceful can often become overbearing. Over the years, I’ve gotten better with this, mainly because I’ve realised something. Unless I’ve genuinely been disrespected, work problems are work problems. I’ve lived a life where I’ve had more significant issues than what happens at work, which is not always the same for other people in the office. This is a realisation that can help many people from non-traditional backgrounds because it gives some context to how many people behave at work. Their work is the most critical thing in their life. Whilst I’m passionate about work, there’s no amount of money you can pay for me to go to the extent that some people in Finance go to further their careers. Even in the instances where I feel undermined, there’s a simple way to address it. I just stand up and walk over to the person and ask what the issue is and how we resolve it, or I walk them off the floor and have a chat with them. Most people are keen to deescalate work situations once they see you’re not intimidated by disagreements. However, this often comes with some element of experience and confidence in your ability. Still, it’s relevant especially for managers to understand that tone is essential when addressing people from different demographics. The same instruction you deliver to a white male employee in his 40’s shouldn’t necessarily be communicated in the same way to a black female in her 20’s.

And thus, my rant for today concludes. The bottom line, I guess, is, whilst things have started to change and improve in the last year and a half, it’ll take some time before the changes really make a difference in hard-set in industries like Finance. But that doesn’t mean we can’t dream.

The Poor Banker

Has this girl outgrown London…? –

August 2019 – “PB, yes?” The cab driver asked, fixing his mirror to see me properly in the fading summer evening. “That’s the one, thanks. How are you?” I responded vaguely, the exuberance of my roof top soiree fading slowly as I sunk into the inviting leather and wound the window down to usher in a warm breeze. “Going to South London, thank you.” The driver fastened his eyes to the road, and we set off, twisting down the narrow city roads through the still unfamiliar surroundings of the city I grew up in. Chimes of carefree laughter from the city floated over the car as we rolled through the streets paved with opportunity that embraced me in these last few years. I looked out the window toward the dull gleam of the retiring sun, set against the hodgepodge of century old buildings, towering glass structures and cobbled back alleys.

My vessel of comfort turned gracefully around another corner navigating the maze of roadworks, buses, cabs and pedestrians jostling for position on the blur of grey concrete. Double yellow lines traced a path through my vision before being broken by the maiden of sleep whispering in my ear; she took my hand and pulled me into her overdue midst, down the familiar path of my wildest dreams trapped amongst my deepest fears all played out against the music pulsing through my head, the melodic drawl of drill being drowned out by a distant horn and a sudden stop. I jerked forward in my seat as the driver pushed down the horn, fending off a man trying to wipe down his windscreen. We had approached the main junction at the bridge where the usual congregation of a few homeless souls chanced wiping down windows. As the driver abruptly whisked us away from the fading calls of the for spare change, I watched the city lights decorate the backdrop of London’s setting sky, boats floating slowly over the Thames and cyclists peddling over the soft camber of the bridge back to South London.

As we crossed the bridge, I sat up in my seat and took in the change in scenery. Immediately I noticed the dimming lights and dark patches that slowly engulfed the street corners. The hoods emerging from chicken shops with a boisterous energy ready for an evening that was just getting started. Music blasted out of stationary BMWs and cagey stares locked onto my car as we trundled deeper into Southern territory. More familiar feelings of paranoia and street smarts set in as my limbs and nerves stiffened. A deafening siren rang out as an ambulance tore through traffic a few streets away from home. We turned off the main road toward the estate. As the driver pulled up, I thanked him absent-mindedly before getting out. I looked over my shoulder towards some of the older guys loitering on the block and nodded as they nodded back towards me. Taking my tired legs up the stairs to the estate, a fox darted out of the bins towards a bush and the dogs at number 47 barked as usual as I entered the hallway. A few drunks at the end of the hallway shouted something but I ignored them as I looked over my shoulder, pushed my key in the door and stepped over the threshold, closing the door and thanking God for another day in the city.

Today – I love London. I love the family I made on the council estate that raised us. I love the opportunity it gave me to transcend my circumstances and achieve beyond what I could have imagined. I love the personas of the different borough’s and the variety in cultural experiences you get here. Since I started working, I’ve grown to enjoy low lit dinners in restaurants whose names I can’t pronounce, going for long drives through the city in the small hours of the morning and seeing people from my community flourish and progress in so many aspects of life. However, my patience with London is starting to wear thin. Before, where I’d defend my city to the death, I now let people get a jab or two in before I step in. Where I’d tell people there was no better city in the land to live in, I listen now when they describe their lives outside the capital. Despite being my first love, my relationship with London is starting to sour somewhat. So this is going to be my therapy session figuring out if we can still stay together or whether it’s time to go on a break.

First of all, London is expensive and yes I know that goes without saying. However, it’s not just how expensive it is, it’s the sheer volume of things you have to pay for in the city and how it adds up. The city has become so expensive that people often turn to second jobs or side hustles to supplement their main income, which seems to perpetuate an overall feeling that work never stops in London; either you keep up or get shut out. An average day going into work can cost 5 or so quid for breakfast, and another 5-10 quid for lunch, and that’s before you’ve gotten to doing anything in the evening. Travel may cost you in the region of £200-300 a month depending where you’re coming in from and we still haven’t even paid rent yet which for a room can be assumed to be in the region of £600-1000. That’s minimum £2k you’re spending for the privilege just to eat and breathe in London without having to sell drugs or busk on a street corner, and this is before we’ve gotten to the dreaded K word… London, the city I love, is a legitimate barrier for me having kids because of how expensive it is. I’m not saying I can’t have children or even that they won’t have a decent life. But at what cost? Is it selfish to say I don’t want to suffer when I have kids? Or be exhausted 24/7? Yes, there’s beauty in the sacrifice you make for the next generation and your children, but at what cost? Earning good money but watching my kids grow from the distance of my corner office on a trading floor is not the life I’d want.

Secondly, and this will seem somewhat controversial, but London is bad vibes. Now I can’t necessarily quantify this, but the atmosphere can be likened generally to the comment section of an Instagram post. A lot of ego, typically cyclical with the occasional splattering of good energy. The poor vibe in London is largely a consequence of how expensive it’s become. Here’s the thinking… Because you have to hyper-perform to have a high standard of living in the capital, you become obsessed with doing more and achieving more. This means you’re cash poor and now time poor. Having periods where you’re not doing anything can be overwhelmingly disappointing because you feel you should be doing something productive. Everyone around you is on their next promotion or third successful business venture and you’re struggling as you attempt to launch your hundredth business idea. The crabs in a bucket feeling intensifies as many people feel resentment towards someone they know who has done very well in their career or lives. “How did they find the time?” “That could’ve been me.” “They just got lucky.” All of this is amplified in London. It’s a city that embodies a fierce competitive spirit and the detriment is that you often need to have sharp elbows and a selfish streak to do very well. This is what makes it bad vibes. No one is truly happy to see you do well because it feels like they do well at your detriment. It’s one less opportunity for you and one rung lower on the social hierarchy you’ve lost. I think of London as a modern-day social trench, a place where your hustler, survival and fight or flight instincts are all heightened, a combination which in long stretches becomes exhausting. I took advantage of recent foreign travel bans to visit a lot more of the UK and it’s fascinating to contrast the living experience. Outside of London, the pace is much slower, the people far friendlier, the priorities very different and as I get older, I find myself gravitating towards that more and more.

Now that I’ve gotten the negative out of the way, I’ll focus on why I love the city. Now at it’s best, London is one of the best places you can spend a day. Firstly, the levels of success you can reach here are incredible. I’m a black guy from immigrant parents from a council block and shit schools. There’s no other place in the country or even on the continent where I could have reached the levels of success that I have in London – there’s no discounting that. It’s not just proximity to business and opportunity though. As I’ve mentioned, the spirit and gusto with which you operate having grown up in London sets you in good stead for the harsh realities of life. You don’t generally get taken for a mug or have some dewy-eyed perspective on things if you have to graft for everything, and in London, that is mostly the case. Secondly, London at it’s prime (which is normally in good weather) is amazing. It’s not something I can quite put my finger on but the feeling you get during a London summer is filled with so much fun and positivity, it almost makes you forget how awful the winters get. Drinking KA fruit punches after playing football in the beating sun, big BBQs out in the local parks, getting a fresh trim and washing the car; it sounds simple but summers in London are amongst some of the best times I’ve ever experienced. It just wouldn’t feel the same if I were out in some sleepy town on the commuter belt debating the hosepipe ban with neighbours who don’t want me there in the first place.

