As somebody who has recently treaded on from the student life to the work life, as somebody who never really wanted to enter the so-defined 9-6 work life, as somebody who never wanted to be one of those who can be bossed around, as somebody who never knew she could still be one of the above ever, I am surely in a very exciting phase of my life.
As a kid the house that I have grown up in also housed one of India’s biggest public sector banks. I have been talking to bankers since an early age – sometimes work related and sometimes personally. I have found their job as bankers of India’s one of the biggest banks at a small place like my hometown, a pretty relaxing 9-6 job one could think of. My knowledge about banking was limited to accepting deposits and giving away loans. Other than that – drafts, cheque books, ATMs are some of the other facilities that a bank provides to lure customers. The more customers the bank has it means more deposits and more loans meaning more business. It was even difficult to imagine that there could be any interesting role in banking wherein the banker does not get to meet the customer.
Now I am working as a banker in country’s one of the biggest banks, no more in my small home town but now in London. I am a banker with no on-the-road customer. My customer so as to speak is now an authority which needs some watchdog in each bank so that they can keep an eye on how the banks are doing their business, they can regulate them, they can stop any unprecedented events from occurring and in today’s scenarios they can stop banks from falling down. My customer is the Financial Services Authority of the UK.
How interesting do you think is this job when you are developing products which do not serve the need of any person but for an organisation? A major reason why I have enjoyed teaching so much is the “thank you” a student says when s/he gets up from a lesson I have delivered. I find it very rewarding. So what is the reward I get by making sure that my fellow bankers are in line with the guidelines laid out by the FSA? A salary / a job / a 9 – 6 brain storming everyday / a nice work atmosphere. I am currently getting all of these, but still something stops me from saying it is rewarding based on the reasons I have cited above.
What in fact makes it rewarding for me is the feeling that somewhere I am helping my bank and my fellow bankers realise that they should not take enough risk to go over the board, to be in a position where they can endanger the savings of those customers I have had acquaintance since childhood, to threaten the chance of a potential customer who is looking for a loan to buy a house, to cause a disturbance in the whole system. I may also say that I feel I am doing a noble duty, a duty towards the society by ensuring that my bank is not one of those who can suddenly go bankrupt leaving the whole world in a state of shock. I feel there should be more bankers like me in each and every bank as we do not have any right to cause the unrest in the world that we have just done. Indeed my work is pretty exciting.