Hear what some of our people have to say about their roles in Premier.
Interviews:
Angela, Premier Manager
Chris, Premier Relationship Manager
Gil, Premier Relationship Manager
Jane, Premier Relationship Manager
Interview with Angela, Premier Manager
How long have you been working with HSBC?
Briefly outline your career. Where did you start? Did you progress within the Group? Which areas have you experienced? Where were you before joining HSBC? Why did you join?
I’ve been working with HSBC for nearly seven years. I came straight to the bank from college where I started as a cashier. I’ve done various roles between then and now and I’m currently a Level 3 Premier Manager, which means on a daily basis I get to manage HSBC’s Premier customers, meeting with them and just basically discussing their financial needs.
What were your preconceptions before joining?
Were they valid? What was different? What was expected?
Before I joined HSBC I just saw it as just ‘a bank’ with not that many opportunities, I didn’t really know what to expect behind the scenes. I started as a cashier and I thought, you know, there’s not that much more to go from a cashier because that’s all you see but once I’ve come to the bank there’s so many more opportunities there, so many areas that I didn’t even think that would exist, so it’s really opened my eyes to the opportunities available to me.
Most big companies offer good training, what’s so special about HSBC’s?
What kind of training have you experienced? How is this different from what you might experience elsewhere? Use examples where possible.
HSBC is really involved in making their people ‘better’. It’s what they aim to do and they’ve introduced various career paths within the premier role, which means that they’re giving me direction of where to go to, and they’re telling me what kind of training they can provide to make it ‘better’ and make it easier for me to get there. I’ve been studying, which HSBC have been funding for the past six years and they’re still funding that now as I go on to do my CFA exams (Certificate in Financial Advice) so they really are dedicated to making their people better and helping customers and the members of staff themselves.
What would you say to anyone who’s considering a career at HSBC?
What’s the one thing that really stands out for you?
For anyone considering a career at HSBC, I would say ‘Go for it!’ There’s fantastic people, there’s plenty of opportunity here. My advice to you would be if you want something, shout about it. Tell everybody what you want and, you know, you build up your network, people will help you get there. It will make an organisation like HSBC that seems so big, just seem so much smaller.
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Interview with Chris, Premier Relationship Manager
How long have you been working with HSBC?
Briefly outline your career. Where did you start? Did you progress within the Group? Which areas have you experienced? Where were you before joining HSBC? Why did you join?
I’ve been with HSBC for three and a half years; I was brought in from university on the management trainee scheme. In that time I’ve actually been in various roles, various parts within the bank – I’ve been in retail, went into corporate banking, commercial banking and now I’m in Premier, so that’s three and a half years and its gone pretty quickly, but its been that long so far.
What are the strengths of the product range HSBC is able to offer Premier customers?
What does being ‘the world’s local bank’ actually mean on a day-to-day level? How does the scope you can offer differentiate you from the competitors? How does this benefit you personally?
Premier customers benefit from a number of products in different areas, products and service as well. We’ve recently just launched Premier Globally, so it actually offers a whole range of items, products, services for each individual Premier customer. These range from having travel insurance and identity-theft assistance to preferential rates on mortgages/savings, so really whichever area you’re after we can give that help and advice. When I say advice, there’s also the independent financial advice which is there for any Premier customer no matter what they want to discuss, whether its things from inheritance tax to capital gains tax or even just if they’ve got £50,000 and want to know where best to put it. There’s also various areas that you could speak to, so for any query, whatever that may be, there’s always someone on hand but it’s my role as a Premier Relationship Manager to actually guide them to that individual or service or product that would best suit their needs.
If you had to sum up the qualities that you need to be successful at HSBC, in just three words, what would they be?
Please elaborate on these qualities.
Three qualities to be successful? First of all ‘ambition’. You need to have ambition in your role, as in you need to look to see what you can do to make that role good, to be successful at, but also ambition to actually drive on to that next level that you’d like to attain. Second one is ‘proactivity’. Constantly in the role you need to be proactive in what you do. You need to look for opportunities, contact customers – whether that may be a customer that you’ve never spoken to before, but be prepared just to actually call them, pick up the phone. And the third one would be ‘flexibility’. The bank’s constantly changing, as are the roles and bits within the role as well. So when that does get introduced, you need to be ready to take it on board and actually work with it rather than be fearful of what that change may be.
What would you say to anyone who’s considering a career at HSBC?
What’s the one thing that really stands out for you?
If someone’s considering a career at HSBC, I would say ‘Go for it!’ I did exactly the same. When I left university I didn’t know where I wanted to go, what I wanted to do. I studied languages so it was a completely different field to what I’m doing now and I really enjoy it, I really enjoy the job I’m doing now and I’ve enjoyed my three and a half years to date as well. If you are considering it as an option, you’re not really sure, come in and speak to us, there’s people there. For myself, I’ve had people come up to me and say, you know, "I’m looking, I’m interested, what do you think?" – look into it, go further, it’s a very good career to get into and for me the bank have treated me well, they treated me well as a student so as an employee as well – exactly the same. I haven’t got any complaints with them and for anyone who is considering it I’d say, "Go for it!"
