Aoifinn Devitt: So I will start like from the beginning. 4 years ago when I joined Vinted, I really was looking for someone like Arab, to be more specific, like to explain to me the obstacles and like to understand what can be the career path that I should expect. Okay, if I get— if I like accept this opportunity, what’s next? What’s the advancement in career? And literally there was— I couldn’t find any, like, I guess one or two in the industry who are Arabs. So along the way, I felt like really lonely. I didn’t have any role models to look up to. And there are many talented people in this industry, but I wanted someone who maybe had to overcome the same obstacles that I need to overcome, and I didn’t find any.
Maram Hussein: I’m Aoifinn Devitt, and welcome to this 50 Faces focus series, which showcases inspiring women in tech and beyond. I’m joined today by Maram Hussein, who is Director of Investor Communications at Vintage Investment Partners and a board member at Kav Mashfey. She started her career as a tax researcher, moving to an auditor role before assuming her current role. In recent months, she established an initiative to integrate more Arabs in the venture capital, investment banks, and consulting firms. Welcome, Maren. Thanks for joining me today.
Aoifinn Devitt: Thank you. I’m really thrilled to record this podcast with you. And by the way, it’s my first podcast in English.
Maram Hussein: Well, thank you so much for being here. And we’re delighted to hear your story. So let’s start with your career journey. Can you tell us where you were born, where you grew up, and what you originally studied?
Aoifinn Devitt: So I was born and raised in a village in the North District in Israel, Zebulun. And then I decided to study accounting and economics at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. At the time, I was looking like for the top-ranked university in Israel, so that’s why I decided to study there. Through my studies, due to exams and lessons, I was looking for a flexible job and eventually started working as a remote internet tax researcher at Walters Kluwer, a London-based company. After which, like, when I finished my studies, I started working in a pre-internship at PwC. In the East Jerusalem branch. I worked there for almost a one year, and then like I decided to move back to the north, and I started interviewing for the Big Four accounting firms. It’s really important to me to describe also the journeys and obstacles that I have to overcome in order to secure a job there. In the university, we were like 50 Arab graduates with accounting, and only 3, I guess, at the time got accepted to the Big 4 accounting firms. And it’s really important, like, to secure an internship there because once you do it, it will open doors for you for a successful career. And like, I had— when I was in the third year, I did the first round of interviews in the Big 4 accounting firm. I did— I was rejected in all of them, and you need to wait 12 months to try again. And I did, and I was rejected in 3 of them, and I was only accepted in Deloitte, and only because the partner there insisted that they should hire me. So I did my internship in Deloitte for 2 years in audit, although at the time I didn’t have the privilege to choose which department I want to do my internship at. I was like really grateful that they give me this opportunity to do the internship there, like, and I I did it peacefully and never raised my voice. And I was looking forward to the time I finished my internship and to start applying for jobs at leading corporates in Israel. So I remember that I spent, I guess, months sending my resume to companies and got lots of rejections. I was not even invited for an interview. So I was really desperate for a job because my job at at the time did not pay well. And I started talking to relatives and one of them worked at a bank, although this is not something that I wanted to do, but I had to take it. And I joined as a credit analyst in a discount bank. For me, I knew it was temporary. And ever since I joined them, I was like looking for a job. And I started building a network and talking to friends and telling them that I’m really passionate about all the high-tech ecosystem. I want to get to know more VCs, more startups, and maybe appreciate the opportunity to join one of these. And I was very lucky because one of my friends introduced me to Vinted and told me that they have an open vacancy in the finance team. It was 4 years ago and I really jumped on this opportunity. And I started as a coordinator in the finance team, investor relations coordinator. And after 1 year I was promoted to lead and today I’m the director of investor relations.
Maram Hussein: That’s a wonderful trajectory. I’d love to just ask you about why you think it was that it was so challenging for you and some of your colleagues and cohorts to obtain internships. Do you think there was perhaps a lack of network maybe, or a lack of interview training? Did you have any insights into why that was so challenging?
