There are numerous awards in the financial industry for strong performance and market leading developments and they are followed with a great deal of interest. This is not to dissimilar to the entertainment industry where awards are so common it is hard to keep up to date with them all.
One key differentiator between the types of awards between these two industries is that in the financial industry there are (to my knowledge) no awards for the worst performance.
Annual award night for the worst financial models
The financial modelling industry really needs some officially bad models to use as warning examples to junior modelers just joining the industry. At present most people are afraid of sticking their head out by saying that such and such build really bad models as it is not a very nice thing to say. It would be SO refreshing to hear this discussion in a bank negotiation:
“Did you hear that MegaBank won the award for the worst model of the year?”
“I am not surprised! They have never had any in-house capability for financial modelling and I am happy that this knowledge is now made public.”
The prize for the overall award - the worst financial model of the year - should be a hefty amount of money so that the person who built the model simply retires straight away without any intention of transferring his/her knowledge to someone else.
Special awards for particularly bad financial modelling
- The longest Excel formula
- The most confusing summary sheet
- The largest number of named ranges (I know who would win this one….)
- The longest recorded VBA macro
- The worst colour scheme
- The most incorrect model
- The biggest balance-sheet imbalance
Award night 2009 - send your nomination!
If no one else volunteers to host this event for 2009, I will do what I can to get this going.
Nominations anyone?
Andy: Ha ha, classic!
I was expecting the classic
Maybe we could start off with
Hi Patrick, Eusprig 2010
If no one else volunteers to
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