An Interview with Fotis Georgiadis
Having a strong vision, endless work ethic, and deep knowledge of the industry is not enough. Technology is all about rapid growth and venture capital is the rocket fuel that funds that hyper-growth. That said, it’s important to note that rocket fuel can only be put into rockets — not bicycles, not cars, not even airplanes. Rocket fuel can only be used by rockets.
As a part of my series about “Big Ideas That Might Change The World In The Next Few Years” I had the pleasure of interviewing Steve Barha.
Steve has spent the past two decades utilizing the key principles of “operating with integrity” and “acting with urgency” to develop successful technology companies. The Founder of Instant Financial, and now serving as the organization’s Chief Operating Officer, Steve brings an extensive background delivering financial technology to large enterprise Customers. Prior to Instant, Steve served as both the CIO and EVP of Mobile for TIO Networks (acquired by Paypal) leading the mobile business unit while driving the company’s engineering, IT, and product teams. Steve was also previously the Founder & CEO of Santra Technology, the pioneer of Web Services QoS and performance monitoring, along with holding senior management positions at Saba Software (NASDAQ: SABA), TELUS Enterprise Solutions (TSE:T) and Emerge Online.
Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would like to get to know you a bit. Can you please tell us a story about what brought you to this specific career path?
At my previous organization, we provided bill payment services for most of the major utility and wireless companies across North America. One of the solutions in our portfolio was a cash-accepting bill payment kiosk that was placed into retail locations, and posted bill payments in real time to vendors. I discovered an amazing phenomenon called “putting 10 on it”- for a $40/month mobile phone bill, many of our Customers would put $10 per week on their bill using our self service kiosk. This was a budgeting tool for them! Though clever, it was both time consuming — in terms of having to make a trip to the kiosk each week — and expensive, as we charged a convenience fee to accept this bill payment. Many of our Customers were paying $52 a month ($40 mobile bill + $12 in fees (4 x $3)) for a $40 service. When I’d speak to these folks and ask why they were overpaying they simply answered this is just the way it is. This is how they budgeted their payments to make sure their phone didn’t get cut off, as they could not trust themselves to save to make the full payment at the end of the month. The charges were just a part of life — it’s expensive to not have money. As you can imagine, this — and numerous similar experiences — have led to very clear guiding principles for me in terms of the right way to create and structure financial services.
Can you please share with us the most interesting story that happened to you since you began your career?
As any professional that has put in a couple of decades working on their craft will tell you, there are many interesting stories to reflect on. One that stands out for me is during the very early days of building Instant Financial. We had just launched our product that allowed employees to stream their earnings at one restaurant location — a wonderful breakfast restaurant called DeDutch Pannekoek House, in Vancouver, Canada. This early version of the Instant Pay program was a success, as employees and the employer were all enjoying the benefits it offered. But what really cemented the idea that we had something very special on our hands was when two young former employees that had decided to leave and seek other jobs actually came to the Instant Financial office to ask us where else paid on Instant, as that was a key consideration in their work search. Without a doubt I knew we had something transformative that was going to change workers’ relationship with their pay moving forward.
Which principles or philosophies have guided your life? Your career?
I seek to always focus on being creative — we are all blessed with this ability, and I believe nothing puts us closer to God, the Great Creator, than when we attempt to create. Having an appetite for failure and approaching problems with a sense of creativity forces me to also have both a sense of humor and of humility.
Ok thank you for that. Let’s now move to the main focus of our interview. Can you tell us about your “Big Idea That Might Change The World”?
As far back as the recorded days of the bible, it states that man should “pay them their wages each day before sunset.” Deuteronomy 24:15
But, in recent years, and only in service of convenience to business (i.e. making payroll easier), workers started to be paid biweekly or even monthly. This is due to industrialization and the creation of mega-corporations, leading to batched payroll to pay 1000’s and 100,000’s of workers.
So, why the two week pay period? Only because it’s easier for business — not right for workers. To add to this, workers who had challenges making ends meet between pay days have been forced to resort to predatory so-called “alternative financial services,” including payday lenders — again, why?
These alternative financial services create a $200B annual “poor tax”; paid each year by 63M working Americans. This poor tax takes $3,174 annually out of the pockets of each of these hard working Americans. Yet we want to talk about financial wellness!?!? First we need to recognize and acknowledge the “Poor Tax” — by doing so we can begin to lift people out of being financially vulnerable to at least being financially coping. From there we can graduate to financial wellness — but talking about wellness on its own is insincere.
Imagine finishing your work day, and hours later you receive a notification on your phone telling you the wages you just earned for the hours you just worked are available to you. Imagine how that levels the playing field for employees by providing a solution to the poor tax, and leads them down a path to financially coping and financial wellness.
The technology at Instant Financial solves for this problem, and also takes any friction away from the employer’s payroll process, allowing employees to get access to their pay on a daily basis, at absolutely no cost to them or their employer.
How do you think this will change the world?
First, it will democratize the payday playing field and put employees more in control of their own money that they have earned. Next, it would put an end to the need for alternative financial services and the predatory nature of payday lenders, who are taking advantage of workers when they are at their most vulnerable.
We foresee a future in which millions of vulnerable American employees are put back in control of their financial future, and don’t have to rely on alternative and predatory lending to get by. Imagine the sea change if millions of people had easier access to their own money on a daily basis, instead of having to wait for 2 weeks. There would be increased spending within the economy and millions of people would stop living paycheck to paycheck.