So the compromise I’ve come to in the time it took me to write this (months by the way) is as follows. Start to enjoy more of the simpler things in life. I’ve taken the turn in good weather to buy a bike and enjoy the city from a different perspective. So far I’m blown away. I’m a simple man most of the time, but experiencing London’s hidden corners, canals and tucked away cafés, visiting the different parks and taking a swig of water after a long bike ride have made me appreciate London from an entirely different perspective. I’ve started to see outside the narrow lens of the two worlds I’ve occupied so far in life of the block and the boardroom. It’s helped me build entirely new lines of tolerance and enjoyment from being in London. It has also helped me fill my time with experiences that are cheap but physically and really spiritually stimulating. What I’ve also tried to do is designate days where I do nothing. I’m not so great at this yet, as I feel periods of nothing can still be filled by something productive, be it physical activity, working on some business idea, or reading something worthwhile. But I’ve been made to realise by important people in my life that scheduling time to do nothing is as important as days filled with productivity, and necessary in breaking the constant mental activity of working on something. Resting the mind is recharging the mind. Finally, post covid I’ve decided that at least every 2-3 months, I will leave London for at least a long weekend. Number one, it mentally breaks up the time I’m spending on work in the city into more digestible periods. It’s far easier working on something when you know you have a break outside of the city in a few weeks’ time. Number two, it allows you to escape the craziness of London and appreciate both escaping the bubble for a while and the life you have that can facilitate nice trips in the first place. I’m hopeful that these small changes can work in at least extending my time in London before I decide what I want to do with my life.

The Poor Banker

September 2018 – “Why don’t you just take a stake in the company?” My manager looked at me from across the table and waited for a response that I didn’t immediately have, so he continued. “You would retain partial control of the venture, keep some monetary upside if they do well and keep your seat here, which will still pay very handsomely.”

It was a late September afternoon and I was sat across from my manager in an office at the back of the floor. By this stage, we had developed a pretty transparent team and so I was open with him when I had gotten an offer to join a start-up. It wasn’t the first offer I had gotten to do something else, but it was the first time I was genuinely interested in joining what looked to be an exciting and potentially lucrative project. Naturally, it meant I had to move on from my role in banking and embrace the wild west of start-up land, or so I thought…

“It didn’t really cross my mind Rob,” I responded frankly. “I figured it was my expertise they wanted more than my capital.” “But I need your expertise as well PB,” Rob responded with a smile. “In any case, the capital you can offer them would certainly make a difference and if the venture achieves the success they envisage, you’ll get rich off it anyway.” Rob paused for a moment before continuing, “Look, it’s different if you don’t enjoy what you do here anymore, then I could understand the proposition, but if you do still like working in this team and believe in this start up then I think at least see if they’d entertain an offer for you to seed rather than join their effort.”

I looked across to Rob, assessing what he had said. He had a point, I didn’t particularly dislike the work I was doing, on the contrary despite it being intense, I still really enjoyed the challenge. However, it was time for me to start investing in ideas and assets that would change my destiny which meant, perhaps Rob was right. Just then, as though he was reading my thoughts, Rob chimed in again,

“Look PB, you’ll come to learn this soon. The more you can make your money work in places where you needn’t be present, the quicker you’ll attain the financial freedom you crave.”

Today – Dame Dash famously got on the popular morning show ‘The Breakfast Club’ and screamed: “There is no amount of money in this world someone could pay me to call them my boss. That’s like calling somebody daddy!” Now thankfully, I’ve developed no confusion of who the paternal figures are in my life, but this was one of the standout statements in a heated debate. With the boom in social media, direct to consumer marketing and the push for expanding opportunities for BAME individuals, the debate on ownership, running your own business and giving the finger to a 9-5 hustle has reached fevered levels. The comment section and threads are full of arguments on having a job versus running a business, being a boss versus having a boss and why owning anything less than 100% of your content is tantamount to being sodomised by the system. The thing is though; ownership is a big deal, ownership of fixed assets, beneficial ownership of stock, ownership of a business, they all contribute to building sound financial prudence and is a key pillar in building generational wealth. However, for this to really filter through to the people who come up from the “Ends” and the broader working class, it has to be communicated with more tact than to just scream at them that their job isn’t something to be proud of on nationally syndicated radio. I’ll try and break down having a job versus business, ownership and everything in between from my perspective.

One of the first things I realised when I started working in finance, was that I didn’t own shit and neither did many of the people I knew. I mean sure, I owned some decent clothes I’d spunked my internship pay on and a car I was barely maintaining, but none of these were the assets that my colleagues would brag about. They owned not just houses, but managed their own portfolios of stocks and ETF’s, owned stakes in private ventures and many had in excess of 3 incomes. I set about trying to internalise and apply as much of this knowledge as much as I did my day job, because it wasn’t just the fact that my colleagues operated this way, it was the nonchalance they did it with. Money was a means to acquiring income generating assets first – wealth created more wealth. They had a coolness towards asset ownership that I’d never seen growing up. This lack of poise is a reason I think our communities feel so passionately about full ownership of their content, their brands, podcasts and businesses. Often, due to the lack of opportunities we naturally have, it’ll be the first thing we actually own and so we’ll fight so intently to keep full control of it that we become blindsided. Here’s the reality though, often, there are more profitable assets you can own. Sometimes if you give up a few slices of the cake to informed investors/ partners, the cake your left with is worth a whole lot more than when you owned the full dish. This is not to undermine your work or the value of it, or saying you should give up total control of your venture, but often I see my community fret over ownership of assets that are as likely to generate revenue as I am to play Premier League Football. Owning 50% of a revenue generating business is vastly better than owning 100% of a failing one. Each industry has their nuances of course. The music industry is famed for having a small selection of individuals who own the masters of a huge range of artists for instance. However, on the whole, yielding some control of your business is the natural order in the corporate world, whether you get funding from angel investors, crowd investors, venture capital funds or other parts of the capital markets.

One aspect of ownership which I’ve struggled with in more recent years is the realisation that I’m often too time poor to own anything that is anything more than a passive investment. This leads me down the familiar road of struggle with working full time. Dedicate myself to my career and working for the man? Or forge my own path using the capital and knowledge I’ve attained to build my own business? I don’t have a straight answer for this in all honesty. I’m often too exhausted to consider doing anything other than struggle to have dinner and sleep when I get home in the evening. In some ways I’m a coward; I’m in a well-paid job and the embrace of a pay check at the end of the month can feel as warm as a mother’s hug sometimes. On the other hand, I’m pragmatic. I’m not a naïve kid who has the luxury of jumping head first into whatever venture comes to mind – it has to be worth the sacrifice I make in forgoing at least a chunk of my career. I feel society is almost built this way by design. Corporations often make employees feel like they’d be foolish to try their hand at anything else and that they’re disposable at the click of a finger. That feeling is simultaneously an employee’s greatest source of motivation to venture out and build their own business and their reason to begrudgingly stay in their seat and be thankful that they still have a job.

All in all, I’m still at a place where I need my job and there’s no shame in that for me. I work hard, get paid well and am still learning skills that will certainly carry once I’ve left. But eventually, the plan for me is to start leveraging the money I make to make something which can truly give me flexibility in my time and efforts to do what I really care about.

The Poor Banker

January 2020 – “You see you mate, you’re incredible! You really deserve this. No one deserves this more than you do, big fella.” I wasn’t sure what was worse. Robert’s clap on my back that threatened to knock me over face first, or the kick coming from his alcohol-laced breath. “Thanks Robert,” I replied. “I appreciate your support; it means a lot.” I genuinely meant it despite the physical and mental exhaustion I had experienced to get here.

It was a drizzly, January evening. The office was packed into a claustrophobic bar in the city, some celebrating promotions, and others comforting disgruntled members of their team who were appalled there wasn’t an extra zero on the end of their bonus cheques. I had just been promoted to an officer of the firm, by far the highlight of my career. However, despite all the festivities, I wanted nothing more than to get home, curl up in a ball and get some sleep.

