Antonio Risso

What did you do before joining Barclays Wealth?
Before joining Barclays Wealth I was reading for my MBA Degree for two years here in London and before that I was an Investment Banker working for an Investment Bank in Lima in Peru, South America.

Did you do an internship before joining?
I did an internship with American Express in the finance department.

Why did you join Barclays Wealth?
I decided to join Barclays Wealth after attending a recruitment event from the bank last year. I was impressed by the people I met at the presentation and also I was impressed by the strategic goals that the private bank had for the future. At that time the Barclays Wealth brand was all over the media and the bank was investing very heavily in developing the private bank. Also they were recruiting top professionals from everywhere and they were investing very heavily in developing successfully the private bank. All of these represented very good opportunities for people looking to go into the private banking world. 

What have you been doing since you joined?
I joined Barclays Wealth in September last year. When I joined the bank I went straight into the Embark programme which is a programme that aims to give all the new hirers the basic tools to perform successfully in their new roles. So I went for two months to this programme and after that I was assigned to the Iberia team in the private bank. The Iberia team covers all south of Europe and in your first six months with the you will work very closely with senior private bankers and you will learn as much as you can about procedures in the bank, about the different products that we offer to the clients and you will learn about the systems and knowing who’s who in the bank which is one of the key things when you join such a big corporation.

What support and training have you received?
The support and training that you will receive from the bank is amazing from an eight week embark programme to ‘lunch and learn’ sessions every single week on investment products. It is simply really amazing. The aim of all this training is to make you feel more comfortable as a private banker and the bank is really behind you to provide you with all you need to be more comfortable in that role.

Can you describe what your current role entails?
My current role involves a lot of different activities which can be summarised in the following: provide a top notch service to our clients and deliver results for the business. My main role is to build a book of clients, of high network clients, and provide them with investment advice and banking services. In doing this you will need to interact with people in the Investment and Product office to give the advice to your clients and you will need to interact with the back office to provide the banking services that your client requires.

Typically, what other areas of the business might you work with?
You will work closely with the people in the Investment and Product Office. They have the technical knowledge to answer most of our clients doubts. They usually help us to prepare the investment proposals we put together for our clients and we need to go back to them to answer any technical questions our clients have so we have to stay in touch with them very often. Another area of the business that we work very closely with is the people in Wealth International. As clients in Wealth International reach £500,000, they are potential targets for the international bank so we migrate those clients from Wealth International to the private bank so we have to be in touch with the relationship managers of Wealth International as well.

What qualities do you need to work here?
There is no doubt you need to have very strong analytical skills to understand and explain to our clients the products we have. You will also require very strong interpersonal skills to engage with clients and start building a successful book for the bank. Also, you might need an entrepreneurial spirit as things keep changing in the bank constantly. Because we keep updating our processing system you need to catch up with the new technology and with the new process and you need to have the spirit to keep up with the pace.

What’s it like working here?
The experience has been amazing. If you have strong analytical skills and you love working in the financial markets like I do then you have the best job you could ever want. If you add to that an amazing group of people working together then you have your dream job. What I like most about Barclays Wealth are the people. There is an incredible, amazing vareity of people working together. On a single day you can hear people around you speaking seven different languages. It only happens at Barclays.

Why should someone come and work at Barclays Wealth?
If you want to join a flexible organisation with an amazing group of people, where your own initiative is taken into consideration and will be encouraged by the senior management, then you should definitely come to Barclays.

What excites you about your future here?
What excites me about my future here are the opportunities available for anyone who wants to pursue a successful career in private banking. You will have the support of the senior staff on your way and the sky’s the limit here.