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This is the age of consumerism and
the banks’ clients today demand efficient service. This, thus,
needs to be addressed by engendering an organisation-wide change
of paradigm, where the customer is seen and recognised as king.
It is in this
overall environment that the book embarks upon a rather onerous
task of providing an omnibus hand-book for the managers of the
banking and financial sector. The book is organised into 14
chapters. The first couple of chapters are devoted to
liberalisation and its political and economic underpinnings,
with special reference to the financial services sector. The
problems thrown up by increased competition and deregulation of
interest rates are discussed thereafter. Corporate planning in
the changed context is examined in chapter four.
The analysis of
balance sheets is followed by three core chapters relating to
risk management and bank investments. The core message is that
risk in banking sector cannot be either wished away, or reduced
to zero. The art and science of banking is practically that of
managing and allocating of risk.
Separate chapters
are devoted to analysing treasury investments and
asset-liability management. Similarly, technology and personnel
management are dealt with in self-contained modules. Banking
regulations are also discussed, while marketing of banks finds
fairly deep treatment in a dedicated part. The book has 15
appendices and a comprehensive bibliography, which can be of
great use to the academically inclined reader. The index is also
quite exhaustive.
While the book is
useful, it is important to remember that the perspective is
essentially that of a banker. The concerns of the economist and
the business administrator (an MBA) are not sufficiently
addressed. Thus, although there is a separate chapter on
marketing, the importance of building brands is not mentioned
even in passing. Also not taken up in depth are the emergence of
aggressive private sector banks; the opportunities offered by
mergers and acquisitions; group synergies offered by the banks
and their specialised subsidiaries; tackling competition in the
housing finance sector from dedicated-purpose players like HUDCO
and HDFC; reducing costs by resorting to the methodology of
Business Process Outsourcing, etc.
On the side of the
advances, the challenges offered to the banks by competing modes
of finance has not been adequately tackled. The role of the
co-operative banks and the regional rural banks has not been
discussed at all. One would have expected a higher focus on the
developments of the past three years, since this present edition
is the second since 1999.
The book, it is
felt, is meant essentially for a nationalised bank manager who
is graduating from the management of branches, regions and zones
to the echelons of higher management. Such a reader would find
the book quite useful, since it encapsulates numerous facets in
a single volume. The book is not meant for a reader looking for
a more macro-economic treatment or a wider view of the financial
services sector.
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THIS
book claims to address the requirements of those who are
handling the challenging jobs of managing the Indian banks in
a rapidly changing economic and regulatory environment and
steering them in the volatile world of financial markets. The
need for the second edition is attributed to the accelerated
process of reforms and deregulation in the banking sector in
the past three years, although the basic objective continues
to be to draw a road map for the journey ahead.
