By Rebecca Ungarino

Anxieties were already running high inside JPMorgan Chase last month, days after top leadership announced that employees would soon be required to work in-office full-time, when an executive found himself responding to a question about another contentious issue at the bank.

An employee at a consumer-banking town hall in mid-January had asked Rohan Amin, the chief product officer of Chase, about the small salary bumps many workers had received -- amid record profits of nearly $60 billion in 2024. Amin responded by saying that higher profits don't necessarily translate to higher compensation.

The exchange captured one of the tensions bubbling inside the firm. Employees have complained about the growing disconnect between the bank's strong performance and pay, the five-day in-office requirement set to go into effect on Monday, a series of layoffs, uncertainty over the state of hiring, and confusion over recent comments made by JPMorgan Chief Executive Jamie Dimon.

JPMorgan would seem an unlikely candidate for such internal turmoil. On the heels of record revenue and net income -- for the seventh- and second-straight year, respectively -- JPMorgan's stock has hit 10 fresh records in 2025. It commands a premium valuation over Citigroup, Wells Fargo, and Bank of America. Dimon's board gave him a raise of about 8% in 2024, to $39 million, reflecting those results.

Interviews with 20 current and recently exited JPMorgan employees across business lines and seniority levels, along with company documents, employee termination agreements, and recordings of internal meetings reviewed by Barron's show employees grappling with poor morale and disillusionment with top leadership within America's largest bank. Leaked audio recordings of remarks by Dimon during a separate company town-hall earlier in February in Ohio have added to confusion in JPMorgan's ranks, including over the bank's hiring strategy and how committed the company is to its diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts.

"We're not perfect, and we always welcome feedback on ways we can be better," a JPMorgan spokesperson said. "We constantly strengthen and change policies and programs when appropriate, as we do across all of our activities."

Dimon is the face of the firm he has run since the end of 2005, drawing a mix of adoration, anger, and ambivalence. He has plenty of fans. An employee who served in the military and who lined up to ask a question during Dimon's visit to Columbus, Ohio in February thanked him for supporting the veteran community. Another employee, in her question to Dimon, expressed gratitude for the opportunities she has found working at the bank.

Other employees question some of the bank's recent decisions. The return-to-office requirement, for instance, helped spur the launch of unionization efforts. In interviews with Barron's, a frequent refrain from employees is that they aren't sure what problem the return-to-office push is aiming to solve. Some felt Dimon's recent remarks about working remotely -- "don't give me this s -- that work-from-home-Friday works" -- and bloated, useless bureaucracy -- "I can't stand it anymore" -- seemed to convey a sense of mistrust in his employees.

"There is almost a feeling of betrayal," an employee said of the mood among colleagues in his office. "People are like, 'Well, if I have to go in five days a week, I'm going to clock in and clock out, 9 to 5.' That sense of 'Oh, I want to go the extra mile,' is weakened."

Several people said in interviews that they found recent raises of 1% and 2% insulting -- "talk about a slap in the face," one of the people said -- after JPMorgan posted another quarter of strong returns. That frustration was magnified in early February when the bank initiated a round of layoffs with plans for additional cuts in mid-March, May, June, August, and September, Barron's previously reported. The firm cut up to about 1,000 positions in February -- the firm had some 317,000 employees as of December after it added some 7,300 employees in 2023 -- and it was unclear how many employees in total would lose their jobs this year.

That has placed employees on edge. A letter to one person terminated as part of the February layoff said in its boilerplate language: "Due to changes in our business, our staffing needs have changed." The employee, a software engineer, says he still doesn't know why exactly he lost his job. His boss didn't offer answers when asked for a rationale in his brief video-call firing, according to a recording heard by Barron's.

The February cuts were "part of our regular management of the business," a JPMorgan spokesperson said, adding that the bank's strategy is unchanged and that it is working to redeploy impacted workers. Eligible employees may also pursue open jobs at the firm while career-assistance services are available, said the employee's notice, which was reviewed by Barron's.

