Monica Millares: [00:00:00] Hi, Pavel. How are you? It's awesome having you in the show. Really excited for our conversation.

Pawel Stezycki: Thanks. Thanks for having me here. I'm also looking forward to it. It's also incredible to connect with the other part of the world, just like that sitting somewhere at the lake and then talking to you somewhere in Southeast Asia.

Monica Millares: Yes. And before we go into full FinTech and product exciting conversations, first, I want to ask you two questions just to get to know you a little bit on more on the personal side. So what is your definition of success?

Pawel Stezycki: So I guess that's personal. So personally, I would say that success is being all over in the areas that I consider important. Like, you know, sometimes with teams, you build a radar of skills for people in the team. So my definition of success would have, would be [00:01:00] to have this radar covering pretty large area, right?

So some people define success as being extremely successful in one area and they're probably the best on the planet doing that. I would say having a right balance by work, people that I like to do, more or less changing that. So yeah, controlling that radar of your personal and business career, that would be a success.

Hmm.

Monica Millares: Yes, it's important that it's not just career. It has to be personal life too. So talking about careers, if you look back at your career, what is the advice you wish someone gave you at the beginning of your career? Yeah, I,

Pawel Stezycki: I wish I talked to people who are much older than I was back then for some reason. I would mostly talk to people being pretty much the same age as I was, which doesn't really make much sense [00:02:00] because I talk to people who have more experience.

I wish I got this advice to focus on industries and jobs and opportunities that have a good future ahead. If you look at the industry that's growing in five, 10 years time, bet on it, bet on the industries that will support your growth because they're growing too. That's the best advice I, would say we can.

Get I know some people who get too focused on industry, which is stagnant. And then it's really hard to achieve there

and talk to adults. Not the people in your age, because they haven't seen what lies in front of you.

Monica Millares: Yeah, I like that idea because exactly people have, it may not be the exact same trajectory, but they have lived more, have more experience, more perspective. So that's very helpful. Okay. So [00:03:00] let's get into the conversation. This podcast is about purpose and product making impact, basically. In your opinion, how can we ensure that we as FinTechs build an industry where we have more impact?

Pawel Stezycki: Yeah, , I would say three things. You make an impact in industry where there is demand, right? So there are countries and areas in the world when there is still a huge demand for services. You get underserved customers. There are pain points, you know, needs that needs to be solved. So, go there and you'll make an impact.

I mean, go into the areas where They need you, right? Obviously, then you make an impact. So that's the first one. Consider where there are underserved communities, right? Look for partnerships and... Growing together, not necessarily as fintech, because people don't need fintech. They need [00:04:00] to get to save money or to make a payment.

Or sometimes to buy things, right? So, consider partnerships and that's good with open finance becoming more and more of things. So grow together with partners. And then hopefully look in longer perspective, because in the longer perspective, there might be a. Bigger impact. Sometimes Fintechs, they are too focused on this one year short perspective and they go, go, go up fast and then they go down and then they go up.

So maybe less of a bumpy road, more consistent

Monica Millares: growth.

I love that as a concept. And I think it's like, you nailed it. It's a good point. We as Fintechs are focused on the short term because we need to survive. That's it. Yep. So maybe a little bit of perspective into long term thinking will also help the industry, but it doesn't take away the fact that we need to survive.

So but it's a good challenge for all of [00:05:00] us. So let's go back to you. how did you get into product and how did you get into NetGuru?

Pawel Stezycki: Well, I guess it's a longer story, but it started with research. Like more than 15 years ago, I would work in research, but like a. Proper research, you know, the user, not so much user testing back then, but exploring products, market segments, mostly with new technologies. So for instance, we would test digital TV before there was Netflix, right?

So we would test, we would actually test the contactless cards, which was kind of funny because no one used contactless 15 years. We'll talk to the users. We will work with Visa and then get feedback from people who started using cards and they didn't want that. I mean, they said, why should we use that contactless?

Maybe I can use the pin pads, put in the card. So that [00:06:00] taught me that, you know. Listen to the users, but then consider their understanding. Maybe you need to filter what they say to consider the bigger picture, right? If I would ask users, do they want faster or more convenient payment?

Yeah. Do they want contactless payments? Well, why should I? So I started with research, then I went to research in R& D with Citibank for some time where we work on new products for Citi, and then I moved more into not only research, but also design, product design. And I set up a lab, innovation lab in a Polish bank and we would test and design new products for different markets, not only Poland, work with fintechs trying to innovate in number of ways to add value to the product in consumer or SME [00:07:00] banking. And at some point I moved on to digital.

