CBA staffers interrogated the board over the new Bangalore-based office complex, particularly as local workforce numbers continue to dwindle and offshore staff numbers continue to grow.
One staffer questioned what the bank’s intentions were with the new building, to which chairman Paul O’Malley responded that the bank was looking to invest heavily in its cyber obligations and increase its defences for financial crime and fraud.
“We’ve got great capability in Australia, but the risk and opportunity to do better in cyber requires us to invest in skills and capabilities – and we’re doing that absolutely substantively in Australia,” he said.
“But we do need to look for complementary skills all around the world, and we hire people from offshore.”
CBA CEO Matt Comyn also said that the office is not an indicator of future offshoring plans, nor a sign that data and records would be shifted overseas.
“We’re not planning to increase the number of employees in India, and then secondly, all of the data and systems and records remain in Australia,” he said.
Concerns from the CBA staffers come at a time when local staff numbers are falling.
Over the last two years, the bank has cut what is believed to be over 1,000 roles, many of which are believed to be related to its increased AI investment and rollout.
In July last year, the bank announced it would be cutting at least 45 jobs to make room for AI, with the terminations impacting the bank’s customer service area. This closely followed 304 staff being cut and 110 new jobs being created in India.
However, the bank rolled back the decision after it was found that call volumes had skyrocketed and managers needed to stay back and man the phones to deal with the demand.
It then cut around 300 jobs during the launch of its $90 million “Future Workforce Program” in February this year but denied the job cuts were AI-related.
Then in April, another 119 jobs were axed. Finally, just last month, CBA once again angered the FSU by cutting 230 more staff.
It is also rumoured to be looking at even more redundancies.
At the same time, major rival banks are looking to increase offshore staff counts, with National Australia Bank (NAB) planning to hire over 1,000 staff in Vietnam and India. Over the past 3 years, NAB has doubled its workforce in both countries.
This article was originally published on Banking Daily.
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