Part 4 — Sequencing The Fintech DNA
Over the past six years in the US, as the head of fintech sales for IDEMIA, I have had the chance to work with all market leaders including Square, Stripe, Robinhood, Marqeta, SoFi, Galileo, Varo and more than fifty others. Now back to Europe, I want to share in this series of posts my experience living the birth of this wonderful fintech industry.
Everyone I’ve had the chance to work with in fintechs embodies a unique culture, and no one will be surprised that this culture is more ‘tech’ than ‘fin’. More importantly, it is really about a way of being, of acting and of operating, not just a mere appearance.
The first characteristic of fintechs is the quality of their employees. How not to be surprised by the level of engineers, product managers, operations managers! Very often graduates of the best universities, super smart, not afraid of trying anything…
Another point that surprised me is their youth, in the premises of a fintech one has the impression it is Take Your Child to Work Day every day! You wonder to whether the person you’re talking to is old enough to buy alcohol, and you learn that he sold his first startup at 15 years old (sold, not started…)
Young people, brilliant and also hard working. This is a common point in the culture of the Bay Area, work smarter, harder, and longer, even if we are starting to see some changes on this, in part linked to the COVID crisis and to the generalization of work in distance.
Never tell “it is not possible”
Never tell them “it is not possible”. Doing something that has never been done before will be the best way to motivate them. They like to create, invent a new universe. When they approach a new concept, a new techno, they want to understand everything and will ask the right questions until they are sure they have it all.
In execution the key words are agility and speed, if you don’t launch your product, your new service quickly enough, someone else will. But this requirement must be met with the desire for product perfection. This is one of the most difficult compromises to find: I have worked with fintechs who went out of business before being able to launch their first product by dint of perfectionism, conversely some have damaged their reputation by launching products not polished enough, and you know how difficult it is to fix with a reputation.
All of this constitutes a particular culture, but I stress once again that it is not just about appearance, it is above all about delivering something concrete.
As you could see — and I tried not to be too emotional — I really enjoyed working with these wonderful people, I have never felt professionally so fulfilled and I loved being challenged so I could go beyond my own limits. So once again, I would like to extend a big thank you to all my friends, customers and colleagues in fintech.
This culture is so strong that it goes far beyond the strictly professional framework in ethics, in a political and social action. That will be the subject of my next post.
— All opinions shared in these posts are my own —
