Finding Needles in Haystacks #4 | Krishna Halai

What’s your name and what’s your job title?

My name’s Krishna, my job title is operations manager. I’m the first operations manager currently at a FinTech company called Pollen. We’re a software company offering banking services to businesses, so not currently direct to consumers.

What do you do on a normal day?

Strategy in how we grow the business, onboarding clients, compliance, billing, demos, etc. I am looking at the parts that need to scale properly and be able to manage it all if we had 10x the customers that we have now.

Sounds about right for an operations manager. How did you get into FinTech specifically?

It’s really interesting. I previously have experience working in tech, in various startups, working in operations. I had experience with KYC (know your customer) when I worked for a [sharing economy](https://www.investopedia.com/terms/s/sharing-economy.asp#:~:text=The sharing economy involves short,that connects buyers and seller.) startup. I really enjoyed it and learned different parts about it.

I think during the lockdown, everyone kind of stopped and thought ‘what do I want to do? Where do I want to go?’ And I think for me, I really wanted to work in FinTech and I probably hesitated at first because I didn’t have the direct or necessary experience but my employer saw something in me and could see I had the skills to do the job.

It’s funny how sometimes those jobs just fall into place, even though that’s obviously not how it happens, but sometimes it feels that way.

Sometimes the stars just align — it’s a really funny reason that I ended up working at Holland. I have a side hustle and just started a company for it and everything. But one of the areas where my new boss and I bonded was that I put it (which is candle making) on my CV, and actually they came back to me on the phone and said that they did the same!

Of all the things to bond over, candle making is not usually at the top of the list. I guess that can be the big difference between working for a really big company with thousands and thousands of people and going to work for a startup where the founder or CEO clearly recognises that passion/drive in someone else ’cause they’ve probably felt the same way or similar for the company that they’ve started.

Absolutely. Even though it’s not tech related, it’s nice to see so many founders that are in similar spaces actually having a job that enables them to pursue their passion.

I worked with someone who now runs a really big company, but at the time we worked together, his job was just a means to pay the bills while he worked on scaling his other company, which luckily turned out to be quite successful. And I’ve seen multiple people like that, who work at places to understand how things are run to take that knowledge away and build something of their own.

I used to work in politics and have a masters degree in politics and therefore a lot of my friends are still in that space and it’s amazing how different we see and approach work.

Totally. What was your experience like working in the UK Parliament? You worked in parliament, correct?

I interned for a couple of months both as part of my degree and after. I spent time in parliament as well as at my local constituency office with the MP that I worked for. It was intense, it was like living in a bubble. I worked for a labour MP and at the time the government was and still is conservative. I feel like I got to see how things are done, how an opposition works, and directly interact with everyday people.

One of the most difficult things was working in the constituency office — So many people came to us with real problems but I didn’t have the mandate to make a difference which left me feeling deflated.

Working in Westminster was immensely weird. The government isn’t reflective of the general population…. terrible feeling knowing that these are our lawmakers. The first person of colour I saw apart from myself (and the MP) was literally someone working the canteen. I just felt massively out of place and I know it’s gotten better now but at the time I felt really out of place. And the stories the MP told me, the microaggressions they experienced and I mean tech isn’t much better (there are many comparisons) but at the time I knew it wasn’t the place for me and couldn’t see progression.

I know that many people do and are making a difference but it completely deflated me and even though the demographic makeup of parliament and fintech are quite similar, I still feel like I can have more impact on the world working in tech.

Having an impact in your role and being able to see that, not necessarily day to day, but at least over time is so important.

As operation professionals, it’s our job to make sure that the business is running as efficiently as possible. The rest of the people in the company don’t see how many fires have been put out on a monthly basis, they just notice when things go wrong.

What are the parallels between working in parliament and working in fintech?

My wider environment hasn’t dramatically changed. It’s still not as inclusive or diverse enough. It’s very white, male dominated, especially at the exec level — there isn’t enough diversity, especially in companies being invested by VCs. If I wanted to start a business tomorrow, and maybe it’s just a perception but it feels like it’s too far a distance from me, like there are more obstacles for me [and people like me].

You went from Parliament to Fintech — How did you get your first job in a startup?

I relied a lot on the transferrable skills I had. After my bachelor’s degree I understood that I really liked politics and absolutely believed in social impact. After working in parliament I realised politics wasn’t for me and started a master’s. At the time, there were lots of great job boards popping up and I applied to start-up for a part-time customer operations role and got it. Getting this role meant that I got way more involved beyond the 12 hours started with. And eventually got to the point where they asked if I could work full-time. Essentially it was baptism by fire.

When you think about recruitment, what are the five words that come to mind?

• connections
• highly competitive
• incredibly challenging
• Deflating
• Inaccessible

I didn’t have connections early on and I think it’s not always easy to find a job or get your foot in the door without knowing someone or someone telling you about a job. I don’t mean nepotism, but sometimes it’s who you know. Great jobs often come from referrals, which is good. At the same time, I also see referrals as a bad thing because it can mean excluding people from a process, and companies can become homogenous because they’re just hiring people who are like them.

Tech is highly competitive. In my last role, I was recruiting and my colleague and I would screen and compare scores of candidates to challenge our biases; It made me realise how competitive it really is.

Interview processes can sometimes be too long. As I said, I had three stages of an interview once and the second stage was to meet all the heads of departments. Long processes are deflating. You do a lot of research and preparation for these companies that have unstructured processes and invest a lot of time in each application to only be dissuaded by the process and never receive any feedback. As I came into this last job, I decided not to put candidates through that awful process.

Yeah, it’s also really expensive.

Exactly. And not just that, it’s not accessible. Some people really cannot be taking that kind of time off of work to do these kinds of interviews, challenges, or presentations.

One of the great things coming out of covid is being able to do remote interviews.

There’s just so much we could be doing for candidates. We have an equal opportunity statement on our website, but its often just that, we don’t see those statements translated into real meaningful action or into building inclusive workplaces.

When you think of tech, what are some words that come to mind?

• whitemenfounders — that can be one word right?
• innovative
• future
• fast-paced

I still believe that one of the biggest issues is that we’re not letting in enough people with different backgrounds, and people of colour. They’re not getting enough of these funding or mentoring opportunities. I do love now that there are specific funds for people of colour or tailored for specific people from specific backgrounds. Tech is still a relatively diverse industry, but there is still a decent amount of work to level the playing field in senior roles and management.

There’s so much innovation happening and it’s so interesting to see that even the most institutional businesses are not innovating in new spaces. Tech really pushes the boundaries of what is possible and also pushes those institutions to move things forward. How we improve things now and have foresight for what is possible, move with the times and scale. There are a lot of people thinking about solving the problems not just for now but ones for the future.

It’s interesting to see something that you’re working with now could easily become outdated in a couple of years and the challenge that comes with building a company that could last and adapt as society changes. Building and moving fast enough to pre-empt and change the vertical you’re on or offer an additional solution. We’ve seen it so much during covid and how many companies pivoted to make things work.

I have one last (very silly) question… Speaking as a candle maker, If “operations manager” were a type or scent of a candle, what kind of candle would it be?

Oh, good question. Is it beeswax? Is it a soy candle? Okay, definitely soy. No wait, a coconut candle, it’s more sustainable. Innovating for what is going on around us. And in terms of a specific scent… I think something funky like patchouli and lavender. I find that, again, I don’t even know what patchouli smells like but like tech, it’s something you hear about and know it’s cool. There’s a lot going on and patchouli is always there.