Good morning. Tech companies aren’t the only ones competing for top-tier tech talent. Big banks, insurance companies, and retail companies, for example, are also aggressively recruiting to bring in those with tech skills.
I was in Houston last week to attend several sessions of the annual AfroTech Conference, created by Blavity, Inc., a technology and digital media company founded by Morgan DeBaun, who is the CEO. The event connects Black tech professionals and students with major companies across industries for networking, career opportunities, and panel discussions on topics like AI and cybersecurity.
During a CFO discussion at AfroTech on Nov. 14 about the evolving role of finance in the digital age, the topic of talent came up.
“I'm competing with everybody else for tech talent,” said Maurice Kuykendoll, CFO of group insurance at Prudential Financial, a Fortune 500 company. Fintech people do need to have finance and actuarial skills, Kuykendoll said. “But our tools are moving so quickly, and the amount of data that we're trying to wrangle in order to get the financial outcomes means that I'm often looking for people across both worlds, who've got tech skills and finance skills,” he said.
Kuykendoll also makes it a point to communicate with young tech professionals at the company. “They teach me about what they were working on, what they’ve just learned,” he explained. And in turn, “I help them understand how the business actually makes money,” he added.
The CFO of retailer Everlane, Vince Adams, oversees a tech team and likewise believes that harnessing data to get important insights is critical. When it comes to AI applications, they have to make sure it's a tool that will create value, he said.
“The worst thing that can happen, and I've seen this happen before, is we get excited about something, we bring it on, and then we have this tool that we ultimately did not use,” Adams said. Making finance teams more tech-savvy requires professional development opportunities and upskilling, he said.
Whenever there is an AI investment discussion, Erika Troutman, VP and CFO for data management at Wells Fargo, a Fortune 500 company, said it’s her job to make sure it aligns with the overall company goals, and gauge whether it will increase efficiency over time. It's important for tech professionals to have storytelling skills, “so that we can own that narrative for you and help with financial goals,” Troutman said.
Today, finance professionals have more insight into tech, but years ago had limited knowledge of AI impacts, she said. Troutman added that she was looking forward to talking with some of the tech talent at AfroTech.
According to CompTIA’s October report, finance and insurance are among the top five industries for tech job postings. As I walked around the exhibit hall during AfroTech, amid the booths of big tech companies like Google, Apple, Microsoft, and Nvidia, along with Wells Fargo, other big banks such as JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, Goldman Sachs, and Morgan Stanley had a presence as well.
It will be interesting to see how the financial services industry will attract tech talent who may have thought they’d build a career in Silicon Valley.
Sheryl Estrada
sheryl.estrada@fortune.com
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