Who would give an ex-banker a job?

"In the City it is long hours and high pressure and I was a mother of three who wanted to spend more time with my family so when they were looking to make redundancies I volunteered," she says. "I still wanted a rewarding career - not more rewarding financially, but in terms of satisfaction. The difficult thing about moving to the third sector is you do not have the same type of back up you have at an American investment bank. But I still have links to a large commercial company, because we deliver our government contract with Ingeus. I now feel I can add more value and I can see when I make a difference.

"I also have a lot more freedom and you cannot beat the sense of achievement when you know you've helped to change someone's life for the better.

"I oversee 10 offices, with 80 staff who are currently working with 5,000 long-term unemployed people. Also, it is not as well paid. I took a 50 per cent pay cut, but my living costs are less as I moved out of London.

"I found that the skills I brought from banking are crucial in my job and I've met at least five former bankers who have also moved into welfare-to-work because the skills are so transferrable. I don't know anyone who has left the city who is unemployed.

"Sometimes they have to move sector but they all find good jobs."

I work for a financial consultancy
Louise Courtman, 33, is another ex-banker who has used experience gained in the City to take her career on a different path. Now an associate partner at financial consultancy Crossbridge, she worked at Goldman Sachs for nine years and left at the height of the financial crisis.

"I was not made redundant but the cutbacks changed the working environment and I was not sure I could use all my skills in the way I wanted to," she says. "I was working on projects enhancing processes and systems in the middle office where I was an analyst and Goldman was cutting back on these. So I started to look around to where next.

That led me to consulting. I took the matter into my own hands and resigned in 2009.

"People do attach a lot of value to the name Goldman on your CV and think you have something about you. I wanted to be involved in a smaller firm where I could add value, use my skills, and take on more responsibility.

"So I looked at niche consultancy firms, rather than the Big Four, where I could work in the same industry just in a different capacity and fast track more quickly, going to a level that was much higher.

"I still work in finance but now work for a range of clients across the City on projects mostly in the operations, risk and the control space helping them on change programmes. But I also run some client accounts, work on marketing and even events and PR.

"The biggest difference is that Crossbridge is more entrepreneurial and by making the move I could leverage all my skills and use them in a way that I feel more valued.

"I did not have to take a hit in pay. My knowledge is valued so I actually am better rewarded now.
"Most other people I know who have been redundant or left jobs in the City are already re-employed too."

The Recruiter's perspective
Peter Istead, managing director of Michael Page Finance, says: "We only deal with the professional end of this market and find that highly-paid and highly specialised front-office bankers nearly always find another financial institution that will want them.

"The next tier of City staff - those working in support, the middle and back office - and in roles such as accounting, HR, IT, administration and project management have more transferrable skills that can be used in the commercial world but they will be competing against those with sector or product experience. Financial institutions tend to take the best graduates, so we would expect these good people to find good opportunities. But they still need to fit culturally."

Andy Dallas, associate director of Robert Half, says: "Despite the general jobs market, there are still opportunities for good people. Three in four chief finance officers in financial services say they plan to increase their headcounts, according to our latest Robert Half Professional Hiring Index, and a number of companies have expended the
profit-making areas of their businesses. With all the new regulations coming into force, we have seen a demand for internal audit and regulatory accounting specialists. As financial services recruiters want candidates to have prior experience in the City, we are able to find skilled finance professionals new opportunities."