“Ah gents, both enjoying your good news I see!” The head of the floor bumped into us on his way to the bar, pulling with him an insistent group of sycophants. “Ah yes Chris, I was just congratulating PB on his promotion.” Robert clapped me on the back again, and some of my drink sloshed over onto the carpet. “Yes, a fantastic year,” Chris continued. “I was really impressed with your acceptance speech, as well. You really have come a long way here!” The small group that had now circled us were nodding in approval, their smiles more self-indulgent than happy. Chris, however, was shooting me a piercing look, as if to detect any chinks in my armour, making sure he had promoted one of the good ones. I held eye contact, ensuring I kept my nerve to pass the only real test that mattered that night. “It’s been a surreal journey Chris, but I’m delighted I’ve been able to add value to the business. I’m excited to push on and do even better going forward.” I smiled warmly, still holding eye contact before Chris broke out into a wild smile and put a hand on my shoulder. “That’s what we want to hear, sir! In any case, the real work starts from here – you’re back to being a small fish in a big pond. You’re really well-liked around here, and you have a shot at really making an impact in this industry! Keep at it.” Chris gave me a friendly shake and faded into the crowd again with Robert and his crew hurriedly following. I slumped into a nearby seat of coats and embraced the smooth rub of the velvet as I was left to contemplate the magnitude of what I’d achieved, and on the more daunting ocean still left for me to navigate.

Today – As I have progressed throughout my career, I have struggled increasingly with one particular aspect: The Curse of Success. This is not to be arrogant, there are infinitely more talented and successful people than me, but on the flip side, I’ve been no slouch in the race to make a name for myself in my field. I was by far one of the highest achieving associates in my class and have continued to be so as an officer of the firm. I have reached career and remuneration milestones that I never could’ve expected. Yet somehow, I battle daily to figure out one thing. Is it all worth it? You see, the more successful I become, the more I wonder why I’m working so hard. Is it to leave the ends? Is it to get my Mum out? Is it to defy odds that I have long beaten? What am I proving, and who am I proving it to? I’ll try and hash some self-therapy out in the next few paragraphs – hopefully, you’ll find it insightful.

During my “come up”, even as a kid, I made a big deal about being the underdog and proving people wrong. It was the biggest buzz for me, whilst my peers validated themselves with girls, credit from the road or money, my biggest high was proving my teachers, careers advisors, friends and parents wrong. When you have nothing to lose, you approach life with an unbridled fearlessness and the feeling of knowing that you have succeeded in the face of adversity is something which still drives me to this day. However, as I count my blessings that increase by the day, I wonder what more there is left to chase? As I have developed and continue to reset the bar higher for myself, I think on when it will all stop? There will always be someone more successful who will be able to exercise privilege, money or power over me. It sounds juvenile and this is something I have to come to terms with myself, but for now, it’s my reality. The conviction I have that I will continue to exceed the expectations I had when I was young, is something I don’t think I can easily shake at all.

The other factor in this is my love for the competition. Whether it be the trading floor or dominoes, I hate to lose. Being from ends, you tend to take your fair amount of losses from the very start. You’re born in a shit estate, go to a failing school and deal with situations you only find out are abnormal when you go out into the real world. Taking losses elsewhere in life seems unacceptable, and it’s why people from the ends are the most defensive, the most prone to get upset over trivial matters and will always defend their last views and pennies to the furthest extent. That’s also why we tend to settle for the shortest straw and protect it even though we deserve better, because what’s the alternative? The love of competition can be unhealthy, but it can also give you an edge in the corporate environment. It can be the difference in thinking more creatively about how to win more business and getting ahead of people who are happy to cruise in their day to day work. However, the willingness to outwork, win and prove doubters wrong, comes at pretty severe costs.

One overriding feeling I battle with though is the sheer exhaustion that trying to win comes with. I often tell young people coming into the industry that the most useful trait you can have outside of raw ability is stamina. It really is a case of last person standing sometimes. The attrition rate in finance is a testament to this. It’s a field that actively encourages pushing yourself to intellectual and physical limits. You can see why people give up once they notice the pattern behaviour in finance. The industry encourages being long-term greedy: “Put the work in and you can end up like me, with millions in the bank, a massive house in Notting Hill and ego to match it.” With the way bank business models are changing, though, a lot of people in the industry find that this isn’t viable anymore. Fewer bank profits are paid out in compensation than previously, and banks are burdened by more stringent regulation and capital requirements, which means it’s harder to reward talent than it was in days past. The carrot at the end of the stick keeps getting further away, and many people burn out before they get anywhere near it.

The other conflicting feeling I have with doing well in finance is the sheer loneliness of the situation sometimes. I’m not really one for dwelling on emotional sentiments or a strong need for consistent validation, but being from a black, working-class background in finance can be extremely difficult, especially as you progress through the ranks. You constantly grapple with the fact that you’re the only one that looks like you in meetings, that you’re vastly out-earning the peers you grew up with and that you have a tiny circle of people to lean on when you’re at your lows. This in no way discredits the support network I have, but the majority of feedback you get from friends and family is normally along the lines of, “Well, you’re well paid for it.” How can I tell my Mum that I turned down working for money she could only dream of in the village she grew up in? Or turned down an opportunity to be in an industry with money people on my old estate would literally take lives for? Often this means I dismiss the hardships I go through because, well it could always be worse. A build-up of these frustrations can really take a heavy toll on you.

To bring it all full circle, I ask the question again, “Is it all worth it?” If I’m honest, it’s something which I change my mind about often, but it’s never brought me close to quitting my job or finding something else to do with my life. Considering finance was never originally my passion in life, this points to a pretty profound conclusion for me. Firstly, I’ve always felt it’s a long, long way down for me if I were to step away from finance. I realise in some ways this is a coward’s approach; the risk of me losing it all weighs heavily on my mind. The truth is though; I have further to fall than many of my peers at the office. I don’t have a legacy to fall back on, and even with my experience, I still fight the battle of being from the background I’m from, even if only psychologically. In some ways, the fear of going back to the person I was before I made anything for myself holds me to ransom. There is a fear of letting people down, especially when I may be the only person in their life they look up to as a real example of someone who has transcended their circumstances and become hyper-successful. For me, it’s not even about that money (although it’s obviously a huge factor), it’s about figuring out how I’d deal with the inevitable regret I’d feel if I stepped away from it all.

The Poor Banker

THINK LIKE A MAN WOMAN

January 2020  – “You know what we have to do, right?” My colleague Jack asked me, pulling his scarf tighter around his neck as a gust of icy wind rushed past us. I knew what was coming and braced for what would probably be a wild statement. “Nah, what’s that?” I asked anyway. “Grow a pair of knockers,” Jack replied. Now Jack was partial to a loose statement here or there but despite his crassness, I didn’t break stride as we walked back to the office in the bitterly cold, January air.

The infamous bonus and promotion week was upon us and the office gossip was rife. What would you get paid? Who was going to run your team? Would you even have a job by the end of the week? Colleagues cut anxious glances over the floor as they mulled over their futures, wondering whether enrolling their third kid in private school was a good idea. Jack was a relatively established middle manager on the floor and someone who I’d grown to like in my time at the firm. We shared a mutually beneficial and transparent relationship, but he wasn’t everyone’s cup of tea. Jack was old school and many of his ways were set as firmly as the chill in my bones as we took our rapidly cooling lunches back to the desk.

I rolled my eyes and responded, “C’mon Jack. You know it’s not that simple. Plus, that would just look weird with all your facial hair.” He flashed me a wry smirk as we stepped briskly across the pavement. “Look PB, I’ve been in this industry for a while and eventually you realise the difference between stuff that needs to be changed and pure politics. This agenda for women, it’s all politics.” His face twisted in scepticism. “Why do you say that?” I responded. “Because it’s clear they’re favouring Katie over me to run the team and we both know she can barely run a bath.” We crossed the road towards the office and I considered Jack’s tone; he was indignant, but I had to keep it real with him. “You know there’s things she’s exceptionally good at though Jack. You may be an excellent producer, but she can charm and work with clients in a way you can’t. She builds and manages teams better than you do and, no offence, she’s way easier to deal with than you are.” Jack shot me a sharp look as we approached the doors to the building. “So you do think she should get the job!?” I shrugged my shoulders as I embraced the warm, sweetly scented lobby air. “Not necessarily, but it isn’t as black and white as you’re making it out, Jack. She’s not just getting the job because she’s a woman, although it probably is a factor.” “And that’s what I have a problem with PB! It should just be the best person outright, why do I have to be a victim to the agenda? Don’t get me wrong, I’m pro the empowerment and progression of women blah blah blah, but not when they’re just outright not good enough and that goes for anyone.” Jack rounded off his point with the vim of a man who was convinced he was the authority on the subject.

