Hans Langenhuizen, the CEO at in3, boasts a shining reputation in the fintech industry and has devoted his career to positively influencing the financial sector. He attributes his success to his lighthearted approach and is renowned for his sense of humor and straightforward, no-nonsense demeanor. In his role, he carries the responsibility of ensuring that in3 remains a reliable source of income for the people who depend on it, directly or indirectly, to support their families. Simultaneously, he diligently monitors the company’s commitment to fulfilling promises to partners, customers, and shareholders.
The most gratifying aspect of his work, Hans believes, is the human connection: engaging in conversations and occasionally deliberating on new developments and ways to enhance the experