Goldman Sachs’ annual headcount-trimming ritual continued this week, and people with knowledge of the fallout said they found some of the names that have emerged surprising.
“I think some people are fantastic. I think other people are not as fantastic,” said Meridith Dennes, the managing partner of Prospect Rock Partners, a Wall Street recruiting agency. Dennes told Business Insider she received roughly a dozen calls last week from impacted personnel.
The annual culling, known internally as the Strategic Resource Assessment, is aimed at purging the firm’s bottom performers. The cuts are taking place earlier than usual and are expected to impact between 3% to 5% of Goldman’s more than 46,000-person workforce.
Dennes, as well as a former Goldman insider who’s close to the bank, said they have learned of cuts across multiple roles and divisions, including investment banking advisors handling mergers and capital markets activities. They described cuts across a range of titles, including analysts, associates, and vice presidents. (The former Goldman employee requested anonymity to speak freely about the situation.)
“This is part of our normal, annual talent management process, which we execute consistently across the firm,” said Nick Carcaterra, a spokesperson for Goldman Sachs, adding, “We don’t comment on the specifics in any given year.”
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Bouncing back after a layoff is always daunting, even for people with Goldman Sachs on their CVs. “The brand is important, but I think it’s secondary to the type of work you were doing at the organization,” Dennes said. “The No. 1 thing I am looking for in this market is closed M&A deals with experience in the full life cycle of a transaction. If you’ve closed no deals, having Goldman on your résumé is not going to help you.”
How to respond to a layoff could become increasingly important as the industry grapples with the fallout of Trump’s policy changes, which have dampened dealmaking momentum.
Three recruiters, including Dennes, walked BI through what to do if it happens to you.
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Don’t delay
The first thing to know is that your career is by no means dead in the water. Getting laid off “isn’t a death sentence, a career ender by any stretch of the imagination,” said Kevin Mahoney, a managing partner at Christoph Zeiss Partners. The key, all three recruiters urged, is not to wait indefinitely.
If you have savings, you might be tempted to take a rest and start recruiting in the fall after a summer holiday. The recruiters who spoke to BI discouraged such a decision, saying that could dull your competitive edge.
“Part of the fundamental issue is, if you take three months off and then start looking, it could take an additional six months to land,” Dennes said. “Nobody’s looking for somebody who’s been out of work, I would say, six months or longer.”
Title, pay, location
Being part of a layoff, for the most part, means swimming upstream to get back into an open seat, the recruiters said.
Caty Wilcox, a director at the recruiting firm Selby Jennings who regularly communicates with investment bankers and others across the Street, said knowing what you want will help speed up the process.
“If you’re looking to leverage your network, the more specific parameters you can give to folks in your network in terms of what you’re looking for, the better,” she said. Are you open to roles that are in different geographic locations, for example? It also helps to have pre-existing relationships with recruiters, she added.
The recruiters who spoke to BI suggested the freshly laid-off keep an open mind when it comes to jobs with lower-tier banks, a lower salary, or even a more junior title. Accepting a step down from an associate III to an associate II could help you land a seat faster.
On pay, Dennes encouraged being realistic and said candidates should avoid holding out for lavish signing bonuses or multi-year guarantees. Take advantage of this down market, the recruiters said, by showing you’re willing to accept lower compensation if necessary. Employers like to hire good talent without the premium price tag of a talent war.
‘Own your story’
In conversations with future employers, it’s essential not to conceal the layoff but to be upfront and honest about it, the recruiters emphasized. Hiring managers and headhunters are all but guaranteed to find out, and coming across as deceptive is far worse than admitting having been laid off.
“When we do our searches, we do a lot of referencing on every candidate even before we call them,” said Mahoney. “The first thing we do is we call their former group head.”
Consider being honest if you struggled to drum up original business, which could be fine at a firm that’s seeking an execution banker, not one focused on generating new inflow. The bottom line, Dennes said, is to “own your story” — sometimes you’re not the reason for the setback.
Wilcox of Selby Jennings agreed, pointing to broader systemic headwinds beyond any one candidate’s control.
“Frequently, there are wider macroeconomic factors at play. You might have been at the wrong place at the wrong time,” she concluded. “We’ve seen quite a few folks bounce back” after losing a job, she said, adding that many go on to enjoy “illustrious careers.”
Indeed, Jamie Dimon was famously pushed out of Citigroup in 1999 by his longtime boss and mentor, Sandy Weill. Now, he’s the CEO of JPMorgan Chase and widely viewed as Wall Street’s elder statesman.
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