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Enoch Yiu

Standard Chartered global CEO Bill Winters on Friday said he was “sorry” for comments describing “lower-value” workers, made while announcing job-cut plans earlier this week.
Winters apologised in a LinkedIn post as he tried to cool debate among upset employees after he announced on Tuesday a 15 per cent cut of back-office staff at the lender by 2030. Winters said that AI adoption would replace some “lower-value human capital”.
The CEO first made a LinkedIn post explaining his comments from earlier this week, before then posting for a second time, apologising for his Tuesday remarks.
“I have received a lot of support for the messages in my previous post,” wrote Winters in his second LinkedIn post on Friday. “But still get questions about my choice of words, which I know has caused upset to some colleagues.”
“For that I am sorry,” he said, attaching a transcript from the media briefing on Tuesday to the post. The transcript included the controversial remarks, as well as other comments he made about his commitment to helping staff reskill.
“I think the transcript makes it clear that I value our colleagues – all of them – most highly and that we are totally committed to helping them to cope with the accelerating pace of change in our industry,” he said.
On Tuesday, the CEO unveiled Standard Chartered’s strategic plan for the coming years at an investor event in Hong Kong. The plan included a 15 per cent reduction of back-office staff by 2030, or about 7,800 jobs, a calculation based on the lender’s 2025 annual report which showed a headcount of 52,271 support staff.
“We do have job role reductions in favour of the machines, and that will accelerate as we go full-bore into AI,” Winters said at a media briefing on Tuesday.
“It is not cost-cutting, but it is replacing – in some cases – lower-value human capital with the financial capital and the investment capital that we are putting in.”

Winters’ transcript said the lender would provide training for new skills to assist the staff affected.
“For the people that want to reskill, that want to carry on, we are giving [them] every opportunity to reposition,” he said.
The responses to his LinkedIn post were mixed. Some readers said his apology delivered the same message as Tuesday, while others contended it helped clarify the situation.
In the earlier LinkedIn post made on Friday, Winters first tried to explain his comments from Tuesday.
“Standard Chartered has, for many years, invested actively in helping colleagues whose roles may be displaced by automation to build the skills needed for new opportunities within our organisation,” he wrote.
“In that context, I said that lower-value roles are more vulnerable to automation, and that we have a responsibility to help colleagues move into higher-value roles.”
Hong Kong’s biggest lender, HSBC, said on Wednesday that it also planned to adopt AI, though it did not discuss the number of potential job cuts.
“We all know generative AI will destroy certain jobs and will create new jobs,” CEO Georges Elhedery said at an investor event in Hong Kong.
Elhedery emphasised that the bank will focus on retraining its workforce to adapt to the new and evolving environment in the sector.


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Winters expresses regret for his choice of words describing how AI would replace some workers at the lender


Winters expresses regret for his choice of words describing how AI would replace some workers at the lender.


‘I am sorry’: Standard Chartered CEO Bill Winters apologises for comments over job cuts

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Winters expresses regret for his choice of words describing how AI would replace some workers at the lender

Winters expresses regret for his choice of words describing how AI would replace some workers at the lender