Equity Group, Kenya’s second-largest lender by assets, is developing an artificial intelligence (AI) tool to forecast staff departures, as it seeks to retain specialist employees and give managers more time to fill critical roles.
The Nairobi-based group said in its 2025 sustainability report that it was developing “predictive analytics to forecast attrition and identify risk windows.” Equity said earlier warnings would help it decide when to intervene to retain employees and where to prepare for staffing gaps.
Equity’s move to use AI to predict staff departures reflects a challenge for Kenya’s banks. As fintechs, telcos, and rival lenders compete for the same pool of digital and payments talent, keeping experienced staff has become as important as hiring them.
“Early insight into potential employee turnover would support targeted retention actions and sustainable staffing strategies to ensure reinforcement and retention of critical talent and preparation for such situations in a sustainable way,” Equity said in the sustainability report.
Net employment turnover fell to 10.6% last year from 11.1% in 2024. The decline was smaller than the improvement in the previous year, when Equity reported turnover falling from 17% in 2023 to about 11% in 2024.
The bank nearly doubled hiring to 3,198 people in 2025, while its overall workforce grew by 2.2% to 13,370.
