This story was delivered to BI Intelligence " Fintech Briefing " subscribers. To learn more and subscribe, please click here . The ongoing proliferation of new technologies in financial services is making employees fearful for their jobs. In fact, 47% of employees in financial services believe technology is putting their job at risk, according to a global survey by data aggregator Emolument. And of those surveyed, workers in financial services emerged as feeling most threatened by technology. Employees in compliance were the next most-fearful, with 37% saying they were worried, while least worried were human resources workers at 15%, and those in engineering at 14%. Fear among financial services employees is also likely driven by the growing tendency of legacy banks to cut jobs explicitly in favor of automation as part of efficiency initiatives — ING cut 7,000 jobs earlier this month in accordance with its digital transformation, for example. Employees in financial services probably feel particularly threatened because several major areas of the industry are already seeing considerable changes to jobs due to technology: Interaction with consumers. As consumers increasingly switch to mobile and digital banking, and in turn, visit the bank less often, front-of-house jobs are seeing more cuts and branches are closing. This is a trend seen across the UK and US , in particular. Compliance. The financial services sector is very heavily regulated, partly as a consequence of the 2008 crisis, making it increasingly challenging for FS firms to ensure compliance. Historically, this was achieved by large compliance teams, but as technologies advance and grow more sophisticated, financial services providers are increasingly adopting regtechs . These firms’ solutions have the added advantages of operating 24/7 and reducing the possibility of human error. For now, regtechs are mostly designed to aid existing compliance teams, but we, […]
