Day In The Life Of Frank Stevenaar, Our Chief Financial Officer

Table of Contents

What is it like to lead Funding Societies | Modalku’s Finance team?

What is your professional background?

I started my career at KPMG before moving on to an insurance company focusing on mergers & acquisitions. After that, I co-founded a financial services metasearch platform called GoBear and we launched the business in six Asian markets. I left GoBear in June 2020 and soon thereafter joined Funding Societies | Modalku (FSMK).
What are the 2 most important skills required in your daily work?

Seeing the bigger picture and having problem solving skills.
What do you like most about your team?

I like that the finance team truly lives our company values with a great focus on Growing Relentlessly & Focusing on Impact while Enabling Teamwork. I appreciate that the team is authentic and doesn’t shy away from being transparent to the stakeholders. We also highlight the things that go well and take the time to appreciate one another, an initiative start-ups often forget to do as they are so busy solving current problems.
3 words to describe your leadership style.

Transparent, empathetical, methodical.
How are you different inside and outside of work? Share your favourite photo of you (1) at work and (2) off work.

Frank and the Finance team at Coastes, Sentosa for an event

Frank on his mountain bike
What do you look forward to at work the most?

Solving difficult problems with the team.
How would you describe your time here so far in 3 words?

Fun, growth, fast.
What do you love about Funding Societies’ work culture?

The people here foster a strong sense of belonging. I also love their dedication towards making an impact on SMEs and societies.
What’s your favourite piece of career advice?

Try lots of new things, and push your boundaries. Be confident, yet humble.
How would you explain what you do to a 5 year old?

I help other people build new businesses.
Use 3 emojis to represent what you do at Funding Societies.🏃 🎉 🌅
Describe a typical work day for you, from the time you wake up to the time you go to bed.

I am currently working remotely from Europe while following Asia’s time-zones, so my day starts fairly early. I would be online by 7.00am for my first few meetings. Similar to most tech companies, we are fully Slack-enabled and the Finance team is no exception. I make an effort to clear up my Slack messages as soon as I can so that teams are not held up waiting for my input or approval before hopping over to my email since it is generally less time sensitive.

This is followed by a 30-minute weekly catch-up with each of my direct reports, where we follow a fixed and structured agenda. The rest of the morning is generally packed with meetings involving external parties like banks, investors, and other strategic partners.

After my lunch, which I tend to also use to have a quick look at financial news, markets, and key events in our region, I move on to doing work that requires deeper thinking. I try to have my meetings with European and US partners in the afternoon. In the afternoon, I also try to pick up my kids from school which I really enjoy doing since I get to hear their stories about their day and their open views on the world.

When we get home, we would eat some fruits together and I would either return back to work or take my mountain bike for a ride in the nearby forest. I love cycling as it takes me to new environments pretty quickly while also giving me a nice workout.

By evening, I would have dinner together with my family: a time that we find very important since it is typically not possible to have breakfast together. The kids would be put to bed after dinner and my wife and I would have time to wind down and catch up on the day. We hardly watch TV together and we usually go out for a walk or run before closing off the day.
What is one most important career lesson you would pass down to your team or the next batch of leaders?

I would choose to pass down my favourite piece of career advice that I received: Try lots of new things, and push your boundaries. Be confident, yet humble.

Like what you read about our team? If you’re interested in a FinTech career with us, check out our careers page below!

Disclaimer: The information provided to you in this blog post is intended only for general information purposes only and does not constitute legal or other professional advice on any subject matter. The materials and the information provided are not intended to be and do not constitute an advertisement or solicitation. In no event will Funding Societies be liable to any party for any direct, indirect, incidental, special, consequential or punitive damages for use of such information by you or any unauthorised third party.