Jordan Lawrence is the co-founder and chief growth officer at Volt, a real-time payments provider that uses open banking to facilitate transactions between merchants and customers.
Founded in 2019 by Lawrence and Tom Greenwood, Volt aims to provide merchants with cheaper transaction costs. Last year, the London-based company secured $60m (£47m) in a Series B funding round.
In February, Volt was granted an EMI licence, allowing it to issue e-money accounts in the UK. The company is now eyeing US expansion and growing its presence in LatAm and Asia.
In this week’s Founder in Five Q&A, Lawrence explains why startups shouldn’t overpromise too early, how his experiences have taught him that you shouldn’t be afraid to fail, and how his surfing background set him up for a career in fintech.
1. What advice would you give to a first-time founder?
Jordan Lawrence: Don’t be afraid to fail. I’ve started five or six companies, and not all of them have been successful. But from each of those companies, I’ve acquired wisdom that was critical in building those that have been a success. Trying and failing is all part of the learning process, as long as you gain insight from that experience.
As a first-time founder, the odds are stacked against your brilliant idea blossoming into an established business, but the journey you’re about to embark on is invaluable. When I started an online surf shop, I didn’t think this would lay the foundations for an entrepreneurial career in the payments space, but that exposure to ecommerce at its inception meant my knowledge of payments evolved with the industry.
2. How do you motivate your team?
JL: I simply remind them that we’re building the most innovative and influential technology in the fintech space. One that will ultimately make things fairer and the payments space more competitive. There’s a huge opportunity to disrupt legacy payments systems, whose infrastructure was first designed and implemented decades ago.
By doing this, we’re changing the world’s behaviour around payments. Knowing your work truly makes a lasting impact helps to keep motivation levels high.
3. What’s a common mistake that you see founders make?
JL: Overpromising too early, resulting in a lot of expectations not being met and technology not delivering; which can be rife in the fintech space. As everything moves so fast, we lose transparency into what works and what doesn’t, resulting in companies or products not providing what has been touted.
After receiving a lot of buzz or creating a lot of noise, this is never a good look. I definitely urge founders to keep expectations realistic and promise what your technology can deliver.
4. What’s a fact about yourself that people might find surprising?
JL: As the founder of a fintech company, it may come as a surprise that I used to teach kitesurfing, windsurfing and a handful of other watersports. But it was this venture that introduced me to how consumer behaviour works and how to find solutions to people’s problems. I discovered that many people didn’t know where to go to learn kitesurfing, for example, so we set up kitesurfing schools.
To add to that, I learnt that people didn’t know where to buy their kitesurfing gear, so we set up kitesurfing shops and later allowed them to buy things online. Without being an instructor or pioneering a new sport, my path to where I am today would look totally different.
5. Excluding your sector, which nascent technology holds the most promise?
JL: I’m fascinated by the rich opportunities that will be afforded by artificial intelligence, especially as it becomes democratised and our understanding of its application deepens. AI is also poised to have a profound impact on the payments space. While driving greater efficiency and security of real-time payments, AI can accelerate open banking adoption by raising the bar for insights and personalised services generated from data sharing. The customer experience will increase exponentially.
But the rapid technological change AI is creating is not without its complexities. It doesn’t take long for regulations to lag behind a technology’s acceleration, posing a challenge to strike a balance between fostering innovation and ensuring safety. Additionally, harmonising these regulations on a global scale, given AI’s borderless nature, requires meticulous coordination.
Founder in Five – a UKTN Q&A series with the entrepreneurs behind the UK’s innovative tech startups, scaleups and unicorns – is published every Friday.
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