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Interview with Gil, Premier Relationship Manager
What were your preconceptions before joining?
Were they valid? What was different? What was expected?
My preconceptions about joining HSBC were very much that I’d be tied to a desk, kind of all day doing the same kind of ‘same old, same old’ and that my career would progress quite slowly, I’d have to do, spend a considerable amount of time in one place before moving on to the next. I was delighted to have been proven wrong with HSBC on both accounts. Actually I’m not tied to my desk at all, I’m hardly ever in the office, always about meeting customers and travelling around, which is just fantastic, I love that, and also my career’s progressed quite quickly. If you work hard and deliver for your line manager, your career will progress, it’s really up to you with HSBC.
What are the strengths of the product range HSBC is able to offer Premier customers?
What does being ‘the world’s local bank’ actually mean on a day-to-day level? How does the scope you can offer differentiate you from the competitors? How does this benefit you personally?
The strengths of the product range we offer our Premier customers really lies in the diversity of the products. No two customers are the same and we appreciate that and with that in mind we have a wide range of products so we can choose the right one for the right customer. In Premier we take that extra time to get to know our customers over a long time and to make the right recommendation for them. For example, I’ve got one customer who needed money to refurbish a house, but preferred to have a kind of structured repayment process, so we chose a personal loan. As opposed to my other customer who kind of needed to dip in and out of the money, we chose a more flexible approach with a flexi loan, where the money can be used again. And it’s this kind of individual touch that we think our customers really appreciate.
If you had to sum up the qualities that you need to be successful at HSBC, in just three words, what would they be?
Please elaborate on these qualities.
Three qualities to be successful with HSBC? I would say the first is ‘positivity’. You’re going to have good days, you’re going to have bad days, what’s really important is how you react to the bad days. Nothing’s more demoralising than a bad day – stay positive, forget what happened, the next day start afresh, move on. ‘Drive’ I also think is very important with HSBC. It’s that thing that keeps you going when things are going bad, so in that situation you know what you want, stay focused on what’s important, and keep going. And ‘adaptability’ – HSBC’s a global organistaion, things are always changing, products are changing, training is changing, you need to be adaptable to cope with that, but also to help your job prospects going forwards.
What lies ahead for HSBC’s Premier team? And for you?
What are your ambitions for the next couple of years? How will HSBC help you achieve them? Biggest challenges? Biggest opportunities?
What lies ahead for the Premier team? Premier’s just gone global. I can really see the Premier teams across the world really working together, to deliver exceptional customer service, wherever the customer is. As for myself, having just taken over a new portfolio, I’m really excited about getting to know all the customers in my portfolios as individuals and really building on the relationships that my predecessor left behind. I’m also very enthusiastic about finishing my qualifications to attain regulated status, to allow me to advise customers on investment products and mortgages as well as the franchise summary on, to really give me a holistic relationship management of my customers.
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Interview with Jane, Premier Relationship Manager
How long have you been working with HSBC?
Briefly outline your career. Where did you start? Did you progress within the Group? Which areas have you experienced?
Where were you before joining HSBC? Why did you join? I’ve been working for HSBC now for the past seven months, previous to that I was an area manager for a cosmetics company. I enjoyed the customer-facing role within the retail industry and so I’d really like to do something that within another sector, so I thought that the bank would be a really good opportunity for me to do that.
What are the strengths of the product range HSBC is able to offer Premier customers?
What does being ‘the world’s local bank’ actually mean on a day-to-day level? How does the scope you can offer differentiate you from the competitors? How does this benefit you personally?
The bank offers a fantastic service for our Premier customers. Not only do we have the choice now of the credit card which gives them access globally to their accounts, but we also have a relationship manager like myself that can deal with the customers on a day-to-day basis within the branch and any needs that they may have if they are going overseas.
Most big companies offer good training, what’s so special about HSBC’s?
What kind of training have you experienced? How is this different from what you might experience elsewhere? Use examples where possible.
Within HSBC Premier we have a very good training programme. You get your initial training within the branch when you join, and then we have a fantastic opportunity to go and do a Premier foundation course where you spend a week training that gives you all the information that you need to be able to fulfil your role as a Premier Manager. As you develop through that as well there’s also an opportunity to do an intermediate course as well, which allows you to go a bit more in depth into your portfolio.
What lies ahead for HSBC’s Premier team? And for you?
What are your ambitions for the next couple of years? How will HSBC help you achieve them? Biggest challenges? Biggest opportunities?
What lies ahead within the world of HSBC and the Premier team is the fact that we now have a structure in place so that you are able to start off at Level 1 with no portfolio and no customers to look after, right up to a Level 4 where you’ll be a qualified independent financial advisor.
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