PEAKLIFE

“The first step to financial liberation for women is to accept that the more you run away from understanding finance, the scarier it will look.”

Neha Misra is the CEO and co-founder of The Fin Lit Project, an IIIT Delhi and STPI Chennai incubated financial and FinTech literacy platform. She has more than a decade of experience in technology and finance, has honed her skills at corporates and startups in India and the USA, and has worked at Wall Street, New York. She is a SEBI and NISM Empanelled Securities Markets expert, and an advisor to the board of governors at IIM Visakhapatnam. Her remarkable work as an advocate for financial literacy in India inspires and equips people with the skills to understand and manage their finances in a more informed and responsible manner. In a detailed discussion with PEAKLIFE, she underlines the need for developing financial awareness. The full version of this interview appears in the March-April edition of PEAKLIFE magazine.

The FinLit Project takes a holistic approach towards building financial skills. Why is it essential for every individual to inculcate these skills, and when is it better to consult a professional?

Financial literacy is one of those tools that help in securing your and your family’s future. While it is best to seek professional help when it comes to managing your finances, understanding the premises of these investments and engagements depends on individual needs. While a SEBI-registered investment advisor will guide you best with regard to your goal planning, only when we take ownership of these financial decisions by embracing financial literacy will the returns be better. Engaging in market-linked instruments should be dealt with professional advice, however, Small Savings Schemes such as Sukanya Samriddhi, Post Office MIS should be started at the right time to provide maximum benefit, and this is only possible if an individual builds these financial skills to save, budget, invest and insure.

Conditioning and culture can often prevent women from gaining financial autonomy. What do you prescribe as a solution for women to become more confident financial decision makers?

I think women are better decision makers owing to our ability to multitask better and evaluate the pros and cons of any product better. But somehow, as a subconscious effort, we are driven to understand that financial decisions should be taken by the men of the house: our fathers, brothers, husbands. The first step to financial liberation for women is to accept that the more you run away from understanding finance, the scarier it will look. On the other hand, if you start embracing it as a way of life, it becomes your best friend. One of the easiest ways to start is to read the finance section in a newspaper or follow hashtags and conversations around finance. Once the initial interest is kindled, they can explore the right books to guide them better around financial planning. Our app ‘The Fin Lit Project’, available on iOs and App Store, has free micro-courses on financial planning, valuations, investments, and bonds, aimed at democratising the ecosystem of finances for women, where anyone can learn about finance in an unbiased environment, at their own pace, without having to financially pay for it. They just need to have the interest to learn.

Money management, budgeting, and investing are the building blocks of a sound financial plan. People tend to be familiar with the first two elements, but the latter needs to be deconstructed. What is the importance and guiding philosophy for the element of investment?

One of the first tenets to investments is the idea of risk profiling and goal setting. Each individual has different goals and a different risk profile, which is why investments should be tailored for each individual. A lot of times, the biggest mistake people make is looking at a one-size-fits-all solution that their peers are engaging in. What they do not realise is that individual decisions should be governed by individual decision making, and hence, embracing financial literacy will only help them in the long run. As a nation, a lot of people have been victims of below par investment options that are disguised as something else, so we find a lack of inherent trust in the investment process. While some of it has changed since the pandemic, we still have a long way to go to cover the ground.