At some point in your career, you’ll likely decide that you need to move on from your current role in order to continue progressing. At that stage, one of the key questions you’ll need to answer is whether to remain with your current employer or look for opportunities with another organisation.

There are many factors to consider when making this decision. Drawing on my experience both as a Headhunter and Career Coach, this short blog highlights highlight some of the key considerations that may help you make the right choice.

At some point in your career, you’ll likely decide that you need to move on from your current role in order to continue progressing. At that stage, one of the key questions you’ll need to answer is whether to remain with your current employer or look for opportunities with another organisation.

There are many factors to consider when making this decision. Drawing on my experience both as a Headhunter and Career Coach, this short blog highlights highlight some of the key considerations that may help you make the right choice.

If you’re a regular here, you’ll know that we advocate having a clear checklist of the things that you’re looking for as you launch your job search. You know that you need to due your due diligence. That said, it’s just worth pausing before accepting any job offer to review the most basic requirements. 

Some of the most technically capable finance professionals walk out of interviews wondering what went wrong. They have the qualifications, the track record, and the expertise, yet they fail to secure the role. The assumption is often that another candidate was simply "better". In reality, that’s rarely the full story. Interview performance is a skill in itself, and success depends on far more than having an impressive CV. Understanding the real reasons why some interviews go off track can transform the way you approach your next opportunity.

For many Financial Services professionals, joining a globally recognised brand at one of the top five banks means that you’ve made it. The prestige that you’re now a part of must be almost overwhelming, and whilst there are so many great things about it, there are some downsides as well.

Better the devil you know, right? No, not right - or at least not always. One piece of feedback I hear from my coaching clients time and again is, “I wish I hadn’t waited for so long” and “I wish I had started sooner.” Quite often, the creeping realisation that all is not well at work isn’t addressed but is consciously ignored, hoping it’ll get better. This is despite plenty of warning signs.

Financial services has always rewarded intelligence, hard work, and technical expertise. Yet today, those qualities aren’t enough to guarantee long-term career success. Markets evolve quickly, technology reshapes roles seemingly overnight, and client expectations continually shift and change. In this highly dynamic landscape, it’s not necessarily the professionals who are the best qualified who thrive; more often, it’s those who are adaptable and proactive. Career optimisation is no longer about waiting for your turn or hoping that opportunities will somehow land in your lap.

Resigning from your current job is a big moment in your career - it’s important to get it right. Emotions are high. Getting and accepting an offer from another firm is flattering and exciting. At the same time, actually going into your boss’s office and resigning may fill you with dread. So, as you consider accepting the offer and before you resign, there are some things that are well worth considering. In doing so, I’ll be drawing on my decades as an Executive Search Consultant, where I helped dozens of candidate go through this process.

Some of the best career moves don’t start with a job application - they begin long before that, in the day-to-day relationship built between a supplier and a client. These relationships are developed over an extended period of time, based on mutual respect, trust, and need.

Here’s a hard truth: the moment a hiring team realises they ‘have’ you, your perceived value as a candidate can quietly drop. Having spent 22 years in Financial Services executive search, and now working as a Career Coach, I know there’s a fine balance between appearing too easily ‘sold’ and not showing enough enthusiasm. Understanding that balance—and how to achieve it—is what we’ll explore in this short blog.

If your job search feels slower, harder, more frustrating, and unpredictable, you’re not imagining it. The job market for Financial Services professionals in 2026 has been tough so far.

In this short read, we will explore why that is—and what you can do about it.

Most senior professionals in Financial Services don’t struggle because they lack experience — they struggle because they approach their job search without a clear strategy.

In a market where roles are often filled through networks, timing, and perception, a reactive approach is rarely enough. The most successful candidates treat their job search like a strategic process — focused, deliberate, and continuously refined.

Signs that it’s time for a change may be big and obvious, such as being made redundant or having to cope with toxic colleagues. Equally, the signs may be more subtle—perhaps a creeping awareness that the ground is shifting, or that you yourself are changing and that it’s time to think deeply and consider your career options.

Recently, I watched the Rally championships taking place in Sweden. It struck me just how vital the navigator is for the driver as they race at great speeds over treacherous snow and ice. The navigator’s role is to call out the road ahead before they reach it. Anticipation of what is coming is vital.

We all know the cliché that a high percentage of New Year’s resolutions fail within a short period of time. Building on that, many ambitious and optimistic goals set at the beginning of the year are missed or forgotten as life gets busy and immediate, urgent tasks take priority. In an effort to reduce feelings of overwhelm, those well-intentioned goals are pushed back, put on hold, and rescheduled for a “better time” that never quite arrives.

Bonus season can stir all sorts of emotions for financial services professionals. It’s useful to unpack these feelings in a way that equips you for the future of your career. It’s all too easy to read false conclusions or assumptions into the numbers — and that thinking can lead you astray. Successful professionals do not confuse this year’s rewards with long-term career prospects.

Recruiters are often making decisions about you before they’ve even met you. They rely on your CV to decide whether they should invest time in exploring if you could be a viable candidate. If you’re embarking on a job search in 2026 and your CV isn’t up to scratch, you may be rejected before you’ve even said a word.

The good news is that there are some basic principles and rules which, if followed, can significantly improve your chances of being invited to interview. Some of the ideas below will help you turn your CV into a compelling career story that showcases you in the best possible way.

This is a very common question asked, and the way in which you answer it is likely to have a significant impact on the outcome of the job interview. The interviewer will be asking this question to test a variety of things, and given that you can anticipate that it will come up, it’s not a bad idea to prepare for it.

In this short read, we’ll discuss why this question is asked, what the key points are to include in your answer, and some common mistakes to avoid.

When job hunting, many Financial Services professionals focus on sensible things, such as brand name, job title, remuneration, the role itself and perhaps the culture of an organisation that they’d want to join. Those criteria will shape their whole job search campaign. But, perhaps they’re missing a much-overlooked and potentially game-changing component: their future boss. After all, it may be no exaggeration to say that perhaps the biggest influence on the success of your career is the boss that you work for.

Dare I say it’s already that time of year, when there’s a great deal of entertaining, parties to attend, and people to meet. I once knew someone in Financial Services who had such an incredible way with people at social events that it felt like watching a master craftsman at work. He had an enthusiastic energy, was engaged and authentic, showed genuine interest in everyone he spoke to, and had an uncanny ability to strike exactly the right note in conversation. It’s no surprise that he went on to have a very successful career.