Aoifinn Devitt: So back in 2013, I remember at least half of the Arab graduates, they didn’t even have the courage to apply. Because they said, okay, students with higher GPA than mine did not get accepted, so why they would accept me at all? And at the time, we didn’t really have the role models, like Arabs weren’t really integrated in those firms. So we did not have an address, we did not have a network of people that we can go to and ask them, what should we do to get accepted? Can someone help us maybe with the case studies or give us some advice to pass the interviews? Maybe the accent. Maybe we weren’t like really strong in speaking Hebrew. I cannot really tell the exact reason, but I remember that it was like sort of a mission impossible at the time. And I really wanted like constructive feedback from the interviewers, but I didn’t get it at the time. Like I wanted to know why I’m not passing this. I passed many levels, like if you have 5 levels to pass in order to get accepted, I always got to the last one and got rejected and I was like really looking for constructive feedback but I didn’t get it. So maybe, I don’t know, maybe they were afraid of the accent at the time. I don’t really know but today it’s changing. There’s more awareness to integrating diversified employees. Also there’s a lack of accounting graduates because everyone is going to study like programming and computer science and want to join high-tech companies. So So the talent is going there and they’re like having a lack of presence in other fields. So like sort of the combination of both.
Maram Hussein: Just moving forward, now you are working on an initiative that you’ve launched to integrate more Arabs into venture capital, investment banks, and consulting firms. Can you talk a little bit about that?
Aoifinn Devitt: So I will start like from the beginning. 4 years ago when I joined Vintage, I really was looking for someone like Arab, to be more specific, like to explain to me the obstacles and like to understand what can be the career path that I should expect. Okay, if I get— if I like accept this opportunity, what’s next? What’s the advancement in career? And literally there was— I couldn’t find any, like I guess one or two in the industry who are Arabs. So Along the way, I felt like really lonely. I didn’t have any role models to look up to. And there are many talented people in this industry, but I wanted someone who maybe had to overcome the same obstacles that I need to overcome, and I didn’t find any. So we were talking about this all the time. We were talking about the lack of presence of Arabs in this industry, but no one did anything on it. I was very lucky that the founder of Vintage, Alan, was like true a leader, and he was like proactively looking for Arab talent. But unfortunately, that was not the case in other VCs. So with time, like, we started thinking, me and some of my friends, that we need to build something from within, like from within our community. And I started networking and just meeting people like our other Arab— Arabs who started working in the, in the VCs, and we started talking to each other and to empower each other. And eventually A few months ago, I decided, okay, we need to build a community. But since VCs is like strongly connected to also the consulting firms and investment banks, because ideally the candidate who fits the VC role requirements is either an ex-consultant at one of the top-tier consulting firms or an ex-investment banker who wants to make a transition. We decided to build a community from these industries. And we also felt that one of the reasons that Arab founders are not being successful to secure funds is because of the network. Arab founders don’t have in their circles any people who work at VCs that can give them constructive feedback and tell them or give them some advice. So we said, okay, there’s lack of presence of Arabs in VCs and consulting firms, and there’s an ecosystem of entrepreneurs who’s not— who’s failing to build up in our community. So we need to build something. We need to build a community that would support each pillar of these. And I literally started looking for all Arabs in those industries. We built this community and started brainstorming, um, on what should be our strategic plan, what should be our next steps, what should we do. How can we help? And we started with a very modest and realistic goal. We said, okay, we have 30 Arabs in those industries today and we want to double the amount in the next year. What should we do to do that? And on the strategic plan, we said, like, we have a very realistic goal, which is to double the amount of Arab employees in those industries in the next year. And to do that, we have like sort of a steering committee who would like to receive some potential candidates resumes and filter them and see which is relevant and which is not. And for the ones who are relevant, what can we do to help them, which courses they can take in order to improve their chances to integrate into industries. Also to help in consulting firms, they have some case studies that they need to prepare for the interviews and maybe like provide them with materials and to match them with someone who works already there and can give them some advice and mentor them.
Maram Hussein: So what exactly are you planning as part of this initiative and what have you seen in terms of interventions that have worked well so far?
Aoifinn Devitt: In terms of interventions that worked so far is if we have like competent leaders who are committed to the cause and committed to create an inclusive culture and not only integrate employees with a diversified background, but also to maintain a sustainable environment for them after they join. To see them and to have a place for them on the table and to promote them and not to integrate them and that’s it. And for diversity also to work, I think that it has to be from both sides. Also like employees should be aware of their talent and abilities and to be more confident and to work more on themselves to enhance and improve. And also for employers to be open to hire them and to be open-minded in terms of the culture gaps, language gaps, network gaps, and all of that.
