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| Golden Handcuffs: The Lowly Life of a High Flyer | 
 enlarge | Author: Polly Courtney
Publisher: Matador
Category: Book
List Price: £6.99
Buy Used: £3.46
You Save: £3.53 (51%)
New (17) from £3.59
Avg. Customer Rating:  23 reviews
Sales Rank: 33280
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 384
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.1
Dimensions (in): 8.4 x 5.4 x 1.2
ISBN: 1905886349
EAN: 9781905886340
ASIN: 1905886349
Publication Date: April 2, 2007
Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days
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| Customer Reviews: Read 18 more reviews...
Informative and Entertaining Read November 19, 2008
If you're thinking about getting a job in the city (pretend we're not in a credit crunch and the glory days still prevail) ... read this book. A well written, well researched and brutally honest portrayal of the sacrifices that are required in order to bring in the big bucks. It highlights the point that money isn't worth anything if you've got nothing else in your life. But overall it takes the shine off an industry that has been shrouded in unwarranted glamour for a long time. I'm happy to earn a normal amount and to have time to enjoy the money I earn with friends and family.
a fine read.. October 2, 2008
Polly Courtney blends in a story of a relationship at a workplace and working for an investment bank in flawless style, it is absorbing and compelling at times, and points out the inequility experienced by females at the workplace in a powerful manner that makes the reader sympathetic to their plight. Although it describes the lifestyle involved in investment banking, such as the 18 hour working days, the thankless recognition, the misery of being at the bottom of the pile, this book has a more all round edge to it than Cityboy for instance. An enjoyable and worthwhile read, i promise it will not disappoint.
Understand the First Year Analyst's Role in Life January 3, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
A very funny romp in the City with only a small bit of over the top zaniness. Are women really treated this badly? As a retired stock broker in the USA, I would say that I saw worse behaviour in the USA than what is written in this very funny book. A lot worse. Read Susan Antilla's book, "Tales from the Boom Boom Room" for a true depiction of Wall Street antics. Does a Philip Oversby really exist? As depicted in this book, Oversby is a boy scout compared with what really exists in the world of Wall Street.
Yes, a lot of the work first year City analysts do is extremely "secretarial" in nature. Mainly, this job as a first year analyst is a training ground for people who are intelligent in their own right, but are not necessarily educated in the traditional sense for a career in investment banking. In this book, Abigail Turner is Cambridge Uni educated in physics, but only trained in New York for investment banking for a couple of months. How could a person who in university only a few months earlier would not have understood an interest payment from a dividend payment be a true analyst after only a couple of months training in the summer? The answer is, they are under the "protective" (or psychologically abusive) wing of the people to whom they report. This is why in the section discussing the annual self assessment, the analyst's self assessment is considered meaningless. These first year analysts are considered to be incapable of using a Kleenex to wipe their own noses. Their bosses want them to do intellectually menial work so thay will pick up the vocabulary and gain an understanding of the business that they didn't learn at Uni. It is basically on the job training that they would have learned in Uni had they studied business and economics. This way, by hiring people with various educations, once they know how to read a financial report, they will be able to use their field of expertise to assess a company in a particular industry. For instance, with a background in chemistry or biology, a person would be able to ask the management meaningful questions about their research programs and would be better able to determine their capabilities of discovering a new pharmaceutical drug, or even a bio-tech drug (made from a live protein). An engineer would know what it takes to create a new machine. In this respect, Polly Courtney has hit the nail on the head. Spot on.
 Money is certainly not everything December 11, 2007
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
This book is very easy to read and entertaining. Not only is it extremely humorous in parts but it also conveys a real sense of the damage done to the well being of two individuals' wellbeing when they work in an environment where everything comes second place to the false god of money that modern society holds up as being so important. Everyone has to work if they want to have a half decent life but this book shows what happens when the balance part of the "work/life balance" concept is forgotten.
Very little fiction in this book November 21, 2007
I worked in the same City firm as Polly and at the same time. Reading the book was a great way to remind myself of the good and bad old times. Many of the events desctribed have a real basis and I recognised a lot of the characters as real-life people I got to know and work with. I must thank Polly for a greatly enjoyable read!
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