Ep 28. The one thing you can change to have most impact

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[00:00:00]

Introduction and Onboarding Requirements

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That's a very good question. For me, I would change the onboarding requirements. I would make them more plausible or at least helping people understand why this information is being collected and then too, I would.

I would make it as widely available as possible. As long as it's a legal. issued document, I would accept it. I wouldn't limit it to just the U. S. issued IDs and the U. S. issued passports. I would take Mexican passports, Argentinian passports, Canadian passports out.

And then you would give a lot more people that inclusion that we're talking.

Host Introduction and Favorite Question

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Hello, and welcome back to Purpose Driven Fintech. I am your host, Moni Millares. Today, we have a compilation episode with my favorite question. I always ask this question at the end of the episode, which is, Hey, if you were to change one thing in fintech that could have the most impact to customers, colleagues, and investors, what would that be?

The immediate response from [00:01:00] almost everyone is. That's a tough question, Ronika. So today let's hear what our guest had to say in 2023. Let's go for it.

Customer-Centric Business Models

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If there was one thing, just one thing that you can change in the industry in FinTech, such that members of staff, customers, and shareholders have a better life. What could that be? I, it's one thing, I can think of many things, but I'll try and bring it to one for you. One thing, it should already be there, but it's not for everyone.

It is for some businesses, but it's not always, always put the, the consumer, customer. At the heart of every single thing that you do, you need robust business models. You need great teams. And we've got a fantastic team of intelligent people, engaged people, but you need great processes. You need all of that stuff, but it's [00:02:00] all for nothing.

If the consumer is not right at the heart of all of your thinking. I agree. And you use the key word, many people could say at the center of what you do, but you use at the heart of everything you do. And that makes a massive difference. But see, it's like massive difference. Center of what we do, heart of what we do.

Yes. The customer should be at the heart.

If there was one thing that you would change in FinTech that would have the most impact for customers, staff, and shareholders, what could that be?

Eliminating Acronyms for Inclusivity

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I would abandon acronyms. I'd abandon acronyms, which is such a simple thing to do because A, it's annoying, but B. All they do is say, this is exclusive, you can't come in, you're not clever enough.

It knocks people's confidence [00:03:00] in meetings. It causes people to doubt themselves. And this is everyone, because I came across a new acronym today. Just read Horizon Scanning Competition Law. SMS. What does SMS mean to you? Text. Yeah. And probably it's not the text, it's something else. Text messaging.

Absolutely, text messages. In competition law, I can't even remember, what does it mean? Can't find my very tiny notes. Strategic, market, something beginning with S. It means your company has an impact in a market and so you need to be directly regulated by the competition authority. It's stupid because not only does it say this is an exclusive club, that if you can't remember the name of this acronym in this meeting, you're not in.

And, all it does is create confusion. Yes. Why would you have throughout your company, throughout your products, run [00:04:00] your meetings? Why would you do something creates confusion? So the one thing is I would abandon acronyms and that whole philosophy because it only serves to exclude people. And by breaking that down, of course I'm leading on to, we need to be a more inclusive society.

And give opportunities for people's talent and capability, not just those that we expect. Yes. And the summary of the acronyms is language. Language matters. The how we communicate matters a lot.

Simplifying Onboarding Processes

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If you were to change one thing in the FinTech industry that could have the most impact to customers, colleagues, and investors, what could you change? Oh, what would I change? That's a very good question. For me, I would, I would change the onboarding requirements. I would make them more plausible or at [00:05:00] least helping people understand why this information is being collected and then too, I would.

Make it as a battle that we're fighting. I would make it as widely available as possible. As long as it's a legal. issued document, I would accept it. I wouldn't limit it to just the U. S. issued IDs and the U. S. issued passports. I would take Mexican passports, Argentinian passports, Canadian passports out.

And then you would give a lot more people that inclusion that we're talking. Yes. I think that sounds sensible because then you give accessibility to everyone, regardless of their nationality. You can open the account anyway. So now make it easy, frictionless.

If you were to change one thing in FinTech that can improve the lives of customers, staff, and shareholders, what could you change?

Understanding FinTech Differences

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That's a tricky question. I think the one thing that needs change or is [00:06:00] necessary is to understand that they're different. It's the understanding of their difference or acknowledgement of their difference.

FinTech is not a bank. Or an insurance company and bank is not a fintech and an insurance company. And by understanding, like with humans, by accepting who you are, you've actually achieved everything. I think we as stakeholders have many, many different roles of what financials work, what fintechs we do.