As the lifts opened, Katie came gliding through the doors. The vim drained out of Jack and was quickly replaced by feigned delight to see the colleague he was slagging off not more than thirty seconds ago. “Hey Katie! You should’ve told me you were grabbing lunch; I would’ve joined you!” Katie responded with an equal amount of enthusiasm, keeping eye contact with Jack as she backed out the turnstiles, “Let’s do it tomorrow, Jack!” Jack watched her walk out into the lobby as the lift doors closed and he growled under his breath. “One thing I will give her though, she’s got an incredible set of legs…”

Today  – Men versus women, coochies versus cajonas, city boys versus hot girls, the list rages on to describe what is a fever pitch in the gender debate. Now if you haven’t noticed from my previous posts, I’m a young guy from the testosterone driven environment known as the Ends who now works in a richer testosterone and cocaine driven environment that is Banking. You might think this means I’ve become an arrogant misogynist who only identifies women by archaic and demeaning stereotypes. You’d be right to an extent; the only thing that frustrates me more than a woman with money is a woman who spends her money on a car and cuts across me without indicating only to do half the speed limit. In all seriousness though, women are doing better than ever and all power to them, so this this isn’t a debate on whether they deserve more opportunities in the workplace or life in general, its self-evident they do. However, it is interesting to compare the journey of males and females and see where the current climate of gender tension stems from.

As a child growing up, classical gender roles played a huge part in shaping how I viewed men and women in society. Despite attending an all-boys secondary school, I was lucky enough to be surrounded by women as a kid. I have all sisters and my Mum was ever present. From an early age I could tell the pressure and expectations were different for me and my siblings. Whilst we were all expected to academically achieve, there was infinitely more pressure on them to help with the upkeep of the house, look presentable, be on call when there were guests and as they grew older, prepare themselves to settle down. These pressures became something they had to juggle with their career and life goals and ultimately, they had to be willing to concede certain opportunities. As women strive for greater gender equality, this presents a problem for some men. I’ve often argued that men are becoming increasingly confused with their roles in modern day society. The rise of the third wave of feminism and woman who can “do it all” has meant that some men aren’t really sure what to do at all anymore. The typical roles and ideals that were formerly required by men: to be the leaders in society, to be breadwinners and providers for their families, to go out and be hyper successful amongst other things, are now being facilitated by women. Young men are seeing an increase of women in positions of authority and many men are disillusioned by this. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not suggesting women shouldn’t get the opportunities they want in life, but it would be naïve not to acknowledge that this will have an impact on young men which needs to be addressed. Many of the ideals that men work towards are fundamentally set by women. In my generation, I knew that if I didn’t have a half decent income and could not protect what was mine, I was redundant as a man. They were simple values really, but I only really cared about them because women did. However, the result of women embodying the same values will ultimately lead to a generation of young men who will feel rejected by their female counterparts unless the ideals by which we measure young men are adjusted, lest we risk a generation of men with an identity crisis.

Here’s the thing that men get wrong as well though. When I started working in banking, I would often notice the resentment of men towards the powers some women held just by virtue of being a woman. It seems that sometimes women can bat their eyelids, wish things into existence and then go on a nine-month maternity leave. I was being genuine when I told Jack that Katie was way more charming than him, she seemed to get people round to her way of thinking in a way I’d never seen a man do in her position. She was eventually promoted to the job and Jack sulked for a month whilst he lambasted “quota filling promotions”. To some extent he had a point. Here was a guy who’d been the top producer in his team that had been run over by a candidate who hadn’t come anywhere near his numbers in her career, but she had managed to convince everyone she was the best person to build a better team and that was the crux of Jack’s problem. As men (especially men from the Ends) we can be too focused on the win, and reluctant to put aside our egos to focus on doing the right thing more broadly for the team or the greater good. It’s actually been a symptomatic issue of many of the biggest corporate and political failures throughout history. Many projects could have been salvaged if men had listened to people often more competent than them or taken less needless risks. However, the cost of appearing wrong or a weak leader is too distasteful for many of us to embrace. I’m not a fan of quota filling exercises but as is the case with all minority issues, if a seat can be filled with someone who owns a different set of ideas from the incumbent and can help drive new avenues of growth by focusing on other qualities aside from individual brilliance, then that’s something I can live with, even if they are less gifted on the surface.

Now back to feminism versus other social agendas. I generally feel that women’s rights fall under the broader spectrum of minority issues. I read ‘Lean In’ by Sheryl Sandberg before writing this and many of the challenges she experienced as a woman in the workplace and life were very similar to mine. Imposter syndrome, selling yourself short and generally being profiled on stereotype (my case being a racial stereotype). The logic suggests that all these social issues be approached with a similar amount of energy to rectify them. The challenge here though, is that modern feminism feels quite different to me than other social justice causes. Women’s rights from the 1920’s all the way through to the 70’s were about fundamental human rights. Early stages of feminism were dominated by rich white women and mostly concerned the right to vote, own property and generally operate freely without the permission of a man. This morphed into a much broader movement (but still mostly excluded non-white and working-class women) ensuring increased social acceptance for women, like the rights to education, employment and independence, especially sexually. Now whilst the most recent wave of feminism has become more inclusive, the actual goal has become less clear. Most of the issues are more social and cultural than they are legal with less tangible measures of success. By what measure can you fix toxic masculinity? How do you solve the gender pay gap? These amongst other issues are complex, and often come with culturally ingrained matters so have no simple solutions. This in addition to the general anti-men rhetoric that comes from some corners of the feminist movement means that feminism in general has become the most fatigued of all social causes. Whilst there’s still a lot of work to do and injustices to address, most of the general population can only assimilate 2-3 big agendas at a time. The longer drawn out and more complex the agendas become, the less interest there is to address it.

To conclude, I want to bring it back to my community. I have never seen a more toxic environment amongst young men and women than I see today. The level of competition between young people in general is pretty damaging however, and the depth to how cynical men and women have become towards each other is just sad. Being a savage is celebrated, vulnerability is shunned, and softer qualities are discarded for fear of being taken advantage of. Men and women take petty shots at each other from the barriers they’ve built to protect their fragile egos and overwhelmed emotions. Yet turn on social media and you’ll find many people celebrating this new normal of painfully forced ideals masked as liberty.

The Poor Banker

Sometime in the last five years – “Is that a hot dog, PB? Christ, it’s only a Monday… A bit strong isn’t it?” I turned around to my manager whilst taking another huge bite of my lunch, gherkins spilling onto the desk, a tomato tinged, satisfied grin creeping across my chomping face. “I still don’t get this idea of a salad for lunch John.” I confessed, turning the tasty chunks of hot dog and onion in my mouth. They melted together in a fusion of orgasmic flavour and the smug look on my face grew wider. I looked at the wilted leaves hanging off the end of John’s fork before pressing. “Where’s the meat, where’s the excitement, the value for money? You’re still going to be hungry after that salad and I’m going to approach the rest of the day with the energy of a man who’s eating right.” John rolled his eyes as he poked at some baby tomatoes and spinach. I pressed further, “I got this hot dog and fries for less than that salad and fancy orange juice you bought, and I look way more satisfied than you do, no offence.” John looked like he was waiting for me to finish but I sensed the rebuttal coming and pre-empted it. “Before you say its unhealthy, I know that. Of course it is, BUT, where’s the fun in being healthy all the time? I exercise, I eat salad sometimes, it just has to be accompanied with actual food and not cost me £10,” I ploughed on. “Plus, I don’t get this hysteria about eating healthily on a Monday anyway.” John looked at me with the same exasperated look he had whenever he thought I was pushing a farfetched idea to clients. “PB, when you get to my age, you’ll realise your health and time are the only things you wish you could buy more of.” I looked at him and stopped chewing, noticing the seriousness in his tone and facial expression. “You’re talented, but if you really want to do well in this industry and in life you need to have more stamina then everyone else.” He took another mouthful of veggie goodness, his conviction stopping my chewing in its tracks. “You won’t get there lifting hot dogs and burgers just because you can.” Suddenly my lunch seemed less interesting, the orgasm of flavour subsiding as quickly as the smile characterising my youthful ignorance.

