What do you do if you need to simplify intricate Financial Technology concepts in an interview?

When giving an interview, it's certainly important to know your audience, but it's equally crucial to thoroughly understand the person you'll be speaking with—do your homework, learn about their strengths and limitations. The success of an interview depends on the engagement of the interviewer. And we all, interviewers included, first and foremost, appreciate attention to ourselves, and secondly, we like clarity. Therefore, an interviewer to whom you can relate will help you reveal much more depth—knowing them well is essential.

Communication and teamworking in cross functional, multinational teams is prevalent and critical in the fintech sector. Clear and comprehensible communication can be achieved if you know your audience and their level of interaction with the fintech sector and their understanding of the fintech terminology. Once I am are aware of my audience and their background (or industry) I find this most useful in tailoring or simplifying my communication/message to suit. One approach I take is to use related terminology from my audience's industry that has a parallel with fintech terminology . e.g. some fintech terms have parallels in the financial services and securities sectors

I like to resolve tricky problems. At work, I face complex insurance accounting issues. They are complex because they are often technical, involve convoluted processes, many teams, different business units, emerging project teams and sometimes changing leaders. They are hard problems to automate, delegate and sometimes to even describe fully. Skills and experience help bring the effort of me and others with resilience, determination and a little creativity to find a good solution. #insuranceindustry #financialtechnology

Break down complex concepts by using analogies or real-world examples that your interviewer can easily relate to. Explain cryptocurrency wallets by likening them to digital versions of physical wallets that hold your digital currency instead of cash.

In my view, it's not the analogies themselves that are important. Analogies should be used with an understanding of your interviewer's background because, like any narrative, the use of analogies involves a great deal of subjectivity. Each interviewer brings their own set of perspectives that they can grasp—some may be more humanities-oriented, others more technical. Some may have expertise in fintech, while others might not but understand cybersecurity instead. Therefore, it's crucial to tailor your analogies to the context of whom you're speaking with at the moment.

In my fintech work, I draw parallels in other fields or areas of everyday life to help to dissect complex fintech terms; particularly for persons who don't operate in the finance or tech spaces. This helps to simplify the terms and make them more comprehensible and digestible; particularly for the non-technical or layman audience. Drawing relevant parallels in finance for a person with a finance helps immensely (for e.g. ICOs in the crypto industry and IPOs in traditional finance).

Another important consideration is whether to simplify financial concepts. Certainly, if you're aiming to discuss your product with the broadest audience because they are your potential clients, then simplification is essential. If not, I would argue that such interviews might not be necessary. Perhaps for a non-financial audience, it might be better to talk about something else, like your business history, or your journey as an entrepreneur—all depending on the goal of the interview. After all, interviews often fail and become irrelevant because people haven’t asked themselves why they are telling this to a particular audience and what they hope to achieve as a result. This should really be the first question to consider.