The role of influence in our lives

By Theodora Lau and Bradley Leimer of Unconventional Ventures

What’s next for the future of banking, the impact of the next technology trend, or for subsequent iterations of our society and the human condition?

To influence. And be influenced.

We rarely come up with answers to the questions like these on our own. Rather, we are directed by that which is most present around us, ideas and realities that surround our own — that which influences our mindsets the most.

“If you can’t fly then run, if you can’t run then walk, if you can’t walk then crawl, but whatever you do you have to keep moving forward.” Martin Luther King, Jr.

When we think about what guides the thoughts and actions that swirl about the most important moments of our lives, what or whom do you think about first? Who are we listening to? What leads us to take action?

As humans, we are all rooted in our upbringing and our experiences, the lives and activities and cadence of our family and friends, and those most close to us.

These experiences impact our lives in a vast array of ways, the decisions we make, and the very path we take. They keep us focused.

Our culture, our opportunities, our travels, what we see and what we hear, what we read, and what we study — our lived experiences — all of this impacts the way our life unfolds.

As does the influence of privilege or lack thereof.

As does the combination of both luck and perseverance.

The influence at the heart of banking

When it comes to financial services, and the industries we hold most dear, we think of those that we most learn from — those that have experience in areas that we may not, those who perhaps have walked a mile more than our own journey.

We may feel compelled to listen to those that are fortunate to have the loudest and most far reaching voices, access to an entire community, and broader media at their disposal.

Is it equal? Real influence is surely nothing of the sort.

What is real and lasting?

As we have written so many times before, access is but one hurdle to holding the microphone — or having your words on that page, or upon thousands of little screens — holding it is quite another thing entirely. There is a price at the door of access that is often unseen.

Being invited to the dance is one thing, but being asked to dance quite another.

We have all seen the lists, we have all seen the accolades of often the same people over time. Every industry has them, every futurist a poet of one verse or another, a presentation of different slides.

But how do we build genuine engagement, or generate real, lasting impact?

How we create society anew

To be truly influential, you cannot find solace in simply changing one’s mind, you must also change their heart.

To change one person, to change an industry, to change society — now that is the real influence that we need more of.

We need more voices, new voices, different voices, ones with dignity and respect, ones that demonstrate the diversity and thoughts of every member of our community.

To move society forward is the responsibility of all.

To improve society is a reflection of the influence that matters.

Now is a time for new moments of normalcy, of influence and leadership that truly transforms society for good, that lets more voices be heard, and restores dignity to — an entire country.

This is a time that hope shall lead us to a better future.

Now that is the influence that really matters the most of all.

“This is our historic moment of crisis and challenge, and unity is the path forward.” — President Joe Biden

At this time, in this place, let’s start afresh.

There is much to heal. And much to build.

________

Don’t miss this week’s episode of #OneVision, where Theo and Bradley chat with global fintech influencer, Spiros Margaris, on lived experiences, his secrets to success, and banking trends for 2021. Having met Spiros in person quite a few times, we promise — he is as real as it gets and is a truly authentic voice in the wild wild west of FinTech.

Listen in to this special episode on Apple Podcast and Spotify. Please consider subscribing.

________

Unconventional Ventures helps drive innovation to improve systematic financial wellness. We connect founders to funders, provide mentorship to entrepreneurs, strategic advisory services to a broad set of corporates, and broaden opportunities for diversity within the ecosystem. Our belief is that anyone with great ideas should have a chance to succeed and every voice should be heard.

Visit unconventionalventures.com to learn how you can partner with us today.

________

Our new book, Beyond Good, is now available for pre-order at Kogan Page.

Beyond Good is a call to arms for business leaders to recognize how they can do well by doing good. Business for good, which is the philosophy that you can pursue profits while delivering on sustainable and societal development goals, is already delivering big changes.

With exclusive interviews with experts from the B-Corp world, policy makers and executives, this book also showcases how companies like Microsoft, Flourish Ventures, Ant Financial, Sunrise Bank and Paypal are doing their bit to make our world better — and you can too.

Also available at Bookshop.org (supports local, independent bookstores), Waterstones, WHSmith, and Amazon.

More about Irish Tech News and Business Showcase here.

FYI the ROI for you is => Irish Tech News now gets over 1.5 million monthly views, and up to 900k monthly unique visitors, from over 160 countries. We have over 860,000 relevant followers on Twitter on our various accounts & were recently described as Ireland’s leading online tech news site and Ireland’s answer to TechCrunch, so we can offer you a good audience!

Since introducing desktop notifications a short time ago, which notify readers directly in their browser of new articles being published, over 50,000 people have now signed up to receive them ensuring they are instantly kept up to date on all our latest content. Desktop notifications offer a unique method of serving content directly to verified readers and bypass the issue of content getting lost in people’s crowded news feeds.

Drop us a line if you want to be featured, guest post, suggest a possible interview or just let us know what you would like to see more of in our future articles. We’re always open to new and interesting suggestions for informative and different articles.

If you would like to be featured in our podcast series drop us a line & don’t forget to sign up for notifications for our latest episodes and follow us on Twitter, Linkedin, SoundCloud, iTunes or your own favourite podcast platform.

Contact us, by email, twitter or whatever social media works for you and hopefully, we can share your story too and reach our global audience. We are agile, responsive, quick and talented, we look forward to working with you!

If you would like to have your company featured in the Irish Tech News Business Showcase, get in contact with us at Simon@IrishTechNews.ie or on Twitter: @SimonCocking