Today – I grew up on a hood diet. That means my lunches were chicken and chip boxes I paid for by hustling donuts in the school playground. This was normally washed down with a carton of Sunpride Tropical juice that we’d somehow managed to make fit into our blazer pockets. I didn’t even know what an avocado looked or tasted like until I started working and even then, my first thought was, “Why is this shit so expensive? I can buy a wings meal and an extra strip burger for the price of spreading this on toast.” To this day I still measure the price of a meal by what it can buy me at Morleys or PFC. I dealt with a lot of sideways comments from people in the office when I rocked up on a casual Tuesday with a burger and fries for no reason other than it was what I felt like eating. The contrast between my diet and others in the office are a testament to the differences in environments we grew up in. Here’s a small explanation of what I mean.

For most people in the office, the formula for their lunch for a week is simple. Start on Monday with a healthy lunch to undo the damage they’ve normally done over the weekend due to exuberant eating and drinking. Typically, this can mean a salad from Pret, Birley’s or some other establishment that charge between £6-10 for a decent salad with a drink. This continues until Wednesday, by which time I would’ve had a burger or two and possibly Deliveroo’d some KFC if I’m feeling kinky. The health freaks on the floor won’t even have a pasta by midweek and its only on Thursday and Friday where they MIGHT join me in the promised land for some artery clogging goodness. This behaviour is in addition to the increasing number of people on the floor who are vegetarian, vegan or on some designer diet that means they can only eat proper food whenever there’s a full moon or because they need to schmooze a client for some business. I can’t lie, when I first started working on the trading floor, I didn’t get it. I had genuinely never known salad to be anything but a supplementary piece on the side of an actual meal. To justify it as a full meal was a foreign concept to me. In fact, meals without meat seemed weird to me in general. It’s only in the last few years that I’ve been open to different dietary patterns and realised how destructive this can actually be.

Now you may think, “Well of course your diet is unhealthy, PB. Wtf?” It’s a fair point and this leads me to something I grapple with. Why do the ends as a community tend to have unhealthier diets than those from more privileged backgrounds? Why do we cook with so much oil? Why is the food so heavy? Black people specifically – our diets surely contribute to our increased risk of health issues. The NHS says that we are three times more likely to get Type 2 Diabetes than people of white European origin in the UK. Is it time for black people to start rethinking the way we eat and drink? This is one of those arguments that for some people is going to come across as, “Ahh PB, so you work with the white man now and you think you know better!” That narrative serves you well and good until cholesterol has you in a headlock and you’re struggling to go past one round with your girl. Seriously though, I’m not against celebrating food as part of cultural heritage, I enjoy it as much as anyone else who likes their food seasoned with more than a pinch of salt and pepper. But I do think we should try and make efforts in adopting healthier diets.

A wise man once said: “Black people go to the funerals of their relatives and celebrate their life by eating the same food that killed them.” What I noticed about white people at work was that they generally had a more selective palette than I did. So a salmon avocado on toast with some chili flakes was pretty expensive, but not something they’d blink twice about paying for because it’s quality food. Heaven forbid they be introduced to the £3 – £5 meals with special sauce at Peckham’s PFC chicken shop, they’d shun it regardless of how cheap it is. Again, this points to the differences in our upbringings. A lot of the people at work likely had a far better quality of food to pick and dine from whilst growing up. The differences between the quality at Ocado and Netto’s supermarket in developing tastes have an impact on the quality of food you are ready to accept, and so my colleagues are naturally happy to continue paying for that standard regardless of price. The other big difference is how we approach junk and fast food. When I was a young kid, KFC and McDonalds were birthday treats. It wasn’t a regular occurrence for me to get a bargain bucket and this was mostly due to the, “We have rice at home,” approach that a lot of black households adopt. The thing is, I liked that shit. It was tasty as fuck, as were the chicken boxes I used to get for lunch in secondary school and then the kebabs in uni after that. I said to myself that when I finally made money, I would buy it every day if I could, because the limitation for me was money, and once I start working and get the money, I could have whatever I wanted, right? I’ve had to do a lot of work to undo that mentality because not only is it destructive, it encourages the dangerous belief that unhealthy habits are fine to have as long as you can afford them. The dichotomy in what food appealed to myself and my colleagues and what we were willing to pay for this food continues to be fascinating.

Now for the disclaimer. I still easily have the worst diet amongst the people on my team, maybe even the floor. My discipline in terms of snacking and eating healthily for lunch are woeful. That’s not to say things aren’t improving. I’ve recently taken to packing my own lunches for the day (this is also after concluding I’m not going back to paying £10 a day for lunch after lockdown), and I’ve cut down a lot on junk food. But some old habits die hard and there are reasons for that. Firstly, its mainly due to the spaces I still occupy. If you chill in ends or with people from that community, the default food to eat is generally unhealthy, even the home cooked meals. That’s not to say I blame my Mum for instance, her generation came and cooked what they could afford and what they knew. But then I think of the food establishments in the ends ranging from a chicken or kebab shop to Subway – the choice of establishments that offer relatively healthy takeaway food are slim. It won’t be until the ends change their eating habits and demand better and healthier food that the supply of healthy and affordable food can be realised. Secondly, there’s a theme which runs through a lot of my articles of dealing with the ‘selling out’ stigma, and unfortunately it applies here too. Food is very personal to people especially minorities, it’s an expression of their identity in many ways and a piece of culture that the majority of people hold on to when they move to the UK. To suggest changing or moving on from that can be blasphemy in many circles, regardless of the intention behind it. This is something that will have to be addressed by my generation; there is nothing wrong with relevant change for the betterment of our community.

This is still an ongoing journey for me. I have at least two decades worth of eating habits to break and that won’t happen overnight. As I grow and become responsible for more people, concern for my long-term wellbeing and quality of life will begin to have a more profound impact on my eating choices. I can only hope the same change happens in my community and we can start to shed the pattern of detrimental dietary lifestyles.

The Poor Banker

November 2019 – On the trading floor: “If Corbyn wins, I’m moving to my beach house in Spain. There’s no way I’m living here under his Labour Government. How is he going to pay for all these measures he wants to put in? I mean Jesus, who signed up for Communism…”

Also November 2019 – In the Barber Shop: “Nah man, mi cyan vote for Boris, Conservatives been killin’ us for years. Look pon Grenfell, look pon the disrespect of Windrush. As long as mi live mi ah go vote fi Labour…”

Today – The narrative for this article is based on a simple question: “Do your politics change with your wealth?” The premise is straightforward; if you start life relatively poor yet manage to transcend your circumstances to become relatively wealthy, do your politics change? Do you suddenly become a staunch supporter of capitalism and fierce fiscal prudence once you understand how the economy works? Or does your newfound privilege oblige you to support politics that work more on uplifting the less fortunate. Growing up in relative poverty, everyone I knew was a Labour supporter. The ends voted Labour, regardless of who was running the party – the constituency I live in have voted Labour since I was born. Working in banking however, I’ve realised that the majority of the people I share the office with vote Conservative and regardless of how many times their leadership make perceived blunders, they’ll keep voting Tory lest they move to their beach houses in Spain. For someone who’s gone through the journey of both worlds, I often ask myself if my politics has changed, or more importantly, if my journey has changed me?