Maram Hussein: That’s great. And what kind of a reaction did some of these initiatives have? And I’m you thinking, know, maybe from the employers as well as the potential new applicants, has it been well received?
Aoifinn Devitt: So I posted about the soft launch 3 months ago, and ever since I posted about it, like I started receiving messages on LinkedIn from partners at VCs or maybe recruiters that they have open vacancies and started asking me how can we reach out to the Arab talent and if I have someone who might fit a certain position or other. I also started getting messages also on programs that help to advance diversity in those industries. Both locally and globally. So I started sending those programs to my community, the community we built, the Go Big community, and they started applying for it, and some of them got accepted, and that was like really amazing. We felt an immediate reaction, and there was VC Academy course here in Israel, and I sent them a few candidates, and they already started this course, and also there were like programs in London Business School, which some of the candidates also applied and got accepted. It was really heartwarming.
Maram Hussein: That’s wonderful, the ongoing support that you give, and I would hope that this is a program that can continue as their careers evolve so you that, know, as they make changes later, not just the initial application, there can be the community of advice and mentors there providing advice on an ongoing basis. As well.
Aoifinn Devitt: Exactly.
Maram Hussein: So just now, going back to some personal reflections of your own, did you have any mentors or advisors or key people in your career that really made a difference to some of the, the positions you applied to?
Aoifinn Devitt: As I told you, in the VC industry, I didn’t really have a role model, so my source of inspiration, to be honest, was initially my mother, who was like really resilient and like encouraged me in every step that I take, and I learned resilience from her. But then in the, in the career, like, I was looking up for especially women in high-key roles and was really inspired by all the obstacles they needed to overcome in order to be where they are today. And in my career, I actually look up to my current boss, which was a true leader. And a few years back when, when diversity was not an issue and there weren’t so much buzz around it, he was a true leader and started opening doors for Arab employees. I was not the only one in the company, so that only shows how true he is and how a great leader he is.
Maram Hussein: And when you think about any words of wisdom or any creed or motto that you live by. Is there anything you can share there?
Aoifinn Devitt: Definitely. So on a personal level, my motto is like Mark Twain’s quote, which is, in 20 years from now, you will be more disappointed by the things that you did not do than by the ones you did. So throw off the bowlines and sail away from your safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore, dream, and discover. That’s on a personal level, like how to challenge yourself and to get out from your comfort zone and do untraditional things. And on a supervisor level, my motto is you don’t hire for skills, you hire for attitude. You can always teach the skills. Something I learned from Simran Singh’s book.
Maram Hussein: Really interesting about attitude. I haven’t heard it that way before, but I totally agree. And it is, it is difficult to shape an attitude, I suppose, although We have to hope in some industries that we can change at least some of the bias that’s out there. And my last question is around any advice you would have for your younger self. If based on where you are now in your career and what you’ve achieved, is there anything that you wish you had known when you were younger?
Aoifinn Devitt: When I started my career, I was just grateful for the opportunities I got. But I was very low profile. I never said, okay, I’m in the audit department now, do I like it? If I don’t like it, what else what do I want to do? I never had the courage to be outspoken and say what I really want, what I really like. So if I go back in time, I would tell Maram, like, be more confident, speak up about your needs, about your ambitions, and don’t be shy.
Maram Hussein: Well, thank you so much, Maram. It’s been a pleasure speaking with you today. Thank you for the work that you’re doing to raise awareness of the question of integration of more Arabs into this community. And congratulations on the great success you’ve seen already. And I look forward to seeing more of that. And thank you for coming here and for sharing your insights with us.
Aoifinn Devitt: Thank you. And I’m looking forward to hear all your episodes.
Maram Hussein: I’m Aoifinn Devitt. Thank you for listening to our 50 Faces Focus Series. If you liked what you heard and would like to tune in to hear more inspiring women in tech and beyond, please subscribe on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be construed as investment advice, and all views are personal and should not be attributed to the organizations and affiliations of the host or any guest.
