Cashflow’s CEO talks careers, diversity and “Women in Fintech”
Hannah Fitzsimons is the CEO of Cashflows – the London-based digital payments fintech. She joined the company in May 2022 after more than a decade at Elavon, holding several positions and working her way up to EVP and General Manager.
She has spent her career working across the finance and fintech industries in roles at Citibank and Natwest and has built high-performing, international teams with a track record of rapid expansion and growth, as well as being a champion of diversity and innovation at the workplace.
We caught up with her to find out more about her journey and experiences as a female CEO in the fintech industry.
Tell us about your role at Cashflows and how you became CEO?
I joined Cashflows, a payment service provider and merchant that makes it easy for businesses to accept payments, in May 2022, after more than 15 years at Elavon. Having previously held senior positions at Citi Bank and NatWest, Cashflows presented a new challenge. Having worked in a number of large companies, I wanted to be part of a rapidly growing scale-up, building technology from the ground up with the future in mind. And it seems that I joined at the perfect time, after an impressive growth period in 2020 to 2021. My ambition is to take Cashflows to new heights, to make a difference to our customers and partners and to change the fintech industry to better.
From initial integration to the day-to-day process of accepting payments from customers, Cashflows works with merchants every step of the way to ensure the process is fast, efficient and hassle-free. Our products and services are built on the latest technology and we exist to serve sellers, today, tomorrow and forever.
I’m also proud to support Women in Payments, advocating for more opportunities for women in fintech to learn about issues and trends, network with peers and celebrate their achievements across the payments ecosystem.
What trend has had the biggest impact on driving diversity in fintech in the past year?
Towards the end of 2022, we started to see Big Tech companies make significant acquisitions of payments companies, with $1.2 billion invested in 14 fintechs last year. This is a trend that is set to continue as Big Tech companies look for a piece of the payments pie.
But where diversity comes into it, the Big Tech companies will not be completely unleashed on the payments industry, as new regulations are introduced. The UK is establishing a pro-competitive regime for digital markets that will actively increase competition and innovation by combating the harmful effects and sources of majority market power. This new regime will ensure that smaller fintechs can continue to thrive, diversify and increase innovation to fundamentally transform digital markets. The UK Government’s action in the landscape shows a clear appetite to increase and drive further diversity in the sector, which will hopefully inspire more female leaders to join the sector.
Which areas of fintech are seeing the biggest increase in female leadership and interest – and why?
In general, more women are considering careers in payments and fintech – a much-needed change in the industry.
Anecdotally, I see more and more women looking at opportunities in financial inclusion, as many are driven by the same goals as myself – to have a direct, positive impact on people’s lives and businesses.
In your experience, which areas of fintech do not attract women – and how can this be resolved?
The more technical side of fintech still suffers from a lack of female representation. Engineering roles in particular are strongly male-dominated. There is a perception that this has always been the case, but in reality, when programming first came into existence in the 60s, it was almost exclusively the domain of women! What this tells me is that the problem is not that women are not interested in engineering, coding and product development, but that there are structural barriers in place that need to be addressed by coherent industry and government initiatives.
The problem is circular, as the lack of women in technical leadership positions means a lack of role models and advocates. With only 5.6% of fintech CEOs globally being women and less than 4% holding the title of Chief Innovation or Technology Officer, there is a giant gap in female fintech representation.
As a female fintech executive, I know firsthand how challenging it can be to break through in a male-dominated industry, and as such, I’m passionate about helping others do the same with partners like TechSheCan.
What changes would you like to see take place in fintech over the next year or so?
Apart from more female representation, over the next year, it is important that the fintech industry invests in education and transparency. The level of complexity in the payments industry has increased dramatically in recent years, so it is understandable that decision makers have found it challenging to keep up. However, this lack of understanding can create significant difficulties for SMEs, especially as costs continue to rise.
In our recent People Behind Payments report, we asked our small and medium-sized business (SME) respondents if they understood the UK payments industry, with 7 in 10 (72%) saying they did. But when asked to place different parts of the payment value chain to show how a transaction is handled, 96% answered incorrectly. In 2023, payment providers will need to do more to help SMBs understand the payment process, providing key insights to decision makers.
To help the education process, the industry needs a fundamental transparency overhaul. The Payment Service Regulator (PSR) has already published recommendations to increase transparency around products and services – stating that payment services need to be improved to better support business – because it is clear that our industry needs to evolve now. By increasing transparency, payment services will become more accessible to SMEs and will therefore become a less onerous task for payment decision makers to manage.