Growing up, I had a general indifference toward politics. I was raised in a Labour supporting, working class household and adopted the same attitude the ends had, which is that politicians generally don’t care about the ends and if they do, they’re in the Labour party. They’re the reason we had free school meals, a roof over our head and the opportunity to even be in the country earning money. Anything else meant you were a sell-out and that you supported people who didn’t want you around and considered you a stain on British purity. For a long time it meant I overlooked the reasons for hardship in my life; stuff like being robbed at knife point, being homeless, and losing peers to the graveyard or jail cell were things that happened in my world. A world separate from politics, one that couldn’t exist if politicians genuinely cared about running a country that accommodated for everyone. Because of this, I never really took the time to understand it. It was rarely discussed in school and to be frank, there was no immediate incentive especially when your main prerogative was to try and survive. The reality is, politics has everything to do with it. When I talk to people in my field about my background, you can see the visible discomfort it creates. No one really wants to believe these disparities live on their doorstep. This points to the ignorance of insidious bias that’s been established over centuries in the UK, which is shaped by politics in a big way.

Since I’ve started working in banking, politics has been part of my job. I follow it because I have to as political decisions can have vast implications on global markets. It has genuinely been enlightening to balance my newfound economic prowess with the circus that is politics. However, it more importantly means that I am able to discern between realistic economic policy and fallacy. This position has allowed me to realise that what on the surface might seem like a great deal to the general public will actually be more punitive in the long term rather than beneficial. Political campaigns are awash with sensationalist pledges and the problem is the majority of people (even those in finance) can’t work out whether they’re getting a good deal or not. If income tax is cut but VAT goes up, what’s my net benefit? If corporation tax goes down but duty on fuel goes up, does my small business still make money? Will the NHS really get another £350 million a week? No one genuinely knows anymore, yet politicians continue to use economic soundbites as the catalysts to push their campaigns. The problem is, a lot of it is just rhetoric and alienates as well as patronises the electorate. Labour of recent, though seeming to have the most decent humans of the main political parties, have been naïve on economic policy. The Tories, despite having been known to be prudent fiscal operators, have resorted to false claims on issues like Brexit. The lack of understanding the electorate generally has on public finances is a big reason voters are pushed into the safety of parties they feel more comfortable with.

Going back to my first point, I mentioned the narrative for this was going to be simple, “Do your politics change with your wealth?” Originally, I wanted to use this article to highlight examples of blind commitment to political groups. Some demographics, like the hood, or the privileged banker are married to their political parties, for better or worse. This is a problem, as a lazy politician will know that they do not need to work hard for your vote. The hood is at a bigger disadvantage here for the reasons I’ve stated; we’re politically uneducated so are less able to decipher what a feasible economic pledge is and so fall into holes of distrust for politics. I do exercise caution when claiming that most of the hood blindly give away their vote to Labour however, because the reality is, if another political party came along and told the top 1% in the country that they could preserve more of their wealth, bankers would lead the exodus of the Tory vote without flinching. Their political allegiances only run as deep as it makes their pockets. I was going to suggest that the hood should become more open to voting outside of the Labour party once they understand more intimately how the economy works and how what seems like a great deal today on paper, may not be in 5-10 years’ time. In theory as you grow in wealth and class you should aim to practice in politics that helps both sides of the wealth and class fence. However, after the events that have transpired this year and seeing three general elections in my working career, I’ve realised that I’d be a hypocrite to suggest any of the above. I still don’t vote, and I still don’t really understand how politics can work. The political system is too archaic, and as I’ve grown in life I understand more about the economy and how the world works as you naturally should. That doesn’t mean I don’t believe working class people should be supported or the social system should be scaled back though. I’m liberal on some views like drug use and prison reform but conservative on others like school and business. What party should I vote for? The Lib Dems went down with Clegg and independent MP’s are doomed from the start. Through the recent crisis, the Tories have shown the same disdain to minorities and public safety as they have since slavery and despite Labour’s continued supporting of the working-class demographic, I can’t just give them my vote by process of elimination. This leaves me in an even more confused position as a working man than it did when I was poor. Though my understanding of politics and the economy has improved, I become ever more disappointed by the whole thing despite my paradoxical efforts to boost political and economic awareness amongst my community.

I wish I could say there’s some redemption in this article but unfortunately there isn’t on this occasion! My apathy toward the political process doesn’t mean I don’t care about the country I live in or that I don’t care to shape my future or my community’s. It just means I don’t necessarily think it can be done effectively through the current political construct. Until such time that politics becomes less of a dick measuring popularity contest and more of a genuine exercise in transparency and inclusion, I won’t be participating.

The Poor Banker

May 2008 – “Yo! What ends you man from!?” It was the question that had youths sweating like they just ran the marathon. It was a May afternoon and the stirrings of a ruckus betrayed the warm and pleasant air. I was at the religiously attended afterschool congregation for year tens – on the high street, kicking boisterously out of chicken shops and off-licences. Our shirts and laces untucked, and undone, and though our ties were carelessly knotted and sat loosely around our necks, they still managed to choke all rational judgement out of us. Giggs’ ‘Ard Bodied’ Mixtape blasted out of Sony Ericsson Walkman phones and aggressive chat made up the backdrop, as juice cartons and chicken bones were thrown nonchalantly to the kerb. We hurled thoughtless chat-up lines getting at the local schoolgirls and dismayed passers-by as they squeezed awkwardly through our groups blocking the pavements on their way home. It was the poisonous combination of adolescent bravado, smothered hopes and an uncaring recklessness unleashed on an undeserving public. That focus shifted however, when we heard the question.

I was stood at the door of the chicken shop, savouring my six wings meal lathered in burger sauce when I heard it. A vaguely familiar guy and a large group of boys were striding across the road to us with hostile intent. All of us tightened up, stopped what we were doing and looked over. Our smirks faded as Andy shouted back: “Ay, who are you cuz?! Man ain’t seen you round these sides before!” His arms outstretched, inviting the entire group for a confrontation. My senses tingled as Steven came out the corner shop next door. “What’s going on?” he asked. “Dunno, these man are on a hype, where’s Samuel?” I responded. “Still in the shop,” Steven replied absentmindedly, watching the scene unfold. My chances of enjoying my chicken and getting home unscathed were quickly fading. The group continued their approach across the road when the sheer number of them became clear. There were at least thirty hooded youths, fists balled, and faces twisted in anger. My boys dropped their bags and took their jackets off. It was clear that this was going one way, and I had to adhere to rule number one of all hood beef: Don’t Run.

I dropped my chicken box and made my way to the group with Steven. “Don’t worry about who we are, cuz. You’ll find out you can’t step to our block though!” Mr Vaguely Familiar exploded, reaching the pavement and approaching Andy. I suddenly recognised him; it was Mario. A few weeks ago, Steven and Samuel had ironed him out at our bus stop. Mario was from the block nearer the river and had taken a similar trajectory to most of my year group. Violently representing his hood, and carrying his postcode on his back like it would somehow protect him from the harsh realities he faced. Young men like Samuel, Steven and Andy lived and died by their ends. Now Mario was back to prove the same. Steven had recognised him as well, his face melting into repulsed fury. He stormed toward Mario, pushing through the group and past Andy, bellowing, “What you on then fam! You really wanna do this, yeah?!” But we never found out what Mario really wanted to do, for just as he turned to Steven, I heard a whistle by my ear. A blur flew perilously close to my head, and glass suddenly exploded on Mario. Samuel burst past me, set to throw yet another Supermalt bottle right before the pandemonium broke out. Blows were being thrown wildly, glass blasted off the floor, boys were flung to the pavement and into the road, and the sound of a bus shelter shattering echoed as a body slammed into it. The pedestrians close by desperately fled the chaos. Steven and Samuel were in the thick of it, swinging at anything in reach, eyes bulging as they roared at all on comers. Amidst the madness, a call broke through the battle like a foghorn, “AY, FEDS!” Police descended onto the scene with frightening speed and everyone began to scatter. Vans pulled onto the curb and officers flooded out, tackling youths to the ground as they rushed to evade the mayhem. Through the shouts of officers and youngers alike, Samuel called out to Steven: “Ay Steven! Take PB yard! Don’t stop for no one!” Steven grabbed my shoulder as we flew past lunging arms and down a backstreet toward my block. Fire tore through my lungs as we wound through the alleys and over fences but after a few minutes we had lost the officer on our tail.

