Ex-employees of NAB trading team speak out about behaviour within the troubled unit

Senior managers in NAB’s trading team requested workers fabricate responses to workplace surveys, as it faced mounting staff losses amid allegations of harassment and bullying.

A trading unit within NAB has lost several key staff. Picture: NCA NewsWire / John Gass

Senior managers in the National Australia Bank’s trading team requested staff fabricate responses to workplace surveys to avoid “making us look bad”, with the unit hit by at least a dozen departures in two years amid allegations of harassment and bullying.

In one message circulated to staff in the team, that has some 44 employees in Australia, one manager writes: “We are asking, not telling, that people write comments about displeasure rather than with the numbers. The numbers are not as effective and end up just making us look bad.” “Also the e-Sat score contributes 15 per cent to the bonus pool … so it is in our interest to answer 5 to that one, but then write comments about why you don’t like NAB.”

While no bonus at NAB is solely dependent on the outcome of the survey, engagement is one factor which contributes to an employee’s variable salary.

Multiple former and current members of the team who spoke to The Australian on condition of anonymity warned of out-of-control behaviour in the trading team.

“The legacy of the 1980s is alive and well,” said one person who has since left the company.

KPMG, which runs the bank’s whistleblower investigations unit, has begun an inquiry following complaints from a separate employee who left the team in April.

The Australian has also confirmed the departure of wholesale banking director Vaughn Harvey, FX dealer Bradley Leffler, trading director Gavin Sheridan, interest rate derivatives trader Noel Nallaiah, head of derivatives Rob Collins, and trader Hermeet Najjhur from the team.

The Australian is not suggesting wrongdoing on behalf of those who have exited the business, only that the turnover rate is significantly higher than sector norms.

Others, including institutional sales director Faye Diamant, trader Gabriella Morona and head of repo trading Dikele Diawara have also left the division. As The Australian reported in April, Ms Diawara is pursuing NAB in the Federal Court, alleging her former boss Tim McCaughey, the head of trading, had subjected her to years of poor behaviour.

David Gall, the bank’s corporate and institutional group executive, on Friday told employees on a call the allegations were “hard to read” and “upsetting”.

NAB said each business unit had established a professional standards forum to review breaches of the bank’s code of conduct within that unit. Picture: NCA NewsWire / John Gass

Mr Gall told staff the bank was taking the issue “extremely seriously”, although he noted the court process would make it difficult for NAB to provide details about the matter.

Ms Diawara, who started working at NAB in 2007 in London, joined the bank’s repo trading desk as director in 2016, moving to Sydney in December. She also alleged her $200,000 remuneration was “the same, or not considerably greater than, what the respondent was paying persons in roles with less responsibility than the applicant”.

The nation’s major banks have acknowledged poor culture. In 2016, ANZ was sued by two sacked traders who alleged there was a rampant culture of sex, alcohol and drugs. One of those sacked traders, Etienne Alexiou, now runs a Sydney-based hedge fund, Belay Capital.

The Federal Court ultimately decided against Mr Alexiou – who claimed he was sacked after he complained about alleged manipulation of interest rates – because new whistleblower laws had not come into effect when he raised those issues internally.

NAB’s trading unit has also previously been stung by scandal, after three traders were jailed in 2005 over a $360m foreign exchange scandal. This came after employees attempted to cover up bad US dollar trades in 2003.

The clean-up of the scandal at NAB cost the traders their jobs, and accelerated the departure of chief executive Frank Cicutto and chairman Charles Allen.

NAB, in its latest full-year review, said it had partially or fully substantiated 53 of the 190 wrongdoing complaints lodged in the year to June 30.

NAB said each business unit had established a professional standards forum to review breaches of the bank’s code of conduct within that unit. It also said it had deployed “a network of 128 whistleblower champions” to help “foster psychological safety” within NAB.

However, NAB’s work culture was singled out by the Finance Sector Union this year, with allegations of mismanagement and overwork levelled at the bank.

Finance Sector Union national secretary Julia Angrisano said bank management turned a blind eye to complaints of overwork and ignoring concerns raised by employees.

Ms Angrisano said while all banks were found to have poor behaviour, “it was the NAB members who came out loudest and most strongly with these complaints”.

“These types of behaviours exist because of the culture in the workplace,” she said.

“We’ve seen this boys’ club culture fairly consistent across the sector. This isn’t specific to NAB but if I come back to NAB, this report shows when issues are raised and not addressed and allowed to fester they get worse.”

Mr Gall, however, told The Australian the bank took a “zero-tolerance approach to all forms of discrimination”.

“NAB is committed to supporting equality and diversity in the workplace and any discrimination is not tolerated,” he said.

“We are building a culture at NAB for 34,000 people who need to feel safe and respected and we’re making progress, with more to do.

“We’re actively speaking with colleagues in the markets team and asking them to let us know if they have any concerns about discrimination in the workplace.”

Ms Diawara, through her lawyers, declined to comment.