Aoifinn Devitt: So I will start like from the beginning. 4 years ago when I joined Vinted, I really was looking for someone like Arab, to be more specific, like to explain to me the obstacles and like to understand what can be the career path that I should expect. Okay, if I get— if I like accept this opportunity, what’s next? What’s the advancement in career? And literally there was— I couldn’t find any, like, I guess one or two in the industry who are Arabs. So along the way, I felt like really lonely. I didn’t have any role models to look up to. And there are many talented people in this industry, but I wanted someone who maybe had to overcome the same obstacles that I need to overcome, and I didn’t find any.
Maram Hussein: I’m Aoifinn Devitt, and welcome to this 50 Faces focus series, which showcases inspiring women in tech and beyond. I’m joined today by Maram Hussein, who is Director of Investor Communications at Vintage Investment Partners and a board member at Kav Mashfey. She started her career as a tax researcher, moving to an auditor role before assuming her current role. In recent months, she established an initiative to integrate more Arabs in the venture capital, investment banks, and consulting firms. Welcome, Maren. Thanks for joining me today.
Aoifinn Devitt: Thank you. I’m really thrilled to record this podcast with you. And by the way, it’s my first podcast in English.
Maram Hussein: Well, thank you so much for being here. And we’re delighted to hear your story. So let’s start with your career journey. Can you tell us where you were born, where you grew up, and what you originally studied?
Aoifinn Devitt: So I was born and raised in a village in the North District in Israel, Zebulun. And then I decided to study accounting and economics at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. At the time, I was looking like for the top-ranked university in Israel, so that’s why I decided to study there. Through my studies, due to exams and lessons, I was looking for a flexible job and eventually started working as a remote internet tax researcher at Walters Kluwer, a London-based company. After which, like, when I finished my studies, I started working in a pre-internship at PwC. In the East Jerusalem branch. I worked there for almost a one year, and then like I decided to move back to the north, and I started interviewing for the Big Four accounting firms. It’s really important to me to describe also the journeys and obstacles that I have to overcome in order to secure a job there. In the university, we were like 50 Arab graduates with accounting, and only 3, I guess, at the time got accepted to the Big 4 accounting firms. And it’s really important, like, to secure an internship there because once you do it, it will open doors for you for a successful career. And like, I had— when I was in the third year, I did the first round of interviews in the Big 4 accounting firm. I did— I was rejected in all of them, and you need to wait 12 months to try again. And I did, and I was rejected in 3 of them, and I was only accepted in Deloitte, and only because the partner there insisted that they should hire me. So I did my internship in Deloitte for 2 years in audit, although at the time I didn’t have the privilege to choose which department I want to do my internship at. I was like really grateful that they give me this opportunity to do the internship there, like, and I I did it peacefully and never raised my voice. And I was looking forward to the time I finished my internship and to start applying for jobs at leading corporates in Israel. So I remember that I spent, I guess, months sending my resume to companies and got lots of rejections. I was not even invited for an interview. So I was really desperate for a job because my job at at the time did not pay well. And I started talking to relatives and one of them worked at a bank, although this is not something that I wanted to do, but I had to take it. And I joined as a credit analyst in a discount bank. For me, I knew it was temporary. And ever since I joined them, I was like looking for a job. And I started building a network and talking to friends and telling them that I’m really passionate about all the high-tech ecosystem. I want to get to know more VCs, more startups, and maybe appreciate the opportunity to join one of these. And I was very lucky because one of my friends introduced me to Vinted and told me that they have an open vacancy in the finance team. It was 4 years ago and I really jumped on this opportunity. And I started as a coordinator in the finance team, investor relations coordinator. And after 1 year I was promoted to lead and today I’m the director of investor relations.
Maram Hussein: That’s a wonderful trajectory. I’d love to just ask you about why you think it was that it was so challenging for you and some of your colleagues and cohorts to obtain internships. Do you think there was perhaps a lack of network maybe, or a lack of interview training? Did you have any insights into why that was so challenging?
