Innovating Financial Solutions!

The banking industry is transforming with innovations that emphasize the integration of sustainability, technological advancements, and customer-centric solutions. As financial institutions respond to global demands for more resilient and accessible services, the sector plays a vital role in driving economic growth and promoting inclusive development.

By implementing digital banking, green finance, and risk management strategies, the industry secures financial stability and helps in addressing larger societal challenges such as environmental sustainability and financial inclusion. Its importance extends beyond mere transactional operations, influencing how businesses, governments, and individuals overcome economic shifts.

Nikita Kissoon, the Deputy CEO of PROVEN Bank (Cayman) Limited, brings a visionary approach that is transforming how the banking sector aligns people with profit. Known for her exceptional commercial acumen, she employs her deep technical knowledge in accounting, regulation, and risk management to ensure sustainable growth.

She pays respect to her former leaders and colleagues who have all played a major role in allowing her to be at the helm of leadership today; she honors the memory and legacy of her former CEO, Benjamin Freeman, who elevated her into C-Suite leadership and played a profound role in providing her with the platform and opportunities to utilize and showcase her vast expertise. Ben holds a special place in Nikita’s heart, and she is even more inspired by him to continue paying it forward.

Nikita’s leadership is grounded in human connection, with a focus on empowering her teams through a transformational approach that encourages personal and professional development. Her ability to inspire others while driving operational excellence has made her a key figure in shaping the future of banking.

PROVEN Bank Limited is a leading financial institution that transforms banking by focusing on delivering cutting-edge financial solutions while maintaining a strong commitment to regulatory standards and sustainable growth. Under Nikita’s strategic leadership and a commitment to innovation, the bank has consistently expanded its market presence and strengthened its client base, all while steering the challenges of the global financial sector.

Let’s explore Nikita’s journey from audit to banking:

Early Exposure to Finance and Business

At an incredibly young age, Nikita was exposed to the intricacies of finance and business as her parents owned a large retail business in Trinidad and Tobago. Her earliest childhood memories included, among other things, spending time at the business and working as a cashier.

In her early teens, she learned the discipline required to excel, how to earn and manage money as she was paid for the job, and how to sell products to earn profits. Her parents inspired her to continue the trajectory of having a sharp commercial acumen, along with her eldest cousins, who all pursued stellar careers in finance.

Nikita never intended to specialize in banking; however, after leading a career in audit with a big four firm and being exposed to many industries, she enjoyed her banking engagements the most. She earned the position of Financial Controller for Republic Bank (Cayman) Limited at the age of 26, which cemented her passion, core understanding, and technical knowledge in accounting, regulatory, risk management, compliance, and Treasury.

With this solid foundation, she ascended to senior executive leadership as Chief Financial Officer of PROVEN Bank for 18 months, which then paved the way to her current, expanded role as Deputy CEO.

Along her journey, Nikita has always sought to add value to the business by identifying and capitalizing on opportunities for growth balanced with sound risk management practices. She is also deeply inspired by human connection and is extremely passionate about sustainability in banking, with a keen focus on merging people with profit.

She believes in taking the bank’s people along the journey of accelerated growth and profit, ensuring they benefit from increased resources, enabling them to self-actualize or, as she coins it,’step into their highest self’. Her vision is to empower and enrich lives through transformational leadership, allowing others to step into their highest selves, and to pioneer a new world of banking that merges people with profit.

Building a resilient Organization and Expanding Client Base

Her primary responsibilities include driving the Banking Pillar’s strategic and operational transformation into the future by:

• Utilizing her core technical abilities in accounting, regulation, risk, compliance, and operations to build a resilient and efficient organization.
• Working alongside the CEO in assessing strategies to grow the client base, revenue lines and new products.
• Driving performance and culture transformation through her transformational leadership style.

Transformational Leadership and Coaching

Nikita describes her leadership style as transformational, which is heavily geared towards a coaching model that seeks to inspire, lead by example, and align her employees’ deeper ‘why’ and strengths with those of the bank.

Her philosophy is centered around creating safe spaces within the organization that empower employees to share ideas and to grow and develop their skillsets. Once there is alignment between the employees’ personal goals and values with those of the bank, teams are naturally motivated to perform as they feel a deep sense of belonging and pride towards the institution.

