DIRE SKILL SHORTAGES IN COMPLIANCE COULD IMPACT ON PERFORMANCE

DIRE SKILL SHORTAGES IN COMPLIANCE COULD IMPACT ON PERFORMANCE

The increasing regulatory intervention in the financial services sector is leading to unprecedented levels of hiring within the compliance advisory function – although dire skill shortages are impacting on institutions’ abilities to shore up their functions to the levels that they would want. That’s according to Michelle Myers, Head of Compliance at specialist recruiter Twenty Financial Services.

“The Financial Stability Board has already published proposals to tighten up on global systemically important financial institutions ( G-SIFIs) and there is an ongoing review of UK banks by the independent commission on banking – consequently the demand for compliance advisory specialists has rocketed”, says Myers. “Quality experienced product advisory specialists at VP and AVP level are in extremely short supply. Institutions are understandably working very hard to retain their compliance talent leading to a lack of churn in the market. There has also been an increasing trend of professionals moving away from cross product advisory roles into more siloed areas such as fixed income, equities, commodities and futures & options which has exacerbated the skills shortage”, adds Myers.

All this is putting an upward pressure on salaries. “Anyone with two years Front Office advisory experience will already be earning around £60k+, tempting them to move can therefore be costly. However, you can use the carrot of the trading floor – not all advisory teams are currently trading floor based and so employers who can offer that exposure can get the edge in the talent war,” continues Myers. However she adds a note of caution: “If you do want to be trading floor based then technical knowledge will not be enough – you’ll need gravitas, to be accepted into a front office facing role as well as a real understanding of the business itself - not just the rules governing them”.