I WAS very annoyed today at the high turnover rate in the computer sector at the bank, for no month passes without being faced with the resignation of one of the manpower in this sector claiming he received an offer from another bank or institution for a higher salary, which made me confused. I had noticed that it also happened last year and it resulted in that I obtained a decision from the bank board of directors to allocate a special allowance for the staff in this sector which became one of the rare sectors in the sense that the demand for computer workers is less than the offer as a result of the successive expansions in this field. The decision of allocating this allowance was made in order to keep the workers in this sector, make them stay there and limit the attraction of other institutions that offer higher salaries... However, this big allowance, which was decided for them, shrank before the temptations of the high salaries that are offered by other banks and institutions. Despite the greediness of the new graduate applying for the post at the computer division in the bank so that he can win the post, and his persistent pursuit to be assigned at the bank, he, after a short period of time and after he is settled in a bank, where he can get an experience certificate stating that he works in the computer sector at the bank for the period from so and until this date, that he receives a salary of an amount of so, that his post is so at the bank and his responsibilities are such and such. With this certificate, he can have a higher post with a higher salary in another bank, not caring for the bank that sheltered him since his graduation and gave him a distinct allowance from his peers at the other sectors in the bank, and the yearly appraisal reports in which he always gets the highest evaluation degrees in view of the need for him and not because of his skillfulness in carrying out the functions assigned to him. Some of them used to leave the bank without considering the necessity of staying till a substitute is assigned; what is important to him is taking the opportunity that was offered to him at the other bank. In fact, such hunters for jobs and jumpers from one bank to another are revealed by the other bank who fears that they will also leave it for a third bank if this latter offered a higher salary. When I formulated the code of conduct for banking performance in the Association of Banks in Jordan of whose board I was a member for many sessions, I remember that I put a term that stated that preparing the trained labour requires investment spending and a long term effort, and so the moving of this labour from a bank to another inside the country must be organised so that it does not affect the basics of the legitimate competition, and that an agreement must be concluded between the banks to maintain an acceptable competition in transferring of labour from one bank to another in a way that does not affect the regularity of the work at the banks from, which this labour moves. I used to hear in the 1960s while working at the National Bank of Egypt about what is repeated on the rarity in the foreign sector of the banks, and in late seventies and early eighties this rarity started to include the employees in the computer sector. This rarity in some specialisations is the result of the weakness of the studies conducted about the real needs of the labour market and the co-ordination with the educational institutions to be planned for so that they will meet the labor market needs without any shortage here or surplus there. The largest transfer of labour was when the openness policy or infitah was implemented in Egypt and the starting of entering of branches of foreign banks in the Egyptian market where the highly qualified personnel from the employees in the State owned banks were attracted to work in the branches of the foreign banks with fanciful salaries that the banking sector had not witnessed before. However, this tremendous wave of transfer from the public sector banks did not significantly affect these banks, which were overstaffed with labour that greatly decreased this dramatic transfer to the branches of the foreign banks. One always seeks where his interest lies, but he also has to take into consideration the interest of the institution he leaves.
