This new scenario requires employees with skills in product development, operational efficiency, marketing capability, service focus, and tech-savvy orientation. Having an understanding of these decisive factors, more and more students are taking up subjects like BBA (Bachelor’s in Business Administration), BBS (Bachelor’s in Business Studies) and other streams, which equips them with the skills required in the versatile and variegated field.
A FEMALE JOB
Although banking and financial jobs were stereotyped as a “male” domain until recently, the picture seems to have changed today. Many colleges in Kathmandu, to take one particular region, claim to have increasing numbers of females taking up management subjects that specialize in banking, finance, and human resource management.
Gahendra Fago, faculty at College of Applied Business (CAB) in Tangal, says, “The number of females taking up BBA has been increasing every year on an average of at least 10 percent.”
CAB has been providing management studies for the past eight years.
The scenario in other colleges, isn´t too different. The Kathmandu Don Bosco College has been discerning an increase in the number of its female students. Devesh Dhungana, its Principal, informs, “At present, around 45% of students in the BBA stream are females.” Dungana also agrees that the number has been increasing.
Banks and other financial institutions as well are seen hiring a larger number of females than males.
Rajgopal Rajbhandari of Prabhu Finance at Lainchour informs, “Almost 75% of the staff at our office is female.”
The HR department of Laxmi Bank also has two females and a male.
These institutions, however, claim that it is not because they prefer females to males but because the applications they receive are more from females. They say companies are increasingly employing people on merits, rather than according to gender.
A GLAMOROUS OPTION
Many see the increasing number of females in the banking sector as a result of the glamour attached to it.
Fago says, “Students see this as a field where you have to look good and attend a lot of high-profile and interactive gatherings.”
Dhungana also mentions that along with glamour, the women today want to be independent. “The banking and PR jobs are believed to be high-paying ones,” he says.
These jobs require a lot of public interaction, and so a person needs to look presentable, thus making one look after one’s personality and consequently giving the person a glamorous image.
MALE ON TOP
While there are many women seen working in this sector, near the top of the job pyramid, however, the upward march of women stalls. It cannot be denied that the top positions are still held by males while women find themselves drastically outnumbered at the higher echelons. They are seen holding entry-level or basic positions in the firms.
Nonetheless, the faculty teachers at specialized institutions of higher learning reason that society expects the situation will not remain so in a few years.
“We can’t expect drastic changes all at once,” says Fago. He believes that with our society being gradually more open, females will get their rightful share in times to come. Dhungana agrees and puts in, “The very fact that more females are taking up these subjects should be a sign for positive changes.”
Many professions that started out as men’s province are now filled mostly by women. They are slowly and surely starting to dominate middle management and other professional careers. It may be happening slowly and not uniformly, but it is unquestionably happening: In the long view, modern economy is becoming an area where women hold the trump cards. The global convergence of financial services will definitely gather further momentum in the years to come, and women, alongside men, can definitely hope for brighter futures.
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