We need to understand that they're different and treat them as such. And I think that is the key tool. Mutually beneficial relationship, partnership, success, understanding that

If there was one thing in FinTech that you could change that could make the lives of customers, shareholders, [00:07:00] and members of staff better, what would that be? I actually think that a lot of the work that's being done in FinTech is actually about changing things. It's about making things. Faster, cheaper, safer, more accessible.

And I also think that there are less solutions out there looking for a problem, which was, uh, I think a bit of an issue a couple of years ago. Again, going back to the start, making that positive impact always needs to be at the center. And then at the same time, let's be honest, we're also. Running a business, so is it a viable business, as in, is this a solution that people want to pay for?

Can you make a living? So [00:08:00] it's still, it should not be about making money of it as the one reason. The positive impact for sure is a key value. I think we all need to, uh, hold ourselves to, but yeah. Making positive change and democratizing services so that everyone can benefit from them.

Open Banking and Financial Inclusion

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So what could be the one thing that you're like, Hey, we as an industry, or I as also an API, if we were to do this, the industry could be better. Yeah. And it's almost kind of full circle back to the whole purpose question. So I genuinely believe this shift towards open banking, open finance, open data can have a dramatically positive effects on society and economies.

So I mean, right now there's still a huge part of the world that is unbanked or underbanked. Creating the right [00:09:00] foundations that remove the big cost barriers of the banking industry of today, remove the data barriers and all of these things, I think can. Can genuinely tackle financial inclusion in many different places.

So, but also I think, I mean, we're seeing some central banks and regulators viewing open finance as a central pillar of societal transformation. Government and the authorities in Saudi Arabia have a really ambitious vision for 2030 to transform society and the economy. And open finance is a really important part of that.

It's a driver of economic growth, it's a driver of wealth creation. It's something that can remove barriers and unlock challenges around financial inclusion. So. At the, what we want to do, we want to accelerate and enable that and see all of those good things happening. We're kind of at the foundational infrastructure layer.

That's the end outcome. And as an industry, there's a whole bunch of players [00:10:00] who all have a, a similar vision and a similar aim. Accelerating innovation based around these foundations of sort of secure consent based access via APIs. And the end goal, it's not about individual fintechs doing well or, or PFM propositions.

It's about laying the foundations for a genuinely better society where customers have much more control. Over how they engage with their data, their money, that kind of aspects of their life. But it's laid the foundations to tackle real issues in society. So that's sort of the lofty sort of vision we want to, we want to see happen.

We'll play it, we'll play that, but I genuinely, I genuinely believe. It has that potential. I love it. And I totally agree with you. Probably that's in line with my vision, not, not as a company, but Monica as a [00:11:00] FinTecher that it's like, Hey, yeah, what's the vision of the world? It's like, yeah, it's a world where people accept it's, I don't want to use the word financial inclusion, but it's more like people have like good quality of life, like they can live life with dignity.

Regardless of how much income you have, but it's because we have used finance and technology in a way that enables people to have that better quality of life. Yeah, exactly. I think like as a, as a fintech community, we're all kind of like going towards that, which is awesome. That's why I love, that's why I love the fintech space.

It has impact. Yeah, absolutely. No, agree more.

If you were to change one thing in FinTech that could make the lives of customers, employees, and shareholders better, what could you change? Ooh, just one thing. That's a hard one, Monica.

Consumer Experience in FinTech

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One thing I would change is to really think about the consumer experience. People are like, Oh, we don't want to onboard another vendor or procurement [00:12:00] process takes us time.

Or we're going to build it ourselves. They really often don't. Ear, or think, or consider the user experience. There's a lot of lip service, but it's not really thought through. And I would argue the beauty of some of these challenger banks, when they started, really do care about the consumer experience.

Deep be care about it. And that really makes a difference. If there's one thing I would suggest is because there's so much inertia in what we do, people don't change their backstop frequently. That maybe you don't need to think about the consumer experience that much, but that would be something that I would really advocate that people think about.

Think about the long term value. Of a customer that you captured 18 and getting them all the way through to their 88, right? Think about their different stages in life and thinking about making sure they have a great experience with you because inking great experience, often they don't go together, right?

If there was one thing, just one thing that you could [00:13:00] change in the industry that could make the lives of customers, colleagues, and shareholders better, what would that be? That's a very difficult question because there's a lot of different industries, products. So it would depend on each of the market and segments that we are doing.

