Fintech
DEI in action: Fintech companies that are getting involved
This June on The Fintech Times, we’re focusing on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI). No longer just a trending topic, but an essential consideration for not only your business operations, but your offerings, this topic seems more relevant than ever.
The fintech sector is known for its reputation for innovation and flexibility, but it still faces a significant diversity problem that risks stunting its growth and preventing innovation.
Rather than just focus on the work that still needs to be done, we here at The Fintech Times also wanted to recognize the great work already being done by fintech companies that are shining a light on DEI. Here are just a few of the companies that are stepping up and showing diversity in action.
Huge value
Raf De Kimpe, CEO at Fintech Week London, She said:
“For Fintech Week London, diversity, equity and inclusion is one of the pillars on which our events are built. I firmly believe that a diverse event, both on and off stage, has a huge value added. Since our first event in 2021, over 50% of speakers have identified as women at our flagship conference. However, it doesn’t stop there. We work hard to ensure our stage represents society, focusing on the inclusion of people of colour and diverse voices everywhere. We are delighted to see the diversity on stage reflected in our audience.
“As a business-to-business event in the fintech and financial services sector, I believe it is important to shed light on how fintech can be used for good. In fact, throughout the afternoon sessions of Fintech for Good, we worked with My clear text, a text-to-speech company who agreed to sponsor us by providing closed captioning for these sessions, once again making our event more inclusive for people who are hard of hearing or neurodiverse. These subtitles were also provided during the panel “Women in Fintech: Inspiring Inclusion and Achieving Together” and our charity partner’s keynote speech Street child.”
A welcoming workplace
Lina Burdenkova, director of organizational development at the all-in-one financial platform for businesses, ConnectPay, She said:
“ConnectPay has a strong focus on making the workplace friendly for specialists with children. As Lithuania has the fourth largest number of young professionals (aged 24-34) with higher education in the EU, many demanding and highly responsible jobs are performed by parents with young children. ConnectPay supports employees with families by allowing them to decide how to work best: they can work from home more often during their children’s holidays or bring them to the office. In addition, parents have flexible working hours, which means they can easily align their parenting responsibilities with their work at ConnectPay.
“We recognize that the need for flexibility can arise for a variety of reasons, so all ConnectPay employees are encouraged to utilize flexible hours and take extra days off to prioritize their mental wellbeing.
We also aim to bring greater gender equality to Lithuanian fintech and consistently maintain a balanced gender ratio at all levels of the company. In particular, 63 percent of employees at the executive and director levels are women. The pay gap varies very slightly between different levels, as we are keen to achieve the best possible balance. For example, women in specialist positions earn about 4 percent more than their male colleagues.”
Why and what?
Emanuele Smadja, co-founder and CEO of MPOWER financing, International student loan providers said:
“The company I co-founded and have run for the past decade, MPOWER Financing, is one of the most diversified companies on the planet and won 6 DEI awards last year alone. But DEI is not an end in itself, it is a means to improve decision making and ultimately improve a company’s profitability and sustainability. Starting with the “why” you want DEI and the “what” it means in your workplace are therefore critical to ensuring that DEI efforts support your business goals and are not just a box-ticking exercise.
“At MPOWER, this meant building a team that reflected the diversity of our international student customers, in terms of gender, age, nationality, religion and marital/family status, so we could better understand and address the unique needs and challenges of our customers. Another important ‘Do’ is ‘Do start early’ or ‘Don’t accumulate Diversity Debt’. At MPOWER, this meant we started recruiting outside of my network and the co-founder’s network since first employee”
Social impact
Eve the Gatherer, founder of the real estate investment portal, Small change, She said:
“Many companies declare a strong commitment to DEI but neglect to take concrete and effective actions. To ensure DEI efforts go beyond formal commitments, fintechs should identify clear goals and measure progress against them. One of the most important initiatives we have undertaken at Small Change is the creation of a proprietary index (The Small Change Index) that measures a wide range of factors to determine the social impact of a project. These factors include the representation of minorities and women in project leadership, the extent to which communities surrounding a project are underserved, and environmental standards.
