How can your company leverage generative AI to become more operationally efficient? What are the opportunities for engineering talent in Vietnam? How do you approach organizational development from early-stage to growth?

One of Vietnam’s leading startup CEOs, ⁠⁠Huy Nghiem⁠, shares his takes from experience growing ⁠⁠Finhay⁠ from an idea in 2017 into an organization now employing 160 Vietnamese building the future of investing for more than 3 million of their fellow countrymen. A great listen for those looking to make their organization AI-ready, interested in hiring Vietnamese tech talent, and looking for inspiration from a growth-stage CEO.

This conversation continues from ⁠the previous episode⁠.

Timestamps and Highlights

(01:31) How to approach generative AI integration into business operations;

“We have a dedicated team that just works on using GPT as a tool. We also started inputting our data into that tool, allowing internal team members to start testing and asking for relevant financial data. So when we are confident with this use case, we can launch it out to users.”

(05:04) How the software engineering talent pool in Vietnam has evolved since 2017;

“…big thanks to the big players who have always been a leader in the tech sector in Vietnam, and also thanks to the many universities in Vietnam which inspire many students looking into software engineering and engineering in general.Also the ecosystem itself, with businesses like Finhay in the market and many other tech players in the market, has started booming and creating more demand for software engineers so they can tailor or even refine their skills.”

(07:41) Why you need a strong company culture before becoming a growth company;

“As a company with 160 people…it requires not just myself, but also the next level of leaders to improve their skills. Not just technical skills, but also leadership, communication, teamwork, and fundamental models for cross-functional teams.”

(11:04) Minute Masterclass: Team Formation and Company Culture for Early and Growth Stage Startups;

“…for the growth stage, I’d advise to build culture before entering the growth stage. When you have the right culture within your company, it can flourish. When you reach the growth stage, you will have more people, which means more potential problems and frictions. There can be internal conflicts, basic administrative tasks consuming time, HR challenges with people coming in and out, and inefficient onboarding. So, build culture before you enter the growth stage to minimize these risks. It helps ensure that the people who join will fit with your expected culture.”

(15:09) Rapid Fire Round;

About our guest

⁠Huy Nghiem⁠ is the founder and CEO of ⁠Finhay⁠ as well as Chairman of Vina Securities. Prior to Finhay, Huy built his expertise and experience in the financial markets as a financial advisor at AMP in Australia. He also co-founded and led tech companies and business initiatives during his time in Australia. He graduated from the University of Sydney with a Bachelor’s degree in Accounting and Marketing. He was part of the 2020 Forbes Asia 30 under 30 list.

The content of this podcast is for informational purposes only, should not be taken as legal, tax, or business advice or be used to evaluate any investment or security, and is not directed at any investors or potential investors in any ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Insignia Ventures⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ fund.

Transcript

Transcripts have been edited for clarity. 

How to approach generative AI integration into business operations

Paulo J: And now I want to get into the topic that we touched on earlier, and I’m sure a lot of our listeners would be interested to hear about it. You talked about how Gen AI and GPT are being slowly integrated into the different products that you have. Maybe you can speak a little bit more about some examples, maybe within your own organization at Finhay. How has AI been helping your organization improve efficiencies and all that?

Huy N: So we’ve been applying AI since the day they talked about it, even before chatbots and GPT. But that time, 2018, was very early for us, and the use cases were very limited. However, in the last five months, we’ve been applying it quite heavily into our business operations.

First of all, it’s the operation itself, which also means tech development. So our tech team started using co-pilot from GitHub. So now they can code even faster. Instead of having to write the whole line of code and then jump into the next line and so on, this co-pilot helps a lot, and the team has been using it, improving the productivity of the team. 

At the same time, the quality of the output and production have improved as well. In our sprint, we generally release one update post-sprint, which is two weeks, but now we can do it within a week, every week. So applying AI to coding has helped a lot. 

We have a dedicated team that just works on using GPT as a tool. We also started inputting our data into that tool, allowing internal team members to start testing and asking for relevant financial data. So when we are confident with this use case, we can launch it out to users. 

When they chat on our platform, they can ask about certain stocks, and we’ll feed out a certain level of data to them. So instead of them having to search for information on the web, they can find what they need within the app itself. 

