A major shortage in computer skills has left South African banks to fight over an already small talent pool.<\/p>\n
Speaking to Reuters, <\/a><\/strong>representatives from Absa, Standard Bank, Nedbank and FirstRand said that they were struggling to access the skills they need to rapidly digitise, and deal with new mobile banking players.<\/p>\n The banks have taken a number of measures to address the shortage – including changing their hiring strategies and developing training programs – but said that it still took months to hire and they were paying ever-rising salaries to win talent.<\/p>\n Standard Bank Group chief information officer, Alpheus Mangale, said that his firm was particularly struggling in trying to fill positions that did not exist just a few years ago – such as cloud engineers.<\/p>\n Banks can expect to pay a 20-30% premium when they do find such skills, he said.<\/p>\n Increased\u00a0<\/strong>competition<\/b><\/p>\n South Africa’s biggest lenders are facing an onslaught of entrants for the first time in 12 years.<\/p>\n TymeBank has seen impressive support since launching in February 2019, and is on track to hit one million customers<\/a> <\/strong>by the end of the year.<\/p>\n After onboarding around 40,000 clients during its \u2018soft launch\u2019 phase between November 2018 and February 2019, the bank then moved to a high growth phase where it was adding 4,000 new clients a day.<\/p>\n Chief executive officer, Sandile Shabalala said the group is averaging 100,000 new customers each month.<\/p>\n South Africans are also eagerly awaiting new offerings from Discovery and Bank Zero which promise to snap up clients from the rest of the ‘big four’.<\/p>\n Discovery \u2018soft\u2019 launched its bank in March and promises to be a more direct competitor to the other major banks when it launches later this year.<\/p>\n Bank Zero will operate as a mutual savings bank, promises to be entirely digital, and will handle all of its services and communications via an app.<\/p>\n
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