SBI takes work-life balance to a new high cutting mechanical lives in the bud

MUMBAI, Feb 17: The nations largest lender State Bank has begun a massive employee engagement programme to ensure its 2.6 lakh-strong staff does not work mechanically and is sufficiently motivated to take on newer challenges that the future will throw up, a top official has said.

The programme, christened Nayi Disha or the new

path, focuses on work-life balance and also involves the

staffs immediate family members, also giving them the ability

to inform the bank if an employee is not able to leave work on

time.

We realised that over a period of time, our

employees, especially the ones in branches, had started to

work mechanically which could have an impact on customer

service and also their morale, Prashant Kumar, deputy

managing director and chief development officer, said over

the weekend.

The previous chairperson Arundhati Bhattacharya too

had initiated a slew of pro-employee measures such as letting

them choose the location before transferring a couple of both

of them are with the bank, extending sick leave to attend to

in-laws health needs, long leaves to help their children

during the exams among others.

He said the bank has hired an external hand to design

the programme, and started implementing it in December with

the top management, including chairman Rajnish Kumar.

Over 350 trained staff are reaching out to every

employee in the programme, which is the first major

initiativereaching out to every member of the staff in over

four years. They undertake five to six hour-long sessions

which end with a team dinner with each ones spouses, Kumar

said.

Half the staff has already undergone the module and

the programme will be finished by March 15, in time to let the

employees focus on the heavy duty workdays towards the end of

the fiscal year, he said.

At the end of the training module, the employee signs

a pledge which draws from the banks value statement released

last year, vowing to keep herself healthy, not damage the

environment, speak positively of the bank and leave for home

at least once a week.

Interestingly, the pledge card has a special bar code

which, if scanned by the employees spouse using a mobile

phone, will send out an alert to the employees superiors

about the employee spending long time at work and result in

corrective action, Kumar said.

Without mentioning non-performing assets, Kumar said

the banking sector has had a difficult time in the last

two-three years which has affected the employees and the bank

found it essential to rejuvenate and prepare them for the

future as well.

While stressing that the worst is behind the bank, the

employee is told about the business plan and also the way

banking is changing due to technology, which will entail

changes in their working as well, he said.

The bank had already started stressing on the

importance of employees health and the need to maintain

work-life balance around a year ago, Kumar said, adding this

programme takes it up as a strong need.

Over 27 per cent of SBI staff are women and the

average age has now come down to 43, he said. (PTI)

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