Even our customer support has improved. We have seen a lot of clients asking the same question over time. The solution before was a simple decision tree. Click on this option, it goes to this option and that option. However, clients know that, and we want to improve that feeling that when they chat with us, it’s not just a bot, but it’s more human. So obviously, GPT has been solving that problem, and that helps our organization.

There are more use cases that we are testing out. We are actually hosting a hackathon internally in the upcoming weeks. The topic is very simple: applying AI in all facets of Finhay. So we will have people working on this, and they will be the ones that come up with the idea, create a solution, and then launch it to the market and see how it goes.

“We have a dedicated team that just works on using GPT as a tool. We also started inputting our data into that tool, allowing internal team members to start testing and asking for relevant financial data. So when we are confident with this use case, we can launch it out to users.”

How the software engineering talent pool in Vietnam has evolved since 2017

Paulo J: I think it’s really exciting to see what comes out of all these experiments and iterations that you guys are doing with the GPT internally. And, as you mentioned, if they work out well, you might even port them over to the user side, and we can actually see that in action on the platform. So I’m excited for that.

And speaking of the developers and engineers, I’m sure this is an exciting time for them, especially those working at Finhay, but I think Vietnam has always had this reputation of being a great talent pool for engineering talent. I wanted to ask how you see the talent pool evolving in Vietnam since you first returned in 2017 and started Finhay, how has the tech talent pool and all that evolved?

Huy N: I’ve seen tech talent being more marketable and of higher quality. I think it would be a big thanks to the big players who have always been a leader in the tech sector in Vietnam, and also thanks to the many universities in Vietnam which inspire many students looking into software engineering and engineering in general.

Also the ecosystem itself, with businesses like Finhay in the market and many other tech players in the market, has started booming and creating more demand for software engineers so they can tailor or even refine their skills.

My observation is that I do see a lot more people accepting this role as a need, and many businesses are hunting them. So, yes, the demand is there, the supply is there, and the quality is also there. 

I’ll give you a bit of a small talk [example]. In 2017, I talked to a couple of people from the older generation, and when we talked about a designer or a software engineer, they would say, “What is this?” 

And now they understand that you should be in software engineering to create products. They’ll say, “Okay, software engineer,” so what it means is that the influence or the idea of being a software engineer makes the older people think this is their proper job and where they should be.

So, I think that’s a good sign. What we have seen Vietnam is that I do see software talent is very much needed, and fortunately, we do see a lot of them in the market.

“…big thanks to the big players who have always been a leader in the tech sector in Vietnam, and also thanks to the many universities in Vietnam which inspire many students looking into software engineering and engineering in general.Also the ecosystem itself, with businesses like Finhay in the market and many other tech players in the market, has started booming and creating more demand for software engineers so they can tailor or even refine their skills.”

Why you need a strong company culture before becoming a growth company

Paulo J: It would be great to see Finhay become a dream company for engineers. If you want to become a software engineer, go work at Finhay.

I also want to shift gears and talk about your leadership approach and how you’ve had to evolve as a leader. Now that you’re in a growth stage and still growing, is there anything from the early days of Finhay that you’ve had to let go of or unlearn as a leader?

Huy N: As a company with 160 people, there are many functional teams, departments, and scopes of business. It requires not just myself, but also the next level of leaders to improve their skills. Not just technical skills, but also leadership, communication, teamwork, and fundamental models for cross-functional teams. 

We also need more knowledge from bigger companies. For example, we obtained training hosted by one of our shareholders. They invited consultants from America to come to Vietnam and identify or analyze cases to see if they can apply to our company and how we can improve. One of the things we learned was authentic leadership, influence, and creating a company culture. 

Another important factor is information. All teams need to be on the same page and talk about the same things. They should be achieving the same objective. In practice, we’ve had many meetings, but not everyone is on the same page, leading to wasted time. We need to transfer information effectively amongst team members.

Leadership changes as the company grows, and I’ve changed a lot in the last few years. As the company grows, so do the skills of its members.

“As a company with 160 people…it requires not just myself, but also the next level of leaders to improve their skills. Not just technical skills, but also leadership, communication, teamwork, and fundamental models for cross-functional teams.”

Minute Masterclass: Team Formation and Company Culture for Early and Growth Stage Startups

Paulo J: I think that’s a really interesting concept, shifting from focusing on product efficiency to organizational efficiency. On that note, I wanted to move into our next corner, which is the Minute Masterclass. If you were to give a masterclass on building a FinTech company for Vietnamese entrepreneurs and business leaders from across the world, what would be the key takeaway you would want them to have after the class? Let’s say, for the early stage startups.

