Happy belated Fintech week! Last week, all across NYC, leaders from organizations of all shapes and sizes gathered together to network, learn, and discuss the trends impacting just about every industry.

We had the opportunity to attend Disruption Forum Fintech, hosted by Netguru, which brought together a range of experts to discuss both the current and future state of the industry. Nayya Co-Founder and CTO, Akash Magoon, sat on a panel to discuss how to reinvent the way that companies innovate and grow. This panel was particularly interesting because the speakers came from organizations of varying sizes and industries, curating a lively discussion on how large organizations can inspire and educate smaller businesses, and vice versa.

Here are 3 key takeaways from the panel:

The pressure to innovate is on

If we took anything away from the panel, it’s that the race to find new, creative approaches to nationwide challenges is well underway. Businesses are feeling the pressure to innovate and develop solutions that can solve challenges brought on by the pandemic, the Great Resignation, inflation, and more. Jeanniey Walden of DailyPay, Inc referred to Taco Bell as an example, citing their struggle to find talent that may result in the need for them to close in-restaurant dining and only accept business through the drive-through. Businesses across the country are fighting to find ways to attract and retain talent, which in turn, is opening the door for innovative new tech to take the stage and help businesses tackle the talent war. Long-story short, it’s a great time to be a business with a new, unique, cost-saving technology—bonus points if it improves employee experience and can help with talent attraction and retention.

Embrace the scientific method

If, like myself, it’s been a while since you’ve sat in a classroom and reviewed the scientific method, don’t worry. At a high level, this method really refers to the process of seeing a problem, ideating on a solution, testing your solution, analyzing what worked and what didn’t work, and then repeating that process over and over again until you come to a successful conclusion. This method was explained by Alex Sion of Citi Ventures, when asked what advice he had for small hyper-growth startups looking to make a splash. Sion likened the process of growing your business to the scientific method, explaining that if you want to grow fast, you’ll want to build, test, throw away what didn’t work, keep what did, build again, test again, on and on.

Focus on growth over anything

When the tables were flipped, and Akash Magoon of Nayya (a 2.5 year old, rapidly growing startup) was asked what advice he had for larger businesses struggling to keep up with market changes, he stressed the importance of prioritizing growth over all else. Oftentimes, larger organizations do what they do well, but fall behind when it comes to thinking of new, creative approaches to different challenges. With everything going on in today’s world, businesses have to adapt to the new way of living and working, or face the consequences of the ongoing Great Resignation. Flexibility is key, and the ability to continue growing and adapting is what will set you apart. “For larger companies looking to expand, it’s all about the innovators. Focus on your current business, but don’t forget to invest in newer areas - this is the innovator's dilemma that Clay Christensen, my favorite economist, talks about in his namesake book,” said Magoon.

No matter how big or small your business, all panelists agreed on one thing: organizations need to be able to adapt to change. If the pandemic taught us anything, it’s that our way of life can quite literally change overnight. Businesses need to be able to pivot, grow, test new initiatives (even if they don’t work out!), and learn from other organizations. We all can’t be subject matter experts in every subject, so being open to learning from other all-star businesses is how companies of all shapes and sizes can work together to change the industry.

P.S. The theme of The Great Resignation came up a lot. We recently surveyed employees and HR leaders to uncover industry trends and how HR leaders can adapt current strategies to attract and retain talent. You can access our research report here.