"We want the best and the brightest to see banking as a credible career choice," says António Horta-Osório, chief executive of Lloyds Banking Group. That's fair for him to say. Part of his job is to find Lloyds' next generation of managers. The rest of us, however, shouldn't worry overly about a supposed drain of talent from the banking industry in the wake of the financial crisis.
The pool of talented school-leavers and graduates is not limitless. If "the best and the brightest" among the current crop really are disinclined to join a bank, surely that's a healthy development. It might mean graduates in mathematics, engineering, or astrophysics spend less time writing and trading derivatives contracts and so on. They might instead put their education to more productive uses.
As it happens, though, this recruitment "problem" identified by Lloyds' survey is probably more perceived than real. The pollsters claim that only 2% of students are considering a career in banking and financial services. OK, but did they tell the students what big banks continue to pay their executive class these days?
