DBS BANK's chop of 900 jobs, half of them to be made in Singapore, reminds working people that job security is getting tenuous as business models adapt to Darwinian forces. Workers comprehend this; they need to retool to remain useful. But the retrenchment was still a shock for its size and the timing. Local operations of the American insurer AIG and of Wall Street and European banks devastated by derivatives losses have so far been circumspect, even accounting for their smaller staff. Is there a hint of haste by a company business graduates looking for a career start gravitate to? In a Straits Times interview with DBS chairman Koh Boon Hwee published yesterday, mention was made of certain financial businesses and jobs culled that will not reappear when the crisis is past. No other financier here has hinted at 'structural' redesign in banking, save the multiplicity of investment products being churned out and the outsourcing of some backroom functions. If more categories of financial jobs are to fall obsolete, it is a sobering reminder of the tsunami that has swept and is continuing to wreak havoc in the financial world.

DBS chief executive Richard Stanley said its finances were 'strong and sound' but staff cuts had to be made for efficiency gains. Banks' experience is that it is hard to replicate good operating teams when business conditions get back to normal. In this credit-crunch business cycle, banks are the most vulnerable to suggestions of being overly aggressive in hiring when times are good and of retrenching when the expected growth fails to materialise. The financial world is herd-like in its hiring and firing habits. One must worry whether the DBS axe, having been swung, will hasten cascading cuts across the finance sector. Singaporean multinationals must be lean, but they should not copy corporate America's habit of making brutal cuts to keep share prices up in the short term.

Retrenchments are not deep yet across the economy, but economists expect the crunch next year. About 6,000 workers were laid off in the first nine months. The number is no worse than in previous years, save between 2001 and the 2003 Sars year. The latest Manpower Employment Outlook Survey which polled 629 companies found only a tenth of them planned to cut staff in the fourth quarter. If this is indicative, Singapore may get off without excessive bloodletting. But these are early days of the recession cycle. Companies are enjoined to avoid reflexive culling of staff. Budget reliefs for business will be known by February. Government efforts to save jobs have to be matched by a sincerity on the part of employers to preserve livelihoods. Everybody, boss and worker, is in this together.

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