But I think that I'll go back to the first question. If you build the products of any kind of segment or any kind of industry or vertical, if you build the products thinking on the customer from the cart, as you said, if you build the products thinking of making them the everyday problem, then you can make a difference one because then the market gets into your, gets into your product and then you have a win.

Definitely.

If there was one thing that you could change in fintech to make fintech better and have more positive impact to customers, [00:14:00] investors, and members of staff, what could that be? That's a tough one. Yes, it is a tough one. One thing I would probably make special fast track due diligence procedure to effectively evaluate, to enable financial institutions effectively evaluate.

Um, to do the fintechs and be able to integrate the fintechs in their lives easier. Interesting. I like that. So it's more of the, how can we collaborate better between fintechs and, and large institutions or not, not, not necessarily fintechs and large institutions, but it's like within the B2B fintech ecosystem with the other fintechs or financial institutions.

And how can we accelerate that process? [00:15:00] And how can we, how can we be synergetic because financial, traditional financial institutions have a lot of what we need to learn from them. But we as the FinTechs also have a lot of value to bring and how it can be synergistic, how it can be brought to the level of effective interaction.

That would probably be the change I would be looking at. Yeah, I like that. It's beyond efficient collaboration. It is proper. How can we work together better? Where I

If there was one thing that you could change in the FinTech industry, such that it would make the lives of customers, members of staff, and shareholders better, what could it be?

Balancing Profit and Sustainability

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If I could do something there, that's a good question. I would say, yes, I [00:16:00] know it's, it sounds a little bit, I would say socialistic or maybe idealistic.

That of course I'm driving, or we are all driving commercial business, which are aiming at, I would say maximization of profit. This, uh, let's say capitalistic system we are all working in. I'm thinking about my own activities and the responsibilities I have. Of course, I have to provide some, yeah, gain and turnover and some, some benefits out of it.

Otherwise it does not work. But now under the impression of this, let's say climate crisis, we are relatively directly heating into, I think it would be a good benefit. And every individual is really reconsidering is this what I'm doing really necessary and. [00:17:00] Do I really have to push, you know, to squeeze the last droplet out of the lemon?

Or is it also sufficient if I only get three droplets out of that lemon and leave the rest to us? Let's say finding the right balance between, of course, a profit driven business, but in the end, try to be a bit more, um, cautious about the resources we all only have. This also means. Maybe I don't have to fly to a meeting, but I can take the train, even it takes two hours or three hours longer, but by this I can reduce my personal carbon footprint, for example.

And yes, always what I really try to balance out is this continuous way of further and further optimization. I think it is not good for [00:18:00] all futures. Everybody's only trying to. Optimize everything until the maximum, there must be some reasonable level where you say, okay, stop, that's enough. We only have sufficient.

I like that. This is my momentum. Because you know what, there's some founders, some founding team, some management team that it's, yeah, we need to drive to make this like the next multi billion dollar company and exactly exploit, exploit to get there. Yes. I understand that motivation. We are working in a money business, of course, money is really creating some kind of desire to get even more.

This is, of course, I, there is a, let's say human reflects and always gaining more wealth. [00:19:00] Yes. But maybe a little bit less would help us all and it would still suffice to, to have a good living. Yeah, I'm pretty sure. Yes, that is very good food for thought.

If you were to change one thing in fintech, just one thing to make fintech better for customers, staff, and shareholders, what would that be?

Financial Education and Partnerships

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Wow. It's a tough one. I think the one thing I would change is having fintech companies and financial institutions partner with governments to promote financial lives and financial education within schools since, from the beginning, when people are kids.

And having like money management, wealth management, spending, having good health financial habits, being part of the [00:20:00] education curricula. And I don't think that's only the government's role to do. I think institutions, fintechs, neobanks, they are the ones that provide those financial products and services to the customers when they are 12 years old, 18, when they get their first job.

And they should be also be responsible and accountable and pushing for that change, right? I think as product managers, we always complain that one of the big pain points is that people don't understand products, people don't know how to use a credit card, so do something about it, right? Education. I have an education blog on my website.

Nobody is going to read it, right? No. People don't have time. I didn't really care, but yeah, I don't. I think I, but, but if you actually promote it from school and make it mandatory, and [00:21:00] they need to get a grade on that to actually get to the next grade and pass the test, then everybody would get out of school at 12 or 18, depending on the opportunities they have in their lives with some level of financial education knowledge, right?

And I think that could really change customer's lives, right? Yeah. And I'm like, that can change the future of humanity as such. Yeah. Yeah. Cool.