Strategic Financial Management Approach

As an FCCA and CAMS charter holder, ethics lie at the core of how she operates. Therefore, her approach is rooted in putting the financial and regulatory interests of the bank first. Financial management and compliance begin at the top by building these out into the overall strategy of the bank, which is then translated into action plans that are developed and tracked on a daily or monthly basis. Her approach to financial management entails.

• Conducting market research and assessing the bank’s current financial situation to determine capacity and changes required for business growth.
• Development of key strategic priorities alongside all stakeholders and business leads based on data-driven insights obtained during the assessment phase.
• Modeling financial projections to create budgets and allocate resources according to the strategic priorities and business plan.
• Translating the business plan and budget into action.
• Tracking and monitoring actual results against budget and KPIs.
• Consistently communicating this process to all staff levels within the organization to obtain buy-in of the strategic priorities and to motivate them to achieve the desired results.

Nikita approaches regulatory compliance by working within the bank’s policies and procedures, ensuring timely updates are made in accordance with changes to laws and regulations. Mobilization of the bank to adopt the three lines of defense approach is also key to regulatory compliance as it ensures the bank’s first line of defense, which is its employees, are knowledgeable and equipped to onboard customers and accept transactions in line with the bank’s risk appetite.

The second line of defense ensures the bank’s internal controls and quality assurance checks are foolproof to detect any errors or breakdowns and will prevent the transaction from being executed. Finally, the third line of defense, which incorporates internal audit, is extremely useful in attesting the strength of the bank’s internal control framework, the results of which give her an opportunity to tweak or correct any identified deficiencies.

Her approach also entails open and transparent communication to the bank’s governing bodies, such as its Audit and Risk Management Committee, who ultimately report to the Board of Directors. Her career was built on the core foundation of external audit, and these guiding principles have stayed with her and defined how she leads from a regulatory compliance and financial management perspective.

Integrating Coaching into Performance Feedback

Through her transformational leadership style, she incorporates her passion for coaching and mentoring into her role at PROVEN. In December 2023, she obtained her Jay Shetty coaching certification, realizing that her passion for coaching others towards their highest potential allowed her to fulfill a profound sense of purpose.

While she had external clients, the demanding nature of her role did not allow her to expand this passion, so she brought her coaching skillset into the bank when leading her teams. She finds this skillset extremely useful in most situations, especially when troubleshooting problems and dealing with conflict, as it allows the employee to arrive at their own suggested solution via carefully curated open-ended questions.

It is a win-win situation, as the employee leaves the dialogue empowered by finding a solution, and she feels fulfilled in being a part of their development. She also incorporates coaching styles into her performance feedback sessions, which again allow the employee to reflect on their skills and behaviors to determine whether they are aligned with both the business and their desired outcome or, as she coins it, their ‘highest self’.

Increasing Female Representation in Leadership

Nikita believes, “To increase female representation in senior executive roles and on boards, there needs to be a revamp of the way we work by introducing more flexibility and work-life integration.” Women are leaders and pillars in all aspects of life simply by the nature of what is required of them; they lead their families, communities, and the workplace, and it is incredibly difficult to successfully do so in all aspects with limited resources, especially from a time and energy perspective.

Due to this fact, many brilliant women with lots of potential may choose to settle in roles beneath C-Suite as there is not enough support from the organizations to set them up for success both personally and professionally. According to a recent article from Johns Hopkins University, for the first time in 68 years of existence of the Fortune 500 list, more than 10% of Fortune 500 companies are being led by women, moving from 2 female CEOs in the year 2000 to 53 in the year 2023.

As women are entering the workforce at a much faster rate than men, the future success of organizations depends on breaking the old paradigm of work and creating a new structure that prioritizes women’s needs. The introduction of after-school programs, daycare for kids, executive assistance, and flexibility will help women better focus on their professional careers.

Additionally, Nikita believes greater introspection is required from male counterparts to determine if there are any biases held against women who are positioning themselves for senior leadership roles. Often, qualified women are overlooked due to discrimination and bias by male counterparts; however, boards must hold themselves and others accountable if these behaviors are prevalent, as it may cost the organization the very skillset and leadership style required to take the business into future success.