Consultancy, which is Netguru, mostly, where I support products for clients all over the world, mostly in EMEA, where we design, help to create. Digital products, apps, or neobanks or payment solutions, or also like we also do for retail. Sometimes there is a greater component in financial component in retail.

So long story short, it started with research when I added design and product design. And right now I'm working in an IT consultancy.

Monica Millares: Yes. And I find that fascinating because it seems like since the beginning of your career, you were in these. area, right? The, the somehow related to customers, whether that's research, understanding the industry. But you've also talked about the big picture a few times in our first few minutes, which I love that makes it like a very [00:08:00] unique combination in your brain.

As in, you're close to customers, but at the same time, it's like, remember the big picture.

Pawel Stezycki: There is a business perspective within each product. Actually, initially I graduated the business administration. So... There is a customer perspective, but to make it a business case, you need to obviously look at how this product will deliver value to the company and to the stakeholders. So it's useful to some extent to look at this very Detailed use case insights from the users.

I don't know, people being happy to see that their kids are starting to use some learning with their mobile banking app or something like that. But then the big picture, obviously, if you. In this case, would be having a strategy for building a future base of users, kids of current parents using banking services.

So there's always, there is [00:09:00] a big picture and there is a customer in the end.

Monica Millares: Yeah. And then just to build on that recently you did a keynote that was titled future users of financial services, Horizon 2013 EMEA, which basically it's elaborating what you're talking about kids, right? Like. The kids today are the future users. I found that like fascinating because like, I think at least myself and people who are in the trenches in FinTech, like we said at the beginning, we're very focused on day to day rather than 2030.

2030 seems so far away, but you have done that work. Can you guide us through the, how did you go about identifying what will be The next thing in demand, what's the opportunity like, can you go to spread your thinking process?

Pawel Stezycki: Sure, I like this approach. I mean, it's like natural for all of us to be focused on daily work.

There is I think it's [00:10:00] McKinsey's approach with Horizon One. Horizon two and horizons three perspective, horizons one being this year, maybe like the next one. And allegedly like 95, 97 of employees in the companies are focused on that. All focused on this, this current perspective, but then there is the horizon two, which is more three, five years.

The board members look into that strategy teams look into that. And then there is this five plus 10 years perspective, which is more of a job for innovation labs to think of that perspective. And in that 10 years perspective, I mean, it can still seem crazy, but it's possible that there's going to be a change that will mess up your business.

It can take down to your business totally. So. You pay people, and I used to be in this place in the [00:11:00] innovation labs, you pay people to try to look for, on one hand, trends, some technologies, opportunities and quite often regulations that, create this opportunity. And out of that mix, you can pretty well identify what's going to be growing in free.

Five years time. That's 510 years time. It might be a little tricky. I mean, I like to take this step back and use this perspective. Sometimes that's a couple of sources of information. Number of be known consulting companies provide you with these reports. Obviously, some of that is overestimated. But if you look on the whole ads, Yeah.

Some like pretty obvious markets perspective considering demand changing regulations. And you can make safe bets that some things will grow in one [00:12:00] way or the other. For instance, take this, something I call that it's going to be SME inclusion in developing countries. I mean, you have entrepreneurial people all over the world, like everywhere.

Some people just, they have this sense, drive to make business better. If you provide them with funding, with financing, they will grow their businesses, which makes total sense both for them and whoever is providing them the money. It's a question, obviously, which of the people are worth to be provided with the money, but we'll have more tech for that.

We have more, we're getting, getting, get better and better with data. There are growing economies and some of them are huge. Like in West Africa, in India, in Pakistan, like people there will look for financial services [00:13:00] and plus on top of that, governments make it more feasible to build new financial services.

So if you combine all these trends or changes, it's pretty safe, but we see more and more companies offering SME solutions to clients, to people in these countries. And like I said, digital consultancy, being a number of early

startups, we also see that demand, you know, rising. So this also helps me to make a judgment. So yeah, a couple of perspectives and trying to make a sense of these data source.

Monica Millares: Yes, and I like that, especially like you touched on different pain points as such. You touched on SMEs and you touched on Africa. Then the other day that we spoke, we do talk about the younger generation. So. What do you think? [00:14:00] Let's go through each of them. I would love to explore like the pain points that we should be thinking about now for each of these segments that are now underserved as such.

So. Let's start with the Middle East and Africa. What are the pain points that you see that are underserved that something like Open Finance can help with?

Pawel Stezycki: I mean, there are many countries, they differ, but in very general, I would say that this thing that I mentioned having underserved communities,

but even a pain point, you're losing the opportunity to leverage whole social groups to provide them with means of storing money safely, right? The cost of payment is high, cost of sending money abroad is super high. And so it's even more than a pain point, it's a major problem. Some of these countries are trying [00:15:00] to tackle that or even more to enable access to banking services, data services.

