Are black professionals different?: deconstructing the stereotype

Abstract

Is there merit in maintaining that since democracy South African black professionals change jobs more frequently than other professionals? JOCELYN VASS investigated the local and international literature on the determinants of employee turnover and found that there are many complex reasons for changing jobs. In 2006, the then Reserve Bank governor, Tito Mboweni, sharing his frustrations on recruitment, said that he had stopped recruiting black people because they leave the Bank soon after being trained. This comment confirmed a widely held view that, since democracy and the advent of affirmative action, black professionals job-hop. Thus, in human resource management circles it is argued that there is a 'war' for qualified black professionals, partly due to the skills crisis but mostly because of affirmative action.