Dr. Michelle O'Sullivan:

The financial services sector comes out internationally as one of the sectors with the highest levels of technological surveillance of employees. That has been found from a survey done by the Trades Union Congress, TUC, in the UK and another by the European Agency for Safety & Health at Work, EU-OSHA. The transport and storage sector scores quite highly as well. In banking, there is no doubt that the introduction of technology has been used to contribute to job losses. Some bank managers we interviewed said that in one particular branch there might be a reduction of five bank tellers because of the introduction of self-service machines. It is also part of the wider restructuring of banks, which Mr. O'Connell could speak more about. The work that managers do also becomes downgraded and in some banks the pay is not as high as it used to be. Mr. O'Connell can speak more about the efforts that banks are making regarding employee well-being.

Some sectors are much more ripe for technological displacement than others. Technology has benefits as well. In some sectors, it is not about the wiping out of jobs but really about displacing tasks as opposed to whole jobs. Some employees we spoke to appreciated the application of technology in trying to get rid of what they might term repetitive or boring work. The other side of the coin is that while it has helped to make work more interesting, it has also led to greater expectations about the quantity of work that employees are able to do. Employees feel that it has enabled banks to increase the intensity and the pace of work. That is the downside.