Interactive Brokers Reviews

Current Employee – been working at Interactive Brokers full-time for more than 7 years

Pros – The money is pretty good. They pay programmers very well and they pay managers very well, but everyone else is paid just okay, but you get annual bonuses and stock options. There is little or no bureaucracy, and very few meetings. This place is not bogged down in process. The non-management people who work here are very nice. The business can be interesting. If you're lucky, you get to work on interesting projects. Medical insurance premiums are paid for 100%.

Cons – You work here for the money. That's the bottom line. They pay for lunch, but not because they're nice, it's so you stay at your desk during lunch. They pay for medical benefits, which are ultimately insufficient if you have a major medical issue. You get 15 days off per year for personal, sick and vacation time, then an extra two days at five years. And you are discouraged from taking too much time off. It is for many employees, a sweat shop. The structure of the company is based on silos: each department is competing with other for the CEO's attention and favor; that is the sole motivator behind all day-to-day decisions. Only management is allowed to create projects and come up with creative solutions, in spite of their lack of real experience and training in many areas, such as software project design, marketing, user interface design, and so on. There is no career growth, no annual reviews, no promotions.

If you want to come and make money and work a lot for a few years, this can be a decent place to be. But it will not be personally or professionally satisfying in any way, and you will get cynical and burn out fairly quickly.

The CEO has surrounded himself with a bunch of long-time associates, most of whom are all from Eastern Europe like himself and have all become millionaires. If you're not in that club, you are simply a lowly employee treated disrespectfully.

Advice to Senior Management – These guys are hopeless. It all flows from the CEO's benevolent dictator management style. Until and unless he changes his personality, it will continue on this path. They really need to bring in people from other companies and allow them to challenge the status quo. And give employees better work-life balance.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at Interactive Brokers full-time

Pros – salary is very good
free lunch
nice people around
after 2 years, work is easy and not log working hours

Cons – No career growth at al. new comers are given minimal information to barely finish projects with a lot of struggle, You can learn more about the business/technology from outside than from your group members.
You will be pigeonholed to to the same thing for ever
Communication is awkward and frustrating
Management is so obsessed with cost cutting, there is not enough head count, so evey one is drowned in maintainance work.
Eastern European employee get better treatment than others

Advice to Senior Management – speechless

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend – I'm not optimistic about the outlook for this company

Former Employee – worked at Interactive Brokers

Pros – - Opportunity to trade in foreign financial market and learn about the market practically.
- Opportunity to learn technical analysis by applying it in real situation.
- Management gave ample opportunity to prepare for real trading by trading simulation

Cons – - Only two person in the firm have real trading experience.
- Do not have a knowledgeable and experienced supervisor for new traders.
- Failed to give a proper guideline to the new trader for example: what is expected to them after the end of a day or month.

Advice to Senior Management – - Should appoint a supervisor who have real trading experience.
- Should have more trading style in the firm to accommodate different people with different qualification. For example: A person who have proper training and motivation to trade by proper analysis should have the independence to trade coming out of the limitation of "day trading style"

Current Employee – been working at Interactive Brokers

Pros – Great salary and benefits recession proof .

Cons – No social life and team culture.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at Interactive Brokers

Pros – Free Lunch & decent bonus

Cons – No work life Balance, Consistently understaffed and overworked. Pay is not for performance.

Advice to Senior Management – Work Life Balance ever heard of it?

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at Interactive Brokers

Pros – If you perform well, you will be promoted.
Nice offices
Colleagues are friendly
modern computer equipment
free lunch is provided

Cons – You can hear a pin drop. Employer does not want employees to chat with each other in the workplace because that means that they are not working.

Advice to Senior Management – Listen to the little guy. The smallest decisions take too long to be made because they have to be approved by top management.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend