Here's how you can navigate the common mistakes when responding to failure in Financial Technology.

Acknowledgement is most important and so is honesty. In most incidents I’ve been part of, it’s places where the team or individuals who made mistakes were forthcoming and shared all they knew to the best of their abilities in a blameless away. Having the right account of what happened can be key to solving incidents quickly. A lot of this also boils down to leadership, trust and culture in teams and organizations.

During my time at Taplend India, leading the development of our digital lending application, we faced a significant setback with our risk engine. An overly conservative algorithm led to an unexpectedly high rate of loan rejections. This error highlighted a flaw in our credit risk model. We immediately informed stakeholders and conducted a thorough root cause analysis. We revised the algorithm, improved our data models, and implemented iterative testing to balance risk and approval rates effectively. This experience taught us the value of transparency, meticulous documentation, and fostering a culture of learning from mistakes. By acknowledging and addressing our error, we improved our processes and ultimately enhanced our product.

5 whys is an excellent way to uncover potential reasons. It’s also important to capture the causes in a blameless way, blame creates a toxic culture and also discourages people from sharing information. It can help to start by making it clear that failure is inevitable and that is how teams learn and improve.

During my tenure at Taplend India, we encountered a significant issue during a major update to our customer journey flow. Post-deployment, user drop-off rates increased dramatically. We conducted a root cause analysis and discovered that a new authentication step was too complex, leading to user frustration and abandonment. We quickly communicated the issue to stakeholders and rolled back the update to reassess the process. By simplifying the authentication step and conducting user testing, we successfully reduced drop-offs. This experience highlighted the importance of user-centric design, thorough testing, and prompt issue resolution to enhance overall user experience.

At Taplend India, we launched a new feature aimed at streamlining loan approval processes. However, soon after deployment, we noticed significant delays and bottlenecks. Realizing our original plan was flawed, we quickly adjusted by revisiting our workflow design. We identified redundant steps and inefficient processes, then streamlined the workflow for better efficiency. By promptly adjusting our plan and involving the team in brainstorming solutions, we mitigated the issue. This experience taught us the importance of flexibility and the willingness to adapt plans based on real-world feedback to ensure project success.

At Taplend India, during the development of our digital lending app, we faced a critical error in our backend system just before launch, causing data processing delays. Recognizing the urgency, I acted decisively by halting the launch and assembling a task force to diagnose and resolve the issue. We identified a database query inefficiency, optimized the query, and rigorously tested the fix. This swift decision prevented a potential launch failure and safeguarded user trust. This experience underscored the importance of decisive action and quick problem-solving in maintaining project integrity and user confidence.

At Taplend India, we launched a feature that unexpectedly led to user confusion and a spike in support requests. To advance our learning, we conducted user interviews and usability testing, discovering that our interface was not intuitive. We integrated this feedback, simplified the design, and added helpful prompts. This not only resolved the confusion but also significantly improved user satisfaction. This experience taught us the importance of continuous learning and actively seeking user feedback. By embracing these practices, we enhanced our product and better aligned it with user needs, demonstrating the critical value of ongoing learning in product development.

Continuous improvement is key, capture learnings from the current failure and follow through any of the key steps you identified. In case of failures in future you can review how the past improvements helped as well what may have been missed that caused the current failure.

Legal and Compliance One of the most common risks in Fintech projects Is navigating the complex landscape of legal and regulatory requirements. Staying compliant with ever-evolving regulations demands constant adaptability.