You had the podcast a few days back on Open Finance, and it was great to listen to it and have it. explain, so the open finance is also about making data available to build new services.

And it's an opportunity, especially, I guess, in Saudi Arabia, they're pushing really hard on that to make. Finance financial services available to other companies to think back to startups to

tech companies. So I would say that it's not that much of a pain point, but the disease that if it's cured, there's going to be room for growth, right? So right now companies cannot access fully financial services and they're limited and the cost of them is high [00:16:00] if they're able to unlock it.

Well, economy will thrive, new companies will be set up and will leverage. Underserved communities, as I said, that's it's also a moral issue because if you think of the people who don't, in first place, they have little money, but then on top of it, they are not able to store this money securely.

Especially in some, countries it also impacts women. For instance, in Pakistan, I think that one in 20 women has access to financial services. This means that 19 are dependent on someone else. That's huge. Like, to, to have an account where you can safely store your money, right? So if you cannot safely store your money then you just will just ask your husband or you need to hide that somewhere.

So, yeah. Yes. Try to. [00:17:00] Save some money, but then there is a risk that can be easily taken away from you. So underserved communities, they exist in number of places all over the the globe, and it would be great to have that solved. It's improving a few years back. I think the data was about. 2 billion adults without access to like a safe bank account

it's been decreasing, but it's still like more than a billion.

Yeah, it is a systemic problem, but fintechs are solving that, right? If you look, you know, many countries that, progress is driven by fintechs. I see that in Africa where. Fintechs are improving the access to financial services for different communities, which is great.

I mean, they still make a money on it. It's business, but it's also big picture, I would say is positive.

Monica Millares: Yes. [00:18:00] So it's like just to build on that, or maybe like to change the topic a little bit, the other area that we discussed. And I am not knowledgeable about, I don't have teenagers to look after. But then we were talking about your kids the other day and we were like, Hey, the Roblox generation, Hey, the alpha generation.

And we need to start thinking about them now for when they are like old teenagers slash early adults. What can you tell us about them?

Pawel Stezycki: I've learned that future generations, they're way more open to new things that we will deliver, create, and build. So it's always good to have them as a, well, to some extent, North star, what's going to be in demand in the future.

Like if you look at general products, Snapchat, [00:19:00] TikTok, these apps started initially with more of a younger generation. And then expand it to some extent. I mean, I'm still avoiding TikTok, but it's, it's probably in the lower age groups, but it's a great place to start that young generations and in banking and fintech, it's even more of that because there is a moment where you need to start using financial services sometime in your life.

Like if you're eight, 10 years old, you don't use much of financial services. Although banks have quite recently noticed that it's an important segment both for the future and for the parents, those banking parents have but that's about trying to engage kids. In a similar way as they, as it used to be in the past.

Let's give them a banking app. They're going to be doing the [00:20:00] banking as their parents were. Maybe we can have this fancy little animals or Pokemon or something like that. So they enjoy that, banking app, which is totally fine, but there's going to be also something different. Each generation should surprise us.

And looking at people who are right now sometimes called alpha generation, really young, early teenagers, well, they, have different habits. For instance metaverse, metaverse is considered one of the potential big game changers in terms of communication channels, digital services. You might have heard that well, Facebook is no longer Facebook.

The Facebook group is called Meta because Mike Berg assumes Metaverse gonna be the future. And maybe we are gonna be wearing a helmets or something like that. Maybe yes, maybe no. I, I don't know. He, he's spending billions on that. He may be better informed, but Sometimes they, [00:21:00] make wrong bets.

But that metaverse thing is something I consider should be regarded as potential changes for payment industry, for finance industry. And it's not only me. I mean, official, for instance, that HSBC, a super old traditional bank, the biggest bank in Europe. They have this Horizon 3 perspective, 5 10 years, and metaverse is on the radar.

Biggest banks consider it's gonna be big, and it's something you should have on the radar. Now, why is that, right? Then when you look at all these... young generations, then they spend time in platforms like Roblox or Minecraft or Fortnite. But not that much to play games, but also to meet, to interact. Like, so I had this, I'll share a story with you.[00:22:00]

So once I went to my daughter's room to get something and I see she's spending time in Roblox. That's like Minecraft or something like similar, an environment when you use avatars to interact with other people, and they are having a bonfire. And I was like, what are you guys doing? Like, , it doesn't make sense.

So

Monica Millares: it's a bonfire of avatars.