“That was a madness,” I panted as we rounded the corner of my block and looked across the road to the new housing development. “Don’t worry about them man. Mario’s a wasteman, he could never violate the ends,” Steven responded typically. I nodded in agreement watching the last of the labourers file out of the construction site. The ghost of the recently flattened council block lingered and watched us as we approached my front door. “I still can’t believe they’re ripping down your block though… where they gonna move you?” I asked. The question seemed to pull him out of his rage and hit him harder than anyone did that afternoon. “I don’t even know still; it is what it is man… Can’t really do anything about it.” For the first time that afternoon, Steven looked defeated, his shoulders hunched, and chest deflated, carrying the weight of his postcode and the world on his young, unwary shoulders.

Today– There is a huge piece of irony in this story, one that’s bothered me ever since my realisation of it that day. Young people, who will happily brawl in the street and risk their lives for the postcode they live in, won’t commit the same energy to preventing or limiting the negative impacts of gentrification. All this vim to rob someone that looks like you from a nearby postcode but nothing when the council are relocating you three zones away? Some young people take Postcode Wars to heart so much that it both saddens and baffles me that the same amount of enthusiasm isn’t put into lobbying local councils on allocating more resource into existing community schemes or helping build more local business. Maybe I’m naive and expect too much from young people who are perhaps ill equipped to tackle such broad challenges. However, having grown up on a now gentrified estate and currently work with the predominant consumers of gentrification in banking, it’s important to highlight that whilst youngers in the ends are cutting each other down over rep, developers and councils are profiting off displacing them. I’m not arguing that areas shouldn’t be redeveloped, but it can be done far more responsibly than how it is currently implemented.

Now young people in our communities, I’m not here to attack or lecture you, I’m genuinely just wondering why we can’t rep the ends like we should. The most common pushback we have when gentrification comes around is to hold steadfast in our homes and refuse to vacate, which often just delays the process as opposed to preventing it. Prevention needs to start way before that. Those from our communities that have managed to do well have a responsibility to give back to the areas and people they were raised by. “When I make it, I’m moving out the ends.” I get it, it’s not the greatest place to be and you want to do better, but how is that furthering your ends? What example are you setting for future generations? I believe repatriating wealth away from our community is more detrimental than an angry man with a knife in his hand. If you build a business and staff it with people from that community, they remain self-sufficient and become role models to younger people. It keeps the people in the community economically relevant and better able to thrive. They can afford to send their kids to better schools if they lack it in the immediate area and the cycle of education and wealth creation starts again. All this will mean that as opposed to growing up and wanting to be like their local drug dealer, young people will aspire to be like their local business owner who owns a few shops, or the pharmacist who’s friends with their parents and drives a nice car, or even the GP whose kids they’re friends with got the new Yeezy’s for their birthday.

I have lived in the same area in South London since I was born, the same kilometre radius for 28 years. I started off in a high-rise council block where the pissy lifts were always broken, then to an estate down the road when they knocked down the council block, and just recently I bought a new build flat across the road from my Mum’s place. There are now meat and wine boutiques on the same high road where you can still step out of a chicken shop and get fleeced for all your belongings. You can walk from my flat, where people are drinking champagne on the balcony, to my Mum’s estate where the bins are overflowing, and within thirty seconds you’ll find used condoms on the floor. It’s a succinct microcosm of the extreme distribution of wealth in London. So, the common question people at work ask me when we discuss gentrification is: “Would you rather your area remain a shithole forever?” Now of course I would prefer people had sex in their houses and not in the block hallways, but how much is it going to cost to ‘un-shithole’ my area, and who will suffer the most? The attitude from the corporate class with regards to displacing people is so blasé, it’s painful to listen to: “It’s no Clapham, still a bit ropey, but it’ll have to do on my budget.” Now whilst I realise there’s no personal responsibility for outsiders to develop struggling areas, it highlights the difference in reality between two groups of people who sometimes live within a one-minute walk from each other. The obligation of ensuring responsible redevelopment of an area sits with local authority and developers. For instance, there needs to be more done to ensure social housing quotas are met (which they aren’t), making sure local business continue to have cheap access to funding and continual improvement of communal facilities, giving the same access to facilities for kids living in social housing as provided to those in private housing.

All in all, like many topics at the intersection of corporate and social interest, there is no black or white answer to whether gentrification is a good or bad thing. It has meant that I can buy a house and live near my family – and to be honest, it always gets a nice reaction out of ladies when they come to visit. On the other hand, it has meant that people like Steven had to live with the uncertainty of whether he and his mum were going to make it in a situation where their livelihood was being flipped against their will. The price of redeveloping areas cannot be one which ultimately costs us another generation.

The Poor Banker

March 2020 – “I’m done bro, I’m spent,” a close friend from work said to me. “I hear you man; I genuinely don’t think I’ve ever been this tired or overworked…well, ever really.” The world had gone into shutdown and investment banks were kicked into overdrive. Global markets were collapsing, and clients desperately tried to get their portfolios in shape making work busier than ever. The atmosphere was thick with uncertainty and fatigue. Colleagues wore anxiety on their face like war paint and carried heavy set bags under their eyes after long gruelling days. Whispers of redundancies were floating around the building like fairy dust and hushed conversations over coffee in the kitchen corners spread unfounded rumours like a school playground.

It was the end of the day and we were taking the sombre stroll to the tube station having a familiar conversation of the corporate struggle and wondering if it was all worth it. “I don’t know if I can keep doing this man, I’m spent.” I muttered as I looked up at my mate. “Yo, should we go for a walk?” He proposed. “I need to grab some food anyway – might as well just catch up for a bit.” We took a detour from the tube station and just caught up. We spoke about work, home, life and our worries. We advised on each other’s problems and made suggestions on what we’d do differently, offering solutions and plans of action. We laughed as we recalled stories of lofty managers blowing their lids and pumped each other up by reminding ourselves of our wins of the week.

As we wrapped up our conversation and walked our separate ways, oblivious to the fact that we’d spent an hour shooting the shit, there was a renewed bounce in my step. I had a lighter feeling on my shoulders and the puff was put back in my chest. The conversation had somehow reconfirmed things were okay and re-instilled the sense I used to have; the sense that I could take on anything. I smiled as I pushed my earphones in and strolled into the evening, telling myself, “I’ve got this…”

Today – Being overworked, mentally drained and generally knackered is a toxic combination. It can cloud rational thought and cause you to doubt everything you’re doing whilst you mourn everything you’re not doing at the same time. Yet, that combination is the exact intersection of how I feel sometimes. Nothing hits harder or makes you more frustrated and anxious than the realisation that you’re exhausted from working five 13-hour days in a row and haven’t worked on your side hustle in a week. You tell yourself you’ll work on it through the weekend but you’re just as likely to wake up in the middle of a Saturday to texts from mates asking you ‘what the motive is’ that evening. And if the motive goes ahead, you’ll end up spending Sunday recovering. Sometimes, you’ll write the weekend off in its entirety, doing nothing apart from staying in bed and actively avoiding everyone. I have this conversation with countless people, where we’ll talk about how we get past these feelings, and how we manage to get everything done without burning out. I often wonder whether being born and raised in London pushed me to be hyper productive, not by choice but because there’s no alternative. You MUST do well here, or you’ll struggle. Other times I wonder (without being ungrateful) if being a Londoner is a curse. The city can consume and push you to dark places. It can turn people inward, hurried and ugly. Go anywhere north of the M25 and you’ll find people are different, friendlier, more welcoming, and less burdened by the exuberant traps of the big city. There isn’t any one answer, but if left unchecked, these feelings can fall into a dangerous spiral of overthinking and self-doubt causing physical and mental issues. I’ve found that there are two main things I can do that can both help deal with and put these feelings into perspective.

The first and most real thing I can push is to tell your employer (whether that be through someone or doing it yourself) if you feel overburdened or burnt out. I used to and still struggle with this, mainly because of my insecurities as a young, black man. It may sound irresponsible, but as a male in general, do you ever want to be the guy that didn’t have enough stamina to do the job? Do you really want to be the guy other people have to step up for because you’re at home chilling? Aside from that, being in the minority at the office or having something that you feel conscious about can magnify this in a big way. Whether it’s being black, or a woman, being pregnant or having a physical or mental condition; you’re already self-conscious about being in the building, and now you’re conscious about having to be out of it. Despite those being difficult feelings to deal with, it’s important to overcome them and prioritise your well-being before work. Now you may feel like that’s hollow advice and that you genuinely can’t take time off for fear of losing your job. If so, figure out a plan to sort it out by first addressing your manager and if needed, finding a more accommodating job / industry for you. Your long-term health and wellbeing shouldn’t be compromised for a pay cheque.