From an employer value, we deliver measurable business value also. Organizations using Instant not only help their employees, but they also see increased performance in key HR metrics, such as increased employee retention, reduced turnover and more. We have a customer that recently saw a 27% reduction in employee turnover — these kinds of results have real financial impacts on organizations.
Finally, there are also macroeconomic impacts — the analogy of a farmer flooding the plain vs sprinkler system and constant water flow. A steady stream of money in pockets means a steadier stream of spending and financial well-being among the american economy.
Keeping “Black Mirror” and the “Law of Unintended Consequences” in mind, can you see any potential drawbacks about this idea that people should think more deeply about?
When we first launched our platform, we thought of the possibility of compulsive program use — spending money as soon as it’s received. This led us to the fractional and perishable offer model that we employ today — users can only access 50% of their wages each day, and offers cannot be ‘stacked’ (that is, wages are only available that day and do not accrue). We are resolved that this is the correct approach and we’re validated insofar as the rest of the industry is moving in this direction as well.
The card-based model was not a pricing discussion for us, but rather a test of our fortitude to put the right business model in place rather than implement a lazy solution that was ultimately a tax on workers (further contributing to the Poor Tax). Instant is the pioneer of no-fee EWA and others are now being forced to follow our lead.
Was there a “tipping point” that led you to this idea? Can you tell us that story?
At the age of 34, while on a flight during a business trip, I had a retina detachment. At the time I was told I would lose the eye because it was a severe detachment. As anyone that knows me would understand, this was not a reasonable outcome and so I fought. I had 9 surgeries over the course of 2½ years and spent a lot of time recovering from these major procedures. During the course of these significantly reduced earnings years, and while lying in bed in the dark post-operation, I gained a real sense of how hopeless being financially vulnerable makes one feel. This — coupled with my prior fintech experiences — led me and my co-founders to the mission that is Instant Financial today. We are on a mission to uplift the financial wellness of workers all around the world by removing the constraints of a bi-weekly pay cycle.
Another example that sticks with me happened during COVID. We heard about employees who were on Instant Pay and — during the early days when toilet paper and medicine were in short supply — were able to take an Instant Pay offer, to buy that last roll of toilet paper, or get much needed medicine and groceries. Imagine trying to do that working for an employer that didn’t offer Instant Pay, or charged you to get that money for a critical life need? Unthinkable. Most of these employees have told us they will never work at an employer that doesn’t offer Instant Pay.
What do you need to lead this idea to widespread adoption?
On the employee side, we need people to realize that the notion of a two-week or monthly pay cycle is a construct defined by business, and is not in the best interest of workers. We also need regulators and the general populace to realize that forcing people to pay fees to access their wages is near-criminal.
On the employer side of the discussion, we need organizations to realize two things:
- Technology has removed the barriers that led to batch payroll processing in the first place; technology now enables frictionless ability to pay staff instantly.
- There are real-world business benefits that result from offering employees instant access to their wages, including reductions in turnover, increased retention and more — all of which have real monetary value to the bottom line.
The technology is here. We’ve removed the friction — there’s no excuse.
What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Started” and why. (Please share a story or example for each.)
- There are no shortcuts: it’s a grind and it takes relentless energy to build something special. It’s not a sprint but it’s also not a marathon. It’s a long sprint … it’s a marathon that you have to sprint through! This is the Founders burden — to have the focus and desire to see something through to the point of mission complete. This is also what makes a founder a founder — not an idea, not starting, but rather the focus and energy to wear through the journey.
- Founder-focused and patient investors are so important. Everyone claims to be founder-friendly but in practice so few investors have ever really operated or built businesses.
- Not everyone is mission-based: lots of bad actors that are not mission-driven who are very clever and very difficult to smoke out.
- There’s an unfortunate relationship with the early employee efforts that set a company on its path and the overall value sharing with these early employees, that if not managed correctly can be very lopsided. Need to get this right from the get-go, otherwise, it’s very difficult to correct along the way.
- Having a strong vision, endless work ethic, and deep knowledge of the industry is not enough. Technology is all about rapid growth and venture capital is the rocket fuel that funds that hyper-growth. That said, it’s important to note that rocket fuel can only be put into rockets — not bicycles, not cars, not even airplanes. Rocket fuel can only be used by rockets.
Can you share with our readers what you think are the most important “success habits” or “success mindsets”?
In my career I would say I have really focused on utilizing the key principles of “operating with integrity” and “acting with urgency” to develop successful technology companies. Personally, I work hard to ensure that I am always learning. What this really means is I have an appetite for failure, as these are the true learning moments!
Some very well known VCs read this column. If you had 60 seconds to make a pitch to a VC, what would you say? He or she might just see this if we tag them 🙂
Instant is the pioneer of providing workers no-fee, real-time access to their earnings. While serving hundreds of enterprise employers with our suite of Instant Pay services we have discovered that:
- Instant Pay is the new direct deposit, and
- Real-time access to earnings drives macro socio-economic changes that Instant is uniquely positioned to be at the forefront of.
How can our readers follow you on social media?
https://www.linkedin.com/in/barha/
Thank you so much for joining us. This was very inspirational.
Instant Financial: Steve Barha’s Big Idea That May Change The World In The Next Few Years was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
