I don't know if you saw that story about the Aussie who works for a German bank. It was in the papers earlier this week (it's taken me a while to write about this because, well, frankly I was gobsmacked).
It seems this bloke, who has a senior position with the bank, is taking them to court because he feels he wasn't promoted sufficiently and essentially he's saying it's a racist thing - ie, he's not German enough.
Amongst the evidence - the case is being held in the UK - is that he was overlooked for promotion because he didn't speak German. Remember, this is a German bank he was working for. It got me thinking. If you were German and you worked for Westpac, say, or NAB, or Barclays or Citibank and you didn't speak English just how high in the company would you expect to soar? Personally I think the only job for you would be working in the banks' German offices and if you didn't speak English, well, you're not going to go anywhere else, are you?
Also, the Aussie was on this massive salary - $3.9million a year. Now, when I bought a house in France I realised that my schoolboy French would not be enough when it came to trying to purchase a gas canister for the barby, let alone ensuring I could get a drink in a bar or a new pair of cullottes (that's not the onions, madam). So, what I did was is I paid for French lessons. Now, I didn't have an annual salary of $3.9million at the time but somewhat surprisingly I managed to pay for those lessons every week and still have some left over for a Stella Artois or two (yes, yes, I know it's Belgian, but you get my point).
Really, it's just another example of the amazing arrogance of people who work in banks; from the tellers who look at you as if you've just asked for a quick blow job before you make your deposit, to the managers who come around my place for a barby and cannot actually explain what they do for their $800K a year, to this Aussie bloke with the inflated bank account and even bigger ego.
Honestly, it's no wonder people think they're a right load of bankers.
18/09/07 @ 07:01