Hiring challenges for US project finance banks

A significant number of North American project finance banks are struggling to hire at both senior and junior levels. 

The resurgence of the project finance market following the pandemic, coupled with the increase in energy transition and renewables projects to fulfil global net zero targets, has sparked expansion amongst many project finance teams. BBVA is expanding its current Americas project finance team and is actively looking to make two new hires by year-end. Credit Agricole’s project finance team of 20 also has four open seats and is looking to hire. 

The trend of post-pandemic musical chairs amongst senior roles in project finance banks continues. The great resignation has had a significant role to play in the mass shake up of senior roles, and even if pandemic pondering didn’t lead to resignation, it facilitated time for a prolonged period of reflection and re-prioritisation which goes some way to explaining the liquidity of the senior job market. Hiring is the priority, but the liquidity means that retaining new hires is challenging at best and nigh impossible at worst. There are reports from major banks of junior analysts simply not showing up for their first day at the job, having received a better offer elsewhere, as banks compete for fresh talent. The junior talent pool appears to be limited for the number of positions available, particularly as teams start to diversify their mandates and look to emerging technologies such as battery storage, carbon capture and hydrogen, where having asset-specific expertise within a team is necessary to aid the navigation of untested waters.