Huy N: Okay, for the early stage, my advice from that masterclass would be about forming the optimal team.

Given that FinTech companies require a right team, you would need three types of members for the early stage, and this setup can evolve as the foundation of the company. The first type is engineers – you need a strong engineering core, including front end, back end, and full-stack engineers.

Secondly, you need a designer – a UX designer, UI designer, graphic designer. In the early stage, one person can often cover these roles.

The third type of person you would need is the hustler, basically someone who can sell the product to the market, be it digitally or offline. These three types of people are very important for the initial team formation.

This advice, which I learned not only from an investor we had in 2017-2018 but also from the book “Inspired” and many other books I’ve read, says that the optimal team composition for productivity is to have these three roles: engineer, designer, and hustler. So that’s my advice for early-stage teams forming their team.

Paulo J: I’m curious, since you mentioned the early stage, do you also have advice for the growth stage?

Huy N: Yes, for the growth stage, I’d advise to build culture before entering the growth stage. When you have the right culture within your company, it can flourish. When you reach the growth stage, you will have more people, which means more potential problems and frictions.

There can be internal conflicts, basic administrative tasks consuming time, HR challenges with people coming in and out, and inefficient onboarding. So, build culture before you enter the growth stage to minimize these risks. It helps ensure that the people who join will fit with your expected culture.

Paulo J: Specifically related to Vietnam, is there anything our audience, maybe the business leaders out there, should know about building a company culture in Vietnam?

Huy N: Good question. For sure, many leaders in Vietnam are looking into culture and working on building and improving it day by day. My advice for them is to start as early as possible because it’s easier to form a culture when you are a small group. For instance, if you’re a group of four people, it’s easier to start forming a culture than when you have a hundred people. 

But remember, culture is built from your consistent activities and how you present yourself as a leader within the company, which influences the culture. So my advice is to start seriously thinking about it before you enter the growth stage.

“…for the growth stage, I’d advise to build culture before entering the growth stage. When you have the right culture within your company, it can flourish. When you reach the growth stage, you will have more people, which means more potential problems and frictions. There can be internal conflicts, basic administrative tasks consuming time, HR challenges with people coming in and out, and inefficient onboarding. So, build culture before you enter the growth stage to minimize these risks. It helps ensure that the people who join will fit with your expected culture.”

Rapid Fire Round

Paulo J: On that note, I wanted to transition into our final corner for this call, which is a rapid-fire round. I’ve prepared a new set of questions for Huy, since he’s done this twice before already. So, the first question is: if you were invited to develop your own Netflix or OTT series, what would the title of the show be?

Huy N: Oh wow, I’ve never thought about that before. That’s a tough question. I like the term “Nothing is Impossible,” but that might be too much. I also like the idea of “Just Do It” and the notion of being different. So, I think “Be Different” could be the title.

Paulo J: If there’s something that you could automate in your job just by wishing for it, what aspect of your role would that be?

Huy N: Writing emails and answering repetitive questions.

Paulo J: I thought you were going to say compliance and all the admin back office tasks. If you could pick anyone, alive or dead, to be your 24/7 executive coach, who would it be?

Huy N: Ray Dalio. I’ve read his “Principles” and tried to reflect on myself using that book. I’m also trying to digest his “Changing the World Order.” His shared insights make a lot of sense to me, and I really appreciate his style.

Paulo J: Next question: If there were no budget constraints, where would you want to take your team for a company offsite?

Huy N: Good question. I would say Japan. I think Japan is very efficient, and I would like to bring the team there not only for sightseeing, like viewing the sakura or enjoying the good weather, but also to see how efficiently Tokyo operates, especially its transit system. Observing this might help us better understand how to transform an idea into a live production product with more efficiency and quality.

Paulo J: Yeah, that’s a great perspective. It really ties into what you talked about earlier, building efficiency as the company becomes more complex. And finally, to wrap up this corner, is there anything new that you’re reading or have recently taken up?

Huy N: Yes, I’m currently reading “Changing the World Order.” It discusses whether we are going through a major shift, maybe from America to China. We’re not talking about politics here, but economics, and how these changes affect businesses in general. I think the book provides a lot of insights.