Aoifinn Devitt: So back in 2013, I remember at least half of the Arab graduates, they didn’t even have the courage to apply. Because they said, okay, students with higher GPA than mine did not get accepted, so why they would accept me at all? And at the time, we didn’t really have the role models, like Arabs weren’t really integrated in those firms. So we did not have an address, we did not have a network of people that we can go to and ask them, what should we do to get accepted? Can someone help us maybe with the case studies or give us some advice to pass the interviews? Maybe the accent. Maybe we weren’t like really strong in speaking Hebrew. I cannot really tell the exact reason, but I remember that it was like sort of a mission impossible at the time. And I really wanted like constructive feedback from the interviewers, but I didn’t get it at the time. Like I wanted to know why I’m not passing this. I passed many levels, like if you have 5 levels to pass in order to get accepted, I always got to the last one and got rejected and I was like really looking for constructive feedback but I didn’t get it. So maybe, I don’t know, maybe they were afraid of the accent at the time. I don’t really know but today it’s changing. There’s more awareness to integrating diversified employees. Also there’s a lack of accounting graduates because everyone is going to study like programming and computer science and want to join high-tech companies. So So the talent is going there and they’re like having a lack of presence in other fields. So like sort of the combination of both.
Maram Hussein: Just moving forward, now you are working on an initiative that you’ve launched to integrate more Arabs into venture capital, investment banks, and consulting firms. Can you talk a little bit about that?
Aoifinn Devitt: So I will start like from the beginning. 4 years ago when I joined Vintage, I really was looking for someone like Arab, to be more specific, like to explain to me the obstacles and like to understand what can be the career path that I should expect. Okay, if I get— if I like accept this opportunity, what’s next? What’s the advancement in career? And literally there was— I couldn’t find any, like I guess one or two in the industry who are Arabs. So Along the way, I felt like really lonely. I didn’t have any role models to look up to. And there are many talented people in this industry, but I wanted someone who maybe had to overcome the same obstacles that I need to overcome, and I didn’t find any. So we were talking about this all the time. We were talking about the lack of presence of Arabs in this industry, but no one did anything on it. I was very lucky that the founder of Vintage, Alan, was like true a leader, and he was like proactively looking for Arab talent. But unfortunately, that was not the case in other VCs. So with time, like, we started thinking, me and some of my friends, that we need to build something from within, like from within our community. And I started networking and just meeting people like our other Arab— Arabs who started working in the, in the VCs, and we started talking to each other and to empower each other. And eventually A few months ago, I decided, okay, we need to build a community. But since VCs is like strongly connected to also the consulting firms and investment banks, because ideally the candidate who fits the VC role requirements is either an ex-consultant at one of the top-tier consulting firms or an ex-investment banker who wants to make a transition. We decided to build a community from these industries. And we also felt that one of the reasons that Arab founders are not being successful to secure funds is because of the network. Arab founders don’t have in their circles any people who work at VCs that can give them constructive feedback and tell them or give them some advice. So we said, okay, there’s lack of presence of Arabs in VCs and consulting firms, and there’s an ecosystem of entrepreneurs who’s not— who’s failing to build up in our community. So we need to build something. We need to build a community that would support each pillar of these. And I literally started looking for all Arabs in those industries. We built this community and started brainstorming, um, on what should be our strategic plan, what should be our next steps, what should we do. How can we help? And we started with a very modest and realistic goal. We said, okay, we have 30 Arabs in those industries today and we want to double the amount in the next year. What should we do to do that? And on the strategic plan, we said, like, we have a very realistic goal, which is to double the amount of Arab employees in those industries in the next year. And to do that, we have like sort of a steering committee who would like to receive some potential candidates resumes and filter them and see which is relevant and which is not. And for the ones who are relevant, what can we do to help them, which courses they can take in order to improve their chances to integrate into industries. Also to help in consulting firms, they have some case studies that they need to prepare for the interviews and maybe like provide them with materials and to match them with someone who works already there and can give them some advice and mentor them.
Maram Hussein: So what exactly are you planning as part of this initiative and what have you seen in terms of interventions that have worked well so far?
Aoifinn Devitt: In terms of interventions that worked so far is if we have like competent leaders who are committed to the cause and committed to create an inclusive culture and not only integrate employees with a diversified background, but also to maintain a sustainable environment for them after they join. To see them and to have a place for them on the table and to promote them and not to integrate them and that’s it. And for diversity also to work, I think that it has to be from both sides. Also like employees should be aware of their talent and abilities and to be more confident and to work more on themselves to enhance and improve. And also for employers to be open to hire them and to be open-minded in terms of the culture gaps, language gaps, network gaps, and all of that.
