If you ask
Google countries with the highest unemployment rate in the world, it will
quickly point the arrow on Sub-Saharan African countries, where Nigeria ranks
one of the highest. In fact, only two days ago, President Mohamadu Buhari was
called upon to declare a state of emergency over the unemployment situation in
Nigeria. Yet the prevailing economic government policies seem not to help
matters. Let us look hence at certain state of affairs, in continuation of our
discussion on EMERGING TRENDS in the Nigerian banking sector.
To understand
where the banks are moving towards, there is need to
underscore how we got here
by looking into the past. Looking at the realities of the average banker in the
past, we realize that bankers then were conservative, prone to sitting down in
the banking hall and assist customers through the cumbersome process of
withdrawing and depositing cash. The banking population at that period
encouraged such traditional and manual process of dealing with cash in the
bank. Also the available technology then was basic, necessitating the need for
human operators. It is also safe to say that banks during that period did not
offer as many services as they do today.
A banking
revolution has however taken place since then, with the advent of the internet,
advancement in technology and the massive increase in the customer base of
banks. Automation became the key to deal with these challenges as banks began
to look at those areas that would drive motion and profit in years to come. The
banking sector has thus driven automation and the automation process is still
going on. These changes can be seen in the advent of ATM machines, mobile Apps
to aid banking activities, internet banking and a whole lot. The present day
banks are now aggressive, dynamic and automated. Banking has been taken from
the confines of the banking offices to the customer wherever they may be.
This is also
accompanied by staggering target figures for the banker, especially those in
the marketing units. It is easy to understand at this point why the average
banker is ferociously embattled and many fall in the wake of massive loss of
jobs in the sector. It also partly explains why most bankers are unhappily very
employed and quite a hand full are not able to survive the ruggedness of the
cut throat competition in the market place. These trends calls for the need for
effective digital literacy among the bank workforce. If wisdom is anything to
go by more so, fresh graduate gate crashers and aspiring career bankers must
study to find out how the fallen heroes fell and go for the requisite skills
not only for today, but for tomorrow’s survival.
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