Meet Heather, our VP of Member Engagement
Our Member Engagement team is focused on understanding our members’ needs to help them save time and money via the products & services we offer on the Tide platform. We’d love for you to meet the people behind the team – so first up, here’s our VP of Member Engagement: Heather!
👋 Hey Heather! So great to talk to you today, could you please introduce yourself?
Hello! My name is Heather and I’m the VP of Member Engagement at Tide — which I think is a fantastic role, with responsibility for engaging with our members, understanding their needs, and helping them save time and money via the products & services we offer on the Tide platform.
The Member Engagement team plays such a key role! What made you want to join Tide?
I’m really excited about Tide’s mission to help drive small business growth. There are over 5.5 million SMEs in the UK, which account for around half of UK economic activity and more than half of employment…..so to say that there’s huge opportunity here would be an understatement! And I think in spite of this, it is a sector that is often underserved by high street banks. So I’m delighted to be here at Tide and in a position where I can really make a difference in the products and services we offer to SMEs.
Having worked in really large companies for much of my career, I was also looking to make the move into Fintech — to get closer to the technology, and to lead in a really hands-on way across both product development and marketing.
How is your role, as VP of Member Engagement Marketing, supporting Tide’s growth?
I think I have one of the best roles in the company! Myself and the team support Tide’s growth in multiple different ways, from leading research efforts to understand what members value most, to showcasing the perks and benefits of being a Tide member, to using a broad range of CRM channels to introduce our members to our products and services.
No two days are the same, and myself and the team have both the pleasure and the responsibility of continually enhancing the member experience — and we know that if we do this well, it will help our members better run their business and, hopefully, recommend us to their fellow entrepreneurs so we can help even more small businesses. What could be better?
Speaking of growth, career progression is a big focus of us at Tide, especially for our female colleagues. Can you tell us how Tide is supporting women to progress into senior positions?
What is really exciting about being part of a rapidly scaling organisation is the opportunities it provides for all Tideans to grow and develop within the company.
And helping female Tideans progress into senior positions is something the leadership team is particularly focused on. At Tide and within the Fintech industry more broadly, we know there is work to do — and this starts with proactive recruitment of female talent, ensuring a great on-boarding process with buddies and mentors, and having our increasing number of senior female leaders within the company share insights from their own career journeys to help inspire others.
And you are part of our inspiring senior female leadership. Can you share the best piece of advice you have received?
I’m going to cheat a little here…..and go with three pieces….
- Be yourself. Everyone brings a unique talent and perspective, and as a team and a company, if we can truly embrace these differences we are so much stronger for it.
- Stay curious. I love asking (and being asked!) difficult or left-field questions, looking at issues from a lot of different angles, and finding new ways to solve problems as a team.
- Keep learning. Which links naturally to staying curious. I’ve found huge satisfaction in being able to look back every 6 months or year and to be able to point to specific new things that I’ve learnt. Which is part of why I’m so happy at Tide, I can honestly say I keep learning every single day.
We’re hiring in all our offices to support our growth! What advice would you give someone who is looking for a role in Fintech?
To get in touch! With myself or other members of the team; we continue to grow at pace and are always looking for great talent.Please check out our current opportunities across London, Sofia and Hyderabad, Gurugram, and many more locations here.
For me, having the right attitude, being curious, and being keen to learn is what’s key — so it doesn’t matter if someone has specific Fintech experience or not. I’ve been fortunate to hire a great team with experience across many different industries. What they have in common is energy, enthusiasm and a genuine desire to continually improve our marketing communications and product offering for the benefit of our member base.
One last question before you go, what is your hidden talent?
I’m really good at making origami birds…..does that count?