Pawel Stezycki: Yeah. Avatars sitting around the fireplace and having this grilling sausages . And I asked her like, what are you doing? Who are you sitting there with? Well, I'm sitting there with John, Patrick and Maya, who I met on camping last summer and we were having bonfire then on camping.

Now we're not on camping, obviously, so we thought we're going to recreate that. And meet in this metaverse. So if you think of it, if this happens [00:23:00] and people get used to combining interactions as we do with social media, right? We met in person, we had a peer, but then we keep contact on LinkedIn.

So these channels interact. If metaverse will be another channel that's going to be important for these new generations. And they're already doing it. So maybe they'll be buying things in that metaverse. These could be digital things and they need to store them and they need to pay for them somewhat.

And actually they're making money. You can make money in Roblox. You can make games and make people, there's a creator economy. So it's like, there's going to be economy inside these metaverse platforms. And if there is economy, guess what? I mean, it needs financial services.

So that's going to be a thing,

Monica Millares: of course. So talking about those economies within the platforms, . So who could sell the [00:24:00] services and what type of services could they sell? What's your view?

Pawel Stezycki: Well, the big question is if this platform is an open economy or a closed economy, because we can have a model.

Yeah, where you just have.

Mike can pay for everything and it's closed. He can't, the company can control the money, the coins or wherever it's used. Or it can be open. So it's interchangeable. You can. By, for instance, close in one creates things or digital close, close, or any type of assets in that platform game. And then perhaps you can trade it.

outside that game. So I would be selling to you shoes you could use in Roblox that I've created, and I would be selling them here. Or [00:25:00] Nike could be selling shoes that would have digital twins. You would be buying your running shoes, but also Roblox.

Minecraft, wherever it comes, right? So it could be interesting

Monica Millares: what they're saying is in a distant future, let's say five to 10 years time, instead of me recording the podcast, like we're doing, we could meet in the metaverse and then I could buy my outfit for the metaverse. And then not only I could do that, but let's say if I buy that blouse, I could buy the digital twin of the blouse so that I can wear that in my interview.

That's kind of cool. Yeah.

Pawel Stezycki: Maybe it's, we'll start

Monica Millares: the other way. Effective and if it's cost effective, but it's kind of cool, but

Pawel Stezycki: the other way, I mean, because initially I've been thinking that you'll be buying proper shoes and then getting like a digital twin of the district, but maybe it's going to work the other way around.

You'll go, we'll go meet on [00:26:00] this interview in the metaverse and consider getting a new shirt for that interview and I'll buy it in the metaverse. The next week, a real one will come to my apartment by mail, right? Yeah.

Monica Millares: Oh, I love that. Yeah. You just expanded our brains. Thank you, Pavel. Okay. So that was about the future of financial services and some things that we need to think about.

Let's move a little bit towards product leadership and product culture as such. We people in product, we know that building a feature or building an app is not enough. We need to build something that's different and something that gives us a competitive advantage. Can you expand, like, what is your way or your process of finding what is [00:27:00] that competitive advantage?

Pawel Stezycki: So having that background I mentioned in research, I would say I'm I'm pretty heavy leaning on the research methods to look for competitive advantage. So what are the expectations? What areas are covered by players on the market and then looking for free spots and opportunities that you could. Try to address, but saying that, I also want to refer back to what I mentioned about reading what the users want, not necessarily directly what they want, but finding the bigger value.

Behind what they're asking for. So as I mentioned, not necessarily they will tell you about the contactless payments. It's up to you to build that solution, but they want fast and a safe, secure ways of paying. [00:28:00] So you can achieve that in a number of ways. Finding that competitive advantages on one hand, being able to listen to the users, not necessarily directly, but what's.

Under underlying needs they have, and then making this creative, great part of the job descriptions that we do, creating product, being creative and finding a way technologies to address that client demands, client need, they mentioned.

Monica Millares: Thank you, Pavel. As product people, like one of our jobs is to create a culture of innovation, to come up with new ideas, different perspectives, to be open minded. How do we go about creating that culture and creating that mindset across the organization? What's your secret sauce?

Pawel Stezycki: Hmm. I would say that the, the part that I've learned can be [00:29:00] underestimated is about being humble to the people who've been in, especially if you're in a bigger company.

Hmm. Like, and I've been in this role trying to build, improve innovation in well established companies. You need to be humble about the people who are already here. Perhaps you need to change their way of thinking, but this does not entitle you to, show a hint that you, don't have respect for what have they been doing?

Like the worst thing that can happen. And it does happen. Literally. I've seen it happen. You can close your innovation team in a. Crystal tower, you know, in a super innovative lab and expect that it's going to transform the company. And I would say that it's the last thing that will work.

