Tech Tuesday: The Role of Education in the Future of Financial Services
Scarlett Sieber
Chief Strategy & Growth Officer, Money20/20. Contributor, Forbes. Author, Wiley. International Speaker. Board Member.
Meet Tram Anh. A woman on a mission to inspire and equip the next generation of financial service professionals with the skills for the future.
Tram and I share the belief that in a world dominated by technology, people must remain at the center of society and organizations. From her experience navigating between the corporate and entrepreneurial worlds, she has seen that education and training are key to helping individuals adapt and thrive.
This experience drove her to launch the Center for Finance, Technology, and Entrepreneurship (CFTE), an education platform supported by senior leaders from the largest institutions, startups and universities around the world. Today, Tram and her team are bridging the worlds of finance and technology equipping individuals with the skills required to succeed in our rapidly changing world.
#TechTuesday Highlight #26: Tram Anh Nguyen, Co-founder, Centre for Finance, Technology and Entrepreneurship
Tell us more about what you do and how did you move into Fintech?
I am the co-founder of CFTE – the Centre for Finance, Technology and Entrepreneurship – and an Industry Fellow at Imperial College Business School.
My world is from traditional finance. I first began my career as a trader at Standard Chartered in New York in 2000. I then moved to Dresdner Kleinwort in Capital Markets in London. I made a big shift from the world of capital markets to joining UBS Private Banking where I worked with the largest UHNW clients.
A couple of years ago, I left banking to start my own venture. I quickly realised by leaving the world of finance that there was a disruptive world that was shaping in Finance.
It was by attending the Singapore Fintech Festival in 2016 that I realised the importance of education in Digital Finance. It was by listening to Ravi Menon of MAS on stage in front of 12,000 people urging everyone to understand the world of finance was in disruption.
Today, I built CFTE with the first Fintech campus in the world in London. Our mission is to help people to learn and to encourage lifelong learning in Digital Finance.
Our mission is to provide education at scale to professionals working in the financial services industry. The accelerated pace of innovation in the industry is transforming every aspect of the industry and organizations are catching up to adapt. This creates an urgency for professionals to upskill or face losing their job. I was myself in this needs of learning. Our purpose is to bring knowledge, to empower people and for them to see opportunities.
What does being a woman in fintech mean to you?
A few years ago, I moved away from finance to venture into the world of education in Fintech. This originated primarily from a drive I always had to create a lasting impact. While there are many ways to create a lasting impact, I was personally most drawn to the medium of education as a change maker. With CFTE, I look to provide a significantly better representation of those who are often missing out on traditional finance education. This can be shown by CFTE’s 40,000+ learners coming from over 100+ countries and from very diverse backgrounds.
When I started my career in finance on the trading floor in New York approximately two decades ago, the sheer lack of women in the industry quickly became apparent, and it is still the case. This experience, together with the desire to make an impact, has prompted me to support women in the finance, technology and FinTech spaces.
With CFTE we take special care to ensure that women can empower themselves through using our education platform. As a result, over 40% of CFTE’s learners are women, which is an astonishing percentage once compared to the extremely low women participation rate of women in Finance. I am proud to witness some incredible women within CFTE.
Today, the world of Fintech is a world full of new opportunities, so we are in a much stronger industry for those who understand it. Women, this is your world too!
Having successful and innovative women in our courses provide excellent examples of what is possible in the world of Fintech. We have incredible experts in our online programmes as well, Anne Boden, Ayesha Khanna, Winnie Cheng, Claire Calmejane, Melissa Guzy and many more and of course including you.
Not only will the barriers of traditional finance be disrupted, but also the barriers created by gender. CFTE allows anyone to empower themselves to flourish in the new world of finance.
What challenges do you think women face in Fintech?
Lack of role models and lack of women in leadership roles
What advice would you give to other women starting out and growing their careers in Fintech?
Start your Fintech journey by learning!
What are 3 keywords to describe Fintech for 2019?
Education in Fintech, Artificial Intelligence in Finance, Innovation and its impact on people.
Who is a person that inspires you? Why?
One person who inspires me the most is my grandmother who came to the US from Vietnam and established herself. She built up a few businesses from scratch, and she is well-respected by her community. I respect and love her a lot. She is no longer with us.
What advice would you give for someone who wants to get into your space?
Start learning and be part of a strong community of people to share and to network. I believe in peer to peer learning. This world is full of opportunities for those who can learn and adapt fast. there's so much to learn and so much demand for talent!
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Have thoughts on this week’s trends or questions for me or Tram? Post your thoughts in the comment section or share them on Twitter. Please include the hashtag #techtuesday and mention me @ScarlettSieber! Until next week. ??
You can connect with Tram on Twitter and LinkedIn
#fintech #techtuesday #womenintech #startup #education #training #p2plearning #cfte #futureoftech #culture
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Want more insights from the movers and shakers of the tech industry?
Read past #techtuesday articles:
Entrepreneur
5 年It is a challenge, how I can get your course or be part of your training program. I live in Lima,Peru. As far as I know, we don’t have that course not at the school or university . Please contact me in private. Thank you ??
Entrepreneur
5 年Silvio Burneo Macedo Samantha Burneo
Pricipal, College Of Nursing (SKIMS) | Educationist | Medico | Environmentalist
5 年Role of education in financial services is of great importance
Graduate Teaching Assistant at Abadina College UI
5 年please educate Us more, I personally want to learn.