The 'dealing room' is to many people what the financial markets are all about. A noisy, pressure-filled place where only a 'certain' type of person can survive and, until comparatively recently, that meant mean, confident, strong-willed, young, men mis-behaving!

This kind of image and generalization is, not surprisingly, far off the mark. Yes, there are many young, arrogant and noisy dealers, but that is hardly unique to financial markets, and the antics of certain professional footballers and offspring of the famous spring to mind. Certainly, some dealers are known to 'relax' by playing hard in the clubs and bars but then the demands of their particular job requires a release of the pressure to perform aggressively and successfully for many hours. Equally, in the heat of the moment as the success of the deal varies, an outpouring of emotion is hardly surprising. OK so the language may be bad and the humour often tasteless to the 'average' person, but then if you cannot handle that you shouldn't be on the dealing floor or, for that matter in a job, which means you potentially come into contact with that kind of environment. In any case, not all dealers or dealing rooms possess these characteristics. Many are full of decent hard-working and pleasant men and women doing their job and having good and bad days at the office, exactly the same as the operations teams in the middle and back offices!

Of course, to those who have to liaise with the dealers...