Factors affecting retention of black professional in the South African financial institutions industry

Abstract

South Africa has a very low supply of adequately skilled and experience Black Professionals and as a result South African companies find themselves competing for the limited resources that are available. Since the government introduced Affirmative Action and Employment Equity Acts which resulted to an increase in the demand for these professionals, this low supply has lead to increased salaries for these professionals. What has compounded the problem is the staff turnover problem that these organisations are facing. The literature shows that 65% of black professionals leave organisations within three years when it takes five years to recover all the costs of getting that person into the organization. The objective of this research is to uncover the reasons why these professionals change jobs at the rate that they are. It was decided that the best research method to use for this exercise is an exploratory study. Depth interviews were conducted by the researcher and the respondents were chosen through a snow-balling technique where the initial respondents were chosen through a judgmental technique. The following are the top five factors that came out of this exercise which, according to the respondents, push them out of the organisation, these have been listed in order of importance: Career Aspirations and Lack of Mentorship Programmes, Treatment and Respect, Salaries, Affirmative Action and Undermining of Black Skills. The details are discussed in the report.