You need to have that team of people who are more open minded thinking. Future [00:30:00] thinking and that type of stuff, thinking how to change the product. You need to inject these, teams, that type of talent into the company and them to evangelize, change the product, support them. Obviously you need that stakeholder support.

So I would say that my secret sauce, what I would encourage is to inject these skills, methodologies, approach as in as many as possible parts of the company and push people to work together on various workshops, planning, and moving forward with the product.

Agile, fast, and, reasonably. Right. It was effective iterations. So that's my secret sauce. And actually the one thing I would like people to remember is to be humble when you're innovating, even if you know [00:31:00] that you're changing it for the better.

Monica Millares: I love that. And I think I haven't heard that perspective. When we talk about innovation, it's like, oh yeah, this methodology, be open minded, try this, iterate this, the other.

Pawel Stezycki: We can't, we do it, we have this great idea, we'll change it. And then first of all, even if you're right, you're not building supporters for your idea with that approach, people will be pushed back.

And you don't want this, obviously, teams change the world, not individuals. Plus, you may be missing out something. I mean, the people who has been for longer, maybe they know this is not possible because I don't know, there is some regulation that will mess up your whole idea. And then you can make full out of yourself.

Monica Millares: Yeah. I think that's a key message. It hits strong, like just be humble and then basically work together. In that environment.

Pawel Stezycki: Yeah. I wonder [00:32:00] how this differs between cultures. Some culture have for them, it's like some business cultures for them.

It's easier to, be humble and have respect for people who've been there longer. And some are just like, Hey, we're going to change this, dum, dum, dum. And then you can end up with total mess. Like you take over a huge social media company and six months later, it's a mess, right? And you need to change his name.

Monica Millares: Yeah, that is very true. Well, it's different culture, different approaches, different leaders and personalities, which talking about different, that takes me to diversity, which is so important, especially when it comes to building product and innovation. Well, and to me for everything what do you think are the practical actions that we can take as an industry to make it better and like for.

women, minorities, and to have more diversity.

Pawel Stezycki: So to say [00:33:00] something new, because you, we probably heard lots of comments to, balance the teams, which is obviously true, but I want to recall the referring back to the Podcast I heard last week, and I think it was by Indicator by Planet Money.

I I do recommend that one. And they were looking into some data as for diversity in particular diversity and supporting, well, different approach to moms and dads when they're working. So this scientist in us, she sent out. Email message to thousands of schools in the US asking them to contact, I mean, she pretended that she, the parents are sending the email and they were asking school to contact, to call them back.

And there was a number to John and Mary or like to, dad and to [00:34:00] mom. And guess who would be called, right? Who would schools call more often?

Yeah, so it turned out that I think 40% of more often mom would be called. And they they pointed out that moms get. Distracted more often by the system and also for dads, it's easier to work professionally and have kids because they have fewer distractions and it's , so I would say maybe I think something new to the diversity discussion and consider like, aren't you treating.

That's in your company in a different way that you're treating moms in your company And maybe you should I mean I've been making that mistake with some of my friends like your mom Okay, maybe you want to take go home early and take care [00:35:00] of your kids, but I would never ask that well, maybe I would now but I would not defer with my colleagues who have kids and I would not think of them like that.

Maybe you want to go home and take care of your kid. So yeah, parenthood is something that may make a difference. And maybe it's good to consider when you're planning your diversity approach.

Monica Millares: I absolutely love that approach, Pavel. Thank you. , I think it's a very practical thing to do reconsider your parenthood approach in the workplace and how you treat women and men different because of gender when it comes to parenthood slash motherhood. That's a big lesson.

Pawel Stezycki: They both have kids usually, right?

There's a mom and dad in most of the cases. So both of them would be treated the same way.

Yes.

Monica Millares: I [00:36:00] like that. Thank you. So it's been a fascinating conversation. Thank you so much for your time, Pavel. Where can we find you and

Pawel Stezycki: NetGuru? Well as for NetGuru, we have a great website and it's the best place to learn what we are doing. For myself. The best way to find me is obviously LinkedIn.

I try to make it interesting, share some thoughts about technology, financial services, but not in a boring way. So every couple of days I share some posts, sometimes articles. Please follow me. Let me know if you like to reach out or have some questions. I love meeting people and in social media on LinkedIn and having some discussions.

Monica Millares: Awesome. Thank you, Pavel. And I'll definitely add all your details in the show notes so people can reach out and ask more about Alpha Generations the future of banking [00:37:00] in 2030. Motherhood and parenthood, how we change that and products in general. It's been a pleasure, Pavel. Thank you so much.