Maram Hussein: That’s great. And what kind of a reaction did some of these initiatives have? And I’m you thinking, know, maybe from the employers as well as the potential new applicants, has it been well received?
Aoifinn Devitt: So I posted about the soft launch 3 months ago, and ever since I posted about it, like I started receiving messages on LinkedIn from partners at VCs or maybe recruiters that they have open vacancies and started asking me how can we reach out to the Arab talent and if I have someone who might fit a certain position or other. I also started getting messages also on programs that help to advance diversity in those industries. Both locally and globally. So I started sending those programs to my community, the community we built, the Go Big community, and they started applying for it, and some of them got accepted, and that was like really amazing. We felt an immediate reaction, and there was VC Academy course here in Israel, and I sent them a few candidates, and they already started this course, and also there were like programs in London Business School, which some of the candidates also applied and got accepted. It was really heartwarming.
Maram Hussein: That’s wonderful, the ongoing support that you give, and I would hope that this is a program that can continue as their careers evolve so you that, know, as they make changes later, not just the initial application, there can be the community of advice and mentors there providing advice on an ongoing basis. As well.
Aoifinn Devitt: Exactly.
Maram Hussein: So just now, going back to some personal reflections of your own, did you have any mentors or advisors or key people in your career that really made a difference to some of the, the positions you applied to?
Aoifinn Devitt: As I told you, in the VC industry, I didn’t really have a role model, so my source of inspiration, to be honest, was initially my mother, who was like really resilient and like encouraged me in every step that I take, and I learned resilience from her. But then in the, in the career, like, I was looking up for especially women in high-key roles and was really inspired by all the obstacles they needed to overcome in order to be where they are today. And in my career, I actually look up to my current boss, which was a true leader. And a few years back when, when diversity was not an issue and there weren’t so much buzz around it, he was a true leader and started opening doors for Arab employees. I was not the only one in the company, so that only shows how true he is and how a great leader he is.
Maram Hussein: And when you think about any words of wisdom or any creed or motto that you live by. Is there anything you can share there?
Aoifinn Devitt: Definitely. So on a personal level, my motto is like Mark Twain’s quote, which is, in 20 years from now, you will be more disappointed by the things that you did not do than by the ones you did. So throw off the bowlines and sail away from your safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore, dream, and discover. That’s on a personal level, like how to challenge yourself and to get out from your comfort zone and do untraditional things. And on a supervisor level, my motto is you don’t hire for skills, you hire for attitude. You can always teach the skills. Something I learned from Simran Singh’s book.
Maram Hussein: Really interesting about attitude. I haven’t heard it that way before, but I totally agree. And it is, it is difficult to shape an attitude, I suppose, although We have to hope in some industries that we can change at least some of the bias that’s out there. And my last question is around any advice you would have for your younger self. If based on where you are now in your career and what you’ve achieved, is there anything that you wish you had known when you were younger?
Aoifinn Devitt: When I started my career, I was just grateful for the opportunities I got. But I was very low profile. I never said, okay, I’m in the audit department now, do I like it? If I don’t like it, what else what do I want to do? I never had the courage to be outspoken and say what I really want, what I really like. So if I go back in time, I would tell Maram, like, be more confident, speak up about your needs, about your ambitions, and don’t be shy.
Maram Hussein: Well, thank you so much, Maram. It’s been a pleasure speaking with you today. Thank you for the work that you’re doing to raise awareness of the question of integration of more Arabs into this community. And congratulations on the great success you’ve seen already. And I look forward to seeing more of that. And thank you for coming here and for sharing your insights with us.
Aoifinn Devitt: Thank you. And I’m looking forward to hear all your episodes.
Maram Hussein: I’m Aoifinn Devitt. Thank you for listening to our 50 Faces Focus Series. If you liked what you heard and would like to tune in to hear more inspiring women in tech and beyond, please subscribe on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be construed as investment advice, and all views are personal and should not be attributed to the organizations and affiliations of the host or any guest.
