ABSTRACT
This chapter describes the situation in the branches before the computer changed the system of work. The possibility of a computer had been mentioned every year at the staff dinner and there had been a number of lectures by the manager of the Organisation and Methods Department including one given at the request of the Staff Association. The manager, like the managers of the other branches scheduled for transfer, was unenthusiastic about automated banking. The chapter considers the kinds of people the bank clerks were, their attitudes to their jobs and their ambitions for the future. The chapter suggests that job satisfaction was not very high for either men or women in Royal Exchange, and this may be true of banking generally. Men and women tended to have similar opinions although men were more inclined to speak approvingly of the interest of their work and women of pleasant social relationships.
