On the heels of the big-bang merger announcement involving Punjab National Bank, Oriental Bank of Commerce and United Bank of India, the management of PNB has now embarked on a massive drive to engage banking industry experts as consultants and advisors to ensure that the three-way amalgamation proceeds smoothly.
Consultants and advisors
External consultants and advisors will be engaged in as many as 21 banking domain areas, said sources close to the developments.
Such consultants and advisors will be responsible for steering the bank in facing the issues that may arise during the course of amalgamation, they added.
It may be recalled that the PNB board had recently given an in-principle approval for the amalgamation of OBC and United Bank of India with PNB.
All external consultants and advisors will be hired on contractual basis The engagement will be for a period of six months to one year initially, which will be reviewed by the bank annually. Also, the engagement will automatically expire permanently on completion of five years or 65 years of age, whichever is earlier, it is learnt. Only those with at least five years of experience in a public sector bank or public sector enterprise, regulatory body, Central government or private organisation will be eligible for the posts of consultants/advisors.
Some of the domain areas for which PNB is looking to rope in consultants include human resource management, fraud risk management, treasury, finance, digital banking, information technology, international banking, law, and risk management, among others.
The three-way amalgamation involving PNB, OBC and United Bank of India is expected to create a banking behemoth, and PNB will be among the top-three largest public sector banks of India.
Such mega mergers are likely to create integration issues, and PNB wants to ensure that there is a smooth integration. In fact, the top brass at State Bank of India and Bank of Baroda had last week made a presentation to the banks now proposed to be merged as part of their experience-sharing exercise.
Banking industry observers felt that HR issues need to be properly fixed if an amalgamation is to be successful. A case in point is the recent three-way amalgamation involving Bank of Baroda, Vijaya Bank and Dena Bank that came into effect from April 1 this year.
Even after six months into the mega merger, there are still rumblings among the officers of erstwhile Vijaya Bank and Dena Bank.
Dena Bank and Vijaya Bank employees are now complaining of ill-treatment by controlling authorities at various levels, and have even requested BoB Managing Director and CEO PS Jayakumar’s intervention in the matter.