“We only list projects that achieve a 60% impact score. This has resulted in strong branding and DEI returns for Small Change. Although the criteria we use are specific to real estate development, fintechs in other sectors can and should develop their own rigorous criteria. Additionally, they should be prepared to report on their progress to various stakeholders, which will increase accountability. No one should expect overnight success, but clear and decisive steps will slowly but surely improve DEI in the fintech sector.”
Prioritize inclusion
My friend Lovanstrategic director of VizyPay, a fintech company serving small businesses in rural America, said:
“At VizyPay we act proactively to prioritize inclusion in the workplace. Our initiatives are included in all strategies, policies and programs that aim to promote our number one “why”: culture. In an unfamiliar area, when referring to DEI, people automatically think of the color of someone’s skin or their gender and check the box to indicate that they have DEI covered. This is not DEI. In VizyPay’s eyes, it’s about understanding the differences in each of us and applying inclusion strategies.
“It all starts with our talent acquisition process, which is centered around the candidate experience. Resumes don’t drive us, the individual does. To create a powerful and inclusive fintech workplace, you must first know your employees. Many of our employees don’t have college degrees or specialized backgrounds in a specific role, so VizyPay’s talent development programs include areas for skills training. Likewise, because many of our leaders are homegrown, we reframe the role: Our leaders are not bosses and shouldn’t be referred to as such. Our leaders are coaches, who understand their employees and bring out the best in them. We operate with open lines of communication, promoting our transparency and bringing awareness to trending issues that impact our people.”
Different voices
Nicholas Valentine, fintech director at Milken Institute, a think tank, said:
“DEI is integrated into the mission, values and activities of our fintech program. Our focus on financial inclusion and access to capital guides our research and analysis, policy priorities and the content we amplify. Diverse voices and leaders of thinking are essential to both telling the stories of fintech’s evolution and designing the future of finance On our global platforms, private policy roundtables and publications, we highlight founders and experts who bring unique and strategic perspectives from diverse groups across. including people of color, Indigenous people, LGBTQ people, and immigrants. The impact of ensuring representation in all these spaces enables representation at major fintech companies and government committees and initiatives. Our approach to DEI is ongoing and intentional.
“Diversity of teams, ideas and experiences brings solutions to our most complex and difficult problems. At the Milken Institute, we focus on equity that leads to the creation of new systems that value ownership and profit sharing. And inclusion is the big why of financial technology, as it is a fundamental element that puts the end user at the center and reminds the industry that we are building products and services for all people and that all people have a role in making them work better.”
Everyday reality
Zahra Alubudico-founder and COO of Level, alternative financing provider for SaaS businesses,
“Given that Levenue is a post Series A scale-up, we are in a unique position because for us the company culture is still very much informed and set by our founding team’s purpose for creating the company in the first place. As a co-founder and COO of Levenue, are a rather rare example in the world of financial services, and even more so in financial technology, where women represent only 4 percent of CEOs, only 18 percent of executive committee members and a paltry 7.7 percent of entrepreneurs in financial technology. I’m female, I’m young, and I have a diverse ethnic background. So when I talk about DEI, it’s not just a theoretical and conceptual point, it’s my actual lived experience that I bring to our business, in service of mine. team and our customers and partners.
“Since Levenue’s inception, we’ve placed DEI at the center of our company’s policies, considering three key things: what DEI means to us; how our leadership can set the tone for DEI efforts; and how we will adapt and evolve to translate ambition into daily reality. Especially in the early stages, when we didn’t have an HR team, leadership engagement was critical in making hiring and advancement decisions and holding each other accountable. It continues to be a priority as our company grows and our DEI policies evolve to reflect and support our goal of being a truly inclusive and exceptional company to work for and with.”