Before going into the second point there’s an important point to note. Growing up I had a typically narrow and toxic view about the struggle of people who had a different background to myself. “Ah, it’s not that deep,” I would say. “Them lot have got money though. Those guys are just soft.” I naively equated money to mental stability because I was broke and unstable. I made the struggle exclusive to myself and like most working-class people, tried my best to bury my frustrations where no one could find them. I didn’t understand that the challenge of keeping mentally strong can apply to the privileged, non-privileged and everyone in between. I work with and have friends who have money and have come from money, and some of them are fucked. Their ability to process stress and adversity at times seems non-existent, and as a result, they end up going through hell for what from the outside, seem like routine life issues. Despite their privilege, I sympathise with them as much as anyone else. Now in an ideal world, the stigma of mental health issues wouldn’t disproportionately affect the working class as it does the privileged. However, like the point of this blog, the idea is to begin to demystify untruths across different types of people to try and get on the same page of how to solve our issues.

That brings me nicely on to my second point and summary here. Communication. The simple act of talking to someone else about what you’re going through is priceless. Now I wouldn’t recommend you just spill your life story to the first person you meet at the bus stop, but friends, trusted colleagues and therapists can all provide really effective outlets to vent. For someone who’s fairly private (I run an anonymous blog!) who grew up harbouring a natural distrust of people, I can’t tell you how different my life has become as I’ve grown my network and shared frustrations with individuals of different backgrounds. You’ll be surprised how much you have in common with people, and fascinated by their different approaches and perspectives when dealing with things. I’ve learnt to never underestimate the sense of catharsis I feel when just talking to someone at the end of a long day, week, or on the odd occasion, when things are getting too much. Give it a try, you might find it helps more than you imagined.

The Poor Banker

October 2014– “Fam, you might as well just cop it, you’re on some joke ting.” “Bro, one sec man… I’m tryna figure out if this even makes sense.” I was looking at a finance agreement for the first time. A few months into my first job at an investment bank and I was ready to blow half my pay check on a car fresh off the show room floor. I was whole heartedly embracing my street ni**a dream of pulling up to every motive in the new plate whip and stealing someone’s girl. But even then, I still had the feeling I was making the wrong decision…

“What do you mean ‘make sense’ bro? The whip is mad, cuz! Did you not feel that test drive? This car is moving! Plus, you got the all leather interior and the colour is sick – you need to cop it still.” It was the finest sales pitch South London could offer. I felt the stares of both my overexcited bredrin and the actual sales manager, as I leafed through the document. I liked the car a lot, which was the main issue. I was on a crash course to spending a lot of money on it and I knew it… “All right”, I nodded to the sales manager. “I’ll take it, just let me know the final amount I have to pay per month.” “I’ll be right back!” The manager scuttled away with a grin, knowing the two youths who’d come to the show room had let their ego and hood dreams get the better of them. “Ay, do you think they’ll let you drive it away today? There’s a motive later we could pull up at.” My friend and I debated for a bit whilst the sales manager got the paperwork together.

As the sales guy walked back to the desk, his facial expression was not one I had anticipated. “I’m afraid the credit check didn’t come back as expected.” My boy and I looked at each other in shock before looking back at the manager. “So, what, I can’t buy it anymore?” I asked, my dream slipping away from me. “Absolutely you can,” the sales manager hastily replied. “It just means you’ll need to stretch your budget a bit more. We have alternative lenders that will happily take you on, but it does come at an extra cost though. I’ve already printed an updated quote here, have a look.” I grabbed the agreement and looked at the ‘updated’ numbers. My boy must have seen the look on my face because he leant in and had a look for himself. “What? An extra £90 a month, that’s light! You got that my guy.” I had a think before finally realising, that none of it made sense any longer; the numbers didn’t add up and I could barely justify it to begin with…

One Week Later– “Thanks again PB! We really appreciate you choosing us for your new car.” The sales manager looked through the open car window at me with a grin bigger than my bill. As he walked back inside the showroom, I started the car and set off, primarily ready to steal someone’s girl, but with the niggling thought that I was the one that had just been taken for a spin around the block…

Today– It took me three and a half years of paying off a car deal I knew I got shafted on to realise that I had to make some changes in my life. Now I’ve already used this platform to talk about financial security, so this is going to be a little different. This is going to be about an epidemic that’s sweeping through our communities. A condition that seizes the hearts and minds of millennials everywhere and threatens their very sanity. It’s called Designer Poverty. Now as a recovering individual of the condition, I’ll run you through the symptoms and how to spot victims of this affliction.

The first and major symptom is the victim’s willingness to subscribe to the mantra “image gang over everything”. Image gang are a select group of people who prioritise how they look and come across to the rest of the world over everything else. Image for some young people is more important than eating food; it’s more important than drinking water. Image gang is the essence of many young people’s lives and the thought of them getting anything less than 500 likes for an Instagram post preys on them endlessly. The problem with image gang is inherent in the name. The motivation of the movement is surface level, superficial and often expensive to fund. This has two main consequences. The first is that they perpetuate poor ideas about what it means to do well, be successful and live a happy life by suggesting: “If you don’t look and come across a certain way, you’re done out here.” The second is that it means that young people make poor financial decisions trying to chase the next trend, piece of clothing, car or piece of jewellery, and because fads are ever changing, young people continue making the same bad decisions. It ruins personal credit and produces a real headwind against building wealth.

Another symptom of Designer Poverty is how stubbornly resistant it is to basic, common sense. This is recognisable in the pattern of behaviour I described in my story. Everything pointed toward the purchase of the car being a bad decision. I knew I could live without it, and I knew I needed to save for my own place; I also knew that it was too expensive, but by some miracle, I managed to cook up an argument against all of that. What’s probably more frustrating is that this resistance to common sense is now justified by many young people as “living your best life”, “yolo”, and “fuck it bro”. It’s now a celebrated cocktail of short-termism, a lack of regard for consequences and an aggressive pursuit of recognition. This pattern of behaviour is key in being able to rationalise a Designer Poverty lifestyle to one’s self when fundamentally it makes little sense.

One last big issue with Designer Poverty is how it often feels like it specifically targets the black community. It feels a shame to say it, but urban culture, despite its huge contemporary success can at times be quite toxic. The level of competition between young, black people (specifically males) is something I have never witnessed with any other race. The willingness to outdo your peers at seemingly whatever cost has surely contributed to some of the crime we see in urban communities. Designer Poverty feeds into this struggle, young men buying jewels as big as their fists to take back to their mum’s council flats. I see black youths spending a third of their income on clothes just to wear their new clothes to the shops. This partly comes from the fact that the majority of the public figures and role models for young, black people are in sports and entertainment, which are inherently flashy, image driven and all about the shine.

Now we all know prevention is better than remediation and being a recovering sufferer myself, I feel I’m well placed to advise on how I eventually found myself in a better place. Whilst finance certainly has its considerable share of big, ostentatious bankers who are all about the image and up to their eyeballs in the facade, it’s the place I learnt about how money and life works. I realised quickly that if I really wanted a comfortable life, I needed to adopt better money management. The second thing I had to do was stop trying to please myself and everyone else in the present in order to get my life right for the future. I deleted most of my social media accounts, withdrew into myself a bit and took a long, retrospective look at what I was prioritising. I realised that many of my decisions had been based on wanting immediate gratification based on mostly external factors as opposed to my spending habits being a healthy mix of stuff I was both genuinely into and able to afford. There was also a huge sense of freedom I got from not chasing trends; I was able to take life at my own pace and be my own genuine person without feeling I had to catch up to others or look like the next rich, black guy – I attained some semblance of peace by living a low key life.

On the whole, going through my Designer Poverty phase was necessary for me to realise that whilst external validation feels nice in the moment, self-validation and taking life at my own pace is far more enjoyable in the long run.

The Poor Banker