“Hot desking for all? HSBC scraps its executive floor”

Apr 20, 2021 | Companies

Tags: Executive floor, Hot-desking, HSBC

If you’ve ever had the misfortune to be what used to be referred to as ‘office fodder’, you’ll know how it works: open-plan hot-desking is fine for you, I need my own space as I have to concentrate, he’s very important so has his own lift. The class and feudal system lives on in all but name. Scrapping the executive floor is a start, but there’s a lot of human nature to change to make it really work. Did shooting the Czar make all Russians equal? I don’t think so.

“Amazon invades financial services with home insurance launch”

Oct 25, 2022 | Companies

Amazon, like Musk, and Branson before them both, can afford to try lots of stuff and fail at some.

“Natwest and trio of private equity firms vie for Quilter”

Aug 2, 2022 | Companies

In the 80s and 90s, banks and building societies bought life insurance, pension companies and fund managers, took on lots of financial advisers and sold financial products by the bucket-load, by means both fair and foul, to their customers.

“Nutmeg losses climb 28% after JPMorgan takeover”

Jun 30, 2022 | Companies

If you’re offering cheap, online investment advice, you need volume to make it profitable. To get volume (ie lots of money), you need marketing (to get lots of people to log in and give you money). And that costs, particularly, as will inevitably be the case, most of...