Canada’s largest bank stumbles through PR disaster

The Royal Bank of Canada (RBC) was thrust into the media spotlight over the weekend when allegations of replacing homegrown staff with outsourced temporary foreign IT workers hit the news via a whistle-blowing website.

An investigation revealed the bank is replacing 45 employees with temporary foreign workers at the end of the month. iGATE Corp., a multinational outsourcing firm from India, employs the foreign workers.

Although outsourcing is nothing new, especially in the IT industry, the narrative by one RBC employee who complained about having to train and ultimately be replaced by a foreign worker played long and loud. And it has resonated loudly with the 1.3 million unemployed Canadians.