MY CAREER IN SIX SPOTLIGHT

 EMMA ROBSON

 Head of Customer Propositions and Payments, UK

HSBC

Sharing her career journey by answering the six questions below.

Who or what has been your biggest source of inspiration throughout your career?

 A tough question: I would attribute my inspiration to two main areas: 1) “Bring your whole self to work” – although it might not work in all environments, I find that this motto has empowered me to be my genuine and authentic self both inside and outside of work. As a result, I’ve been successful in building trust and continue to build a network where I can seek support to simply get things done (of course, I return the favour when I can too). 2) I had an opportunity to work with for an incredible female leader, which energised me as I could see her success was based on her extensive knowledge and understanding of customer needs. This aligns to who I am – I find that I acquire as much information as I can through collaboration and insight gathering to then influence direction and decisions for the best possible customer outcome. Seeing her work this way had a lasting impact on me as I found I don’t need to compromise who I am to succeed.

Would you say your success is primarily due to luck or hard work?

 I would not say luck alone, but I have made the most of being in the right place at the right time and have been fortunate to gain a lot of knowledge and experience from the roles I have held at HSBC. I would say the foundation of my success has been largely due to Transformation roles, where I could spend anything from 6 to 18 months in a new business area, needing to learn and drive action to achieve a defined goal/objective at pace. I have passion to deliver change, problem solve and make life better for our customers – that makes the hard work easy, and I have found the hardest steps are usually the right ones to take, and always worth the journey to get things right.

What is the driving force behind your career aspirations?

Helping others. I am genuinely always happy to help others whether it is for my immediate team or those that I interact with daily. I’ve been fortunate to meet a lot of people in my career, and my motivation to continuously learn and drive to resolve problems has meant I naturally increase my profile and have an advantage compared to my peers who can sometimes focus on their immediate workload and competing priorities. I haven’t perfected this by any means; I quite often get into the task at hand without stepping back but I practice every day to ensure the habit sticks. A book I recently read by Emma Pears, ‘What Does it Matter?’ reinforced the value of focusing on what is important, what I can do, and how much effort to apply.

If given the chance to do one thing differently in your career, what would it be and why?

 I would tell myself not to doubt myself, and to believe in my self-worth. In my early career, there would be times (too many to count) where I felt I could not contribute to ideas as I was new to a team or project and thought I was too young and inexperienced to share my thoughts or that they wouldn’t be valued. I had not heard of imposter syndrome back then but now upon reflection, I admit I was feeling this way.

What was your most favourite job/role and why?

I would say my job right now. I have a passion for helping others so managing a growing team, supporting their careers, and seeing them grow is very rewarding. I also like to drive change, and for anyone in Payments, there is not a moment where there is not a problem to fix, a change to implement or the ability to innovate the way customers interact every day. I also had the opportunity to lead on one of the critical workstreams following the acquisition of the UK arm of Silicon Valley Bank, now known as HSBC Innovation Banking, which was an exciting way to meet others, learn a lot, and achieve major change at pace!

Do you have a favourite motto or quote that guides your professional life?

The one that has stuck with me is from Sheryl Sandberg, from her book Lean In. “Careers are a jungle gym, not a ladder”. Until reading this book, I was worried I had no direction, feeling lost and not knowing where I could go next. What I had not realised, was that I was building my network and knowledge, creating the path for me to grow – knowing it was OK to move side to side and that I didn’t have to continuously move up was key! I also reflected on my career in 2022 where I realised what I enjoyed most and what motivated me – this was both learning and driving change. This has meant I can be more deliberate and focused to target new opportunities, recognising what value I can bring whilst keeping motivation levels high through a personal sense of achievement.