Episode 3: Discovering FinTech Talent through “FinYology - FinTech for Youth”
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Last year in February 2020, the Central Bank of Egypt launched
an initiative called “FinYology - FinTech For Youth”, in collaboration with the
Egyptian Banking Institute as its strategic partner, to raise awareness on
FinTech among university undergrad and postgrad students, in addition to
exploring young talent by encouraging and supporting the creation of innovative
FinTech solutions to modern-day financial problems in Egypt.
This ongoing initiative was the subject of the third episode
of the FinTech Egypt Dialogue podcast, and an excited audience sat listening
attentively as moderator Hossam Mahmoud, Advisor for Startup Finance, GIZ, kicked
things off and introduced the guest lineup. The three speakers attending the
third session were Dr. Lamya El Ayouby, Associate Professor of Entrepreneurship
at New Giza University, Mr Emad Shawky, Head of Digital Factory and Innovation
at Banque Misr, and Ms. Laila El Oteifi, Senior Director, Research &
Awareness Department at The Egyptian Banking Institute.
Mr Emad Shawky led the introduction phase by giving a brief
overview of his role at Banque Misr, where he has been for 3 years so far.
Being involved at the crossroads between technology and financial services for
more than 20 years, Mr Shawky has held tenure at various financial institutions
across his career, where he harnessed the power of technology to enable growth
into different markets and acquire more clients for these organizations.
The moderator went on to ask Mr Shawky to elaborate on the
gaps he thinks are found in the current FinTech talent market, as well as what
kind of talents they have now at Digital Factory and what kind of talents they
are looking to attract. He stated that, although the current team is made up of
a young, unique and agile workforce that is delivering a new generation of
FinTech services, he believes his organization is in need of a lot of fresh talent
that will do things in a different way, but that also comes with its challenges;
new graduates need to learn and research a lot to face the rapid pace of
technology and its implications on the industry, typically taking up a lot of
time and effort for them to prepare themselves, and he mentioned that this has
been facilitated by the FinYology initiative that adds FinTech to the students’
curricula, but it is still not enough to deal with the huge potential that
awaits them.
Following with Ms. Laila El Oteifi, Senior Director,
Research & Awareness Department at the Egyptian Banking Institute
introduced herself again to the audience, and highlighted her career which
spanned more than 13 years in the banking sector. She mentioned that her
research department at EBI allowed her to conduct many awareness-raising
seminars, conferences and workshops on financial literacy, and the department
also releases a series of periodical studies and publications covering a wide
selection of critical trends and themes of the industry, in addition to
organizing different training sessions and competitions for emerging bankers. When
asked about the young talent at EBI, Ms. El Oteifi mentioned the various
programs that they have for nurturing this talent, like finance certificates
and anti-money laundering programs, and other departments like IT that handle
education on FinTech, RegTech and other financial technology branches. EBI also
recently launched entrepreneurship programs and an in-house business incubator
that elevates students from ideation to incubation for the last couple of
years. These efforts that combine business knowledge and financial awareness offer
a comprehensive approach to creating the digital bankers and FinTech heroes of
tomorrow, embodied in the several seminars that EBI conducts at Egyptian
universities. Hosam Mahmoud asked about how students and interested people in
general can follow all these efforts and get updates, to what Ms. El Oteifi
replied that the EBI website contains all the information, and students can
either call the institute or contact their dedicated customer support team to
get answers to all their inquiries about any program offered.
Dr. Lamya El Ayouby, Associate Professor of Entrepreneurship
at New Giza University, then took to the digital stage to answer a question
about her journey as a FinTech educator that keeps students aware and updated
with the latest FinTech trends and practices. Dr. Lamya has been teaching
entrepreneurship for 10 years, and she stated that her main approach is to get
her students real-world case studies that they can study and understand through
a hands-on approach. Although her programs did not previously focus on FinTech
but rather the business side, she was later introduced to the FinYology
initiative by Dr. Rasha Negm, Head of FinTech & Innovation at the Central
Bank of Egypt (CBE), after which she researched FinTech as an industry and
found it to be a treasure trove for her business students. Unfortunately that
passion was implemented during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, which has led to
her conducting her lessons about FinTech online with her students, which proved
to be challenging in terms of having to introduce a new, somewhat complicated
topic like FinTech remotely.
Dr. Lamya also emphasized that although the current FinTech
ecosystem in Egypt has been addressing many pending problems and has been
greatly empowering and supporting startups, banks and financial institutions,
FinTech education tends to focus on those entities while leaving out two
important elements that will complete the cycle once addressed; the current
level of financial literacy needs to be raised quickly, as she believes these
will be the early adopters of new technologies, and also the gap in talent
availability in Egypt as Mr. Shawky mentioned.
The “FinYology - FinTech for Youth” initiative has been
getting traction with university students across Egypt, with more than 600
students participating in creating over 280 projects and resulting in 35
awarded internships won by students. The third episode of the FinTech Egypt
Dialogue has certainly yielded some great insights and information from leading
experts that can help bridge the gap between FinTech-passionate students and
the required talent pool that will eventually spearhead the digital change into
the next phase of FinTech solutions in Egypt.
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