Sarah Sinclair
Co-Founder and CEO at Change Gap
Please introduce yourself and your background in finance and fintech
I’m the co-founder and CEO of Change Gap. I started my career journey as a computer science graduate working in software engineering before realising I didn’t feel “geeky” enough. I was more interested in the business side of things. Later on, after several decades working in the financial services industry and feeling compelled to do something to help create a stronger future for financial services, just over 4 years ago, I co-founded Change Gap.
As a female leader, have you experienced any challenges at work before you founded your own company?
When I was contracting, I thought I would like to one day become a director of one of the big banks because I had the talent and knowledge for it. But it became clear that I felt held back as I didn't have the ‘profile’ of someone who is normally entrusted with those titles. I felt like an outsider, and having strong ethics and wanting to make positive changes, didn’t make me feel I was in demand. Only now, having created my own business, I realise that what I saw as an issue, I now see as an advantage. I definitely did on many occasions, struggle to be heard and appreciated, in a strongly male dominated work environment - and yes, there were times where I have been a victim of foul play in the work environment, causing real impact both mentally, emotionally and ultimately, financially. Interestingly, I have found it easier to navigate these issues, as a business owner, and I am so pleased to have found support and respect from both men and women who share the same values as that in our mission. Regrettably, though, the scale and depth of the challenges are still very real, so despite much good work to redress the balance, there is a huge effort required to achieve genuine change and supporting women at all stages of their careers.
What do you think are the qualities female fintech leaders should embrace?
The 2008 financial crisis revealed the systemic lack of trust in the financial services industry. Sadly, here we are 16 years later, and there is still insufficient evidence of real change in this regard (add to this a lack of trust in technology, including fintech). So, in today’s fintech environment, I think it is critically important to be trustworthy and authentic as a leader. You need to be a leader who really supports people and demonstrates commitment to diversity and inclusion.
What kind of initiatives need to take place to support diversity and change within fintech?
My view is that we need to know what data ‘matters’ in order to make the right decisions. Without trustworthy data, you don’t really have a good global or local picture. What are we targeting? What are our diversity goals? What exactly do we measure, and how? How far are we from our goals? These and other questions must be disclosed and measured in a transparent way. We also need to tackle the problem of diversity holistically. And we need to have tangible examples of where the gaps are and how we address them. Ultimately, then, it is people that will make the changes happen. The data we need to collect, measure and report, must be relatable to all, and communicated in a way that drives people to take action.