In addition to this, there needs to be a greater investment in offering women executive mentorship to assume the top positions, which will enable them to learn from other women who have successfully created leadership blueprints, built influence and social capital, navigated tough negotiations, especially for salaries and compensation, and created positive change within organizations. She must say she is incredibly proud to be a part of the PROVEN organization, which has put female leadership at the top, with over 70% of the executive leadership team being female.

Staying Updated with Industry Trends

She stays updated with the latest trends and regulations in the banking industry by staying connected with local associations, such as the local Bankers Association, for which she serves as Treasurer on the executive committee.

She also participates in working groups with other member organizations, such as the Cayman Islands Institute of Professional Accountants, where she is on the ESG and sustainability committee, and the banking working group at Cayman Finance. These memberships are the first to be informed about changes to laws, regulations, and trends and are critical in providing feedback to the various ministries via consultations on planned changes.

She is also active in the attendance of various local and international conferences with expert speakers, which keeps her abreast of what’s happening in the IT, banking, and financial services space. Finally, she is an avid listener of various podcasts, such as HBR Ideacast and the Bankers Podcast, and a subscriber to various apps, such as the Bloomberg business news app and the Wall Street Journal app.

Creating Value and Proactivity

Nikita advises young women to get clear on their deeper WHY. Aspiring to senior executive roles in any industry without clarity as to why the office is being sought or the impact they are desiring to create will lead to a deep sense of unfulfillment. As a senior executive, days are increasingly busy, and at times, one tends to forget one’s why and feel completely lost.

At those times, remembering and staying grounded in the why is super important. Once the why is established, create a pathway to begin gaining the technical and leadership experience required to step into senior executive roles. Don’t discount the level of technical skills required and take the necessary steps to close any skills gap identified. Don’t skip steps, as each level of learning and training is necessary in building the core foundation required to lead at an executive level.

In most organizations, staff costs are the highest expense. For this reason, it’s important to always create value for the organization, be proactive, offer ideas and solutions to colleagues and leaders, and demonstrate the ability to implement those solutions. This way, one becomes top of mind when a senior leader or even a board member has a problem to be solved.

She also highlights investing heavily in oneself by working with a powerful, inspiring, and far more advanced coach and mentor. She is blessed to have an incredible high-performance coach, Dr. Shelly-Ann Gajadhar of Alphastute, and a wellness coach and mentor, Mirabelle D’Cunha, who are both able to pull out of her more advanced versions of herself that even she couldn’t see at times and guide her to step into bold, new possibilities. She also speaks of staying grounded in humility through her deep connection to family and remembering where she came from. She deeply enjoys spending time at her home with her spouse and Shitzu, Molly. Having a supportive family makes the world of a difference when leading at the C-Suite level.

Begin building a brand and reputation, as it certainly takes precedence and is the biggest asset; this will get one into rooms and in front of audiences that will propel them even further into leadership and larger roles. Incorporate work-life integration into the day; there is no need to show up as two separate personalities with very distinct goals; when operating authentically as the full self, there will be alignment between both, and one will feel more fulfilled.

Vision for Empowering Lives

Her goal is to live out her vision, which is to empower and enrich lives through transformational leadership, allow others to step into their highest selves, and pioneer a new world of banking that merges people with profit. She plans to achieve this vision by continuing on her current path as Deputy CEO, creating impact by driving her teams to high performance and allowing them to realize their personal and professional goals.

She is also laser-focused on applying her technical know-how and transformational leadership skills, which will add value to sustainably grow the market share of the bank and provide premium digitalized banking services and products to the public that can allow them to achieve their financial goals.

Financial empowerment is a huge passion of hers, and she will continue to utilize her finance coaching background and current Deputy CEO role to create products and services that allow a larger subset of people to achieve financial empowerment.

She also plans to build out her coaching company, “By Her Grace Ltd,” which targets young women who are seeking coaching and mentorship to establish greater leadership presence, financial freedom, and self-actualization. Her legacy will be rooted in the number of lives she has touched through leading by example, and even if this turns out to be just one person, that would be enough.