JPMorgan's recruitment strategy also remains unclear to some employees. Though the bank says it continues to hire in different areas and has some 14,000 open positions, Dimon caused confusion when he addressed a hiring pause at the same town-hall meeting in Ohio on Feb. 12. Dimon's remarks at the town-hall were first published by Reuters and Barron's .

After one employee asked whether the firm would recruit more within or outside the U.S. once it picks up hiring, Dimon said: "Can I just go to this hiring freeze -- do you all know about it?" before saying he "should have sent a note out." After explaining that it wasn't done out of anger, and only a "little bit" because of the return to the office issue, he said that it was because in the last four years the company had increased its workforce by 50,000 people. A week later, staff at an asset- and wealth management town-hall meeting weren't sure how to square Dimon's messaging with talk of ramped-up hiring by their division's leadership.

"That makes ZERO sense," one person in the meeting texted a group chat of colleagues, pointing out Dimon's remarks about a freeze. Crying-laughing and 100% emoji reactions followed, screenshots viewed by Barron's showed. A spokesperson had later corrected Dimon's remarks: "Regarding the comments on the hiring freeze, he was referring to working to keep head count flat, not a freeze."

The direction of JPMorgan's yearslong efforts to promote diversity, equity, and inclusion internally and in its business activities has become another point of confusion. Major employers such as Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, and Amazon have backpedaled on some diversity initiatives since the Trump administration's January executive order encouraged the private sector to end diversity-focused initiatives.

In February, JPMorgan dropped all but one mention of "diversity, equity, and inclusion" from its annual report. In a statement, the JPMorgan spokesperson said: "We strictly adhere to the law and prohibit discrimination of any kind. Our hiring is merit-based." The spokesperson added that the bank regularly reviews its policies and programs and changes them as needed, including in the aftermath of the Supreme Court's decision in 2023 to roll back race-based affirmative action in higher education.

Employees want clarity. Brad Baumoel, a longtime executive who oversees JPMorgan's Office of LGBTQ+ Affairs and serves as a global lead for diversity programs, is scheduled to meet with members of the firm's LGBTQ+ employee-resource group to discuss the bank's efforts and answer questions, people familiar with the matter said.

"We reach out to veterans, and disabled, and Second Chance, we'll continue our outreach. I just came from the community branch, Northern Lights, the Black community, Hispanic community, the LGBT community, we'll defend their rights and capabilities," Dimon said during the Ohio town hall. "And we want to lift up society."

The CEO's comments have also prompted questions. He said during the town hall, according to recordings heard by Barron's, that the bank would "probably have to" change the name of Advancing Black Pathways to Advancing Pathways. The group's website says it was formed in 2019 to "strengthen economic foundations and address systemic obstacles within Black communities." Dimon added the firm would probably not "have to change the name of Entrepreneurs of Color Fund, because everyone's got a color." He was referring to a program specifically meant for backing minority-owned businesses. A spokesperson declined to comment on whether either name would change.

Dimon also offered criticisms. "There are a couple of examples, by the way, and this has nothing to do with President Trump becoming president, that -- I saw how we're spending money on some of this stupid s -- , and it really pissed me off, okay," he said. "So you're going to see some of the things, I'm just going to cancel them...I don't like wasting money and bureaucracy." Dimon later expanded on those remarks in an interview on CNBC, where he said the firm could reassess certain diversity-related workplace trainings, meetings, and outside consultants.

Some employees agree their time is being wasted. During the recent asset- and wealth management division town hall, an employee asked the executives leading the meeting what the most important skill was for an employee to have. Storytelling, executives responded. Some employees later remarked on the exchange in a private group chat with colleagues, according to screenshots of the conversation.

"They're basically admitting that spinning narratives is their strongest suit," one of the people in the group wrote. "Just keeping up appearances while employees get squeezed."

Write to Rebecca Ungarino at rebecca.ungarino@barrons.com

This content was created by Barron's, which is operated by Dow Jones & Co. Barron's is published independently from Dow Jones Newswires and The Wall Street Journal.

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February 28, 2025 15:37 ET (20:37 GMT)

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