By David Reiling, Author of "Fintech 4 Good"
DO YOU WANT TO MAKE A DIFFERENCE IN YOUR WALLET, OR A DIFFERENCE IN THE WORLD?
If you ask people to describe the factors that constitute a successful business, most of their answers will have to do with making money.
It’s not that the business world doesn’t care about helping people and creating a positive difference. Rather, corporate success has been closely tied to profits because doing good has largely been mutually exclusive from doing well.
In the traditional business landscape, every single dollar needs to be allocated strategically if you want to survive, let alone thrive. Oftentimes, each buck that isn’t contributing to your bottom line is one that your competitor is using to get ahead. Out of sheer necessity, many businesses (and especially startups) have had to put doing good on the backburner to stay alive.
Thanks to new technology, however, the paradigm of success is shifting. The entire financial world is changing at a million miles an hour, and with that comes a better way to measure and achieve success.
Now, through the power of financial technology (otherwise known as fintech), doing well and doing good are no longer mutually exclusive. In fact, they are combining forces to exponentiate success across the board. Helping others is just as important of a metric as making money – and we can now achieve both at the same time.
I’ve also had the honor of helping procure that change through Sunrise Banks.
As a Community Development Financial Institution (CDFI) and certified B Corporation, and as one of the first Public Benefit Corporations in Minnesota (i), we’re proud to play our part in empowering everyone to achieve financial wellness.
Many of these fintech firms are making a solid profit, receiving prestigious venture capital funding, and experiencing hockey stick growth. Yet, at the same time, they are helping people in a very significant way and putting a ding in the universe. For instance, you’ll read about a firm that’s allowing people to escape triple-digit interest rate payments, and another that’s giving millions of immigrants desperately-needed access to affordable financial tools.
They’re able to achieve that by merging willpower, groundbreaking technology, and a desire to help those who need it most. What’s even more impressive is that all these fintech innovators started with minimal capital and turned a small startup into a national solution.