Career ..!?

I have started to reach a mid-life crisis in terms of my career. After having spent +12 years in the financial industry I wonder if it gets any better ..? Better in what, you may ask. Better position on the career ladder, better company, better, better? I currently am VP of Enterprise Architecture in a sizable investment house, AUM = +€200 Billion, so bigger, better, higher is not the issue.

One just gets frustrated that we as an investment industry make it ourselves so difficult in terms of business and technology alignment not to mention regulatory requirements. I believe most investment companies could get by with half of the IT systems they actually need to do business, a green field design would compromise of fewer systems and fewer ‘core’ processes. Driven by ‘enforced’ incompatibilities (who is the leader of the standards pack?), ‘not invented here’ syndrome, and the increase of complex instruments, the industry is sliding of into managing complexity instead of doing business. Trading platforms, Algo-trading, etc will only bring so much relief by wrapping complexity behind facades … Old problems, with new faces, meaning doing the same concepts over and over again.

Is it time for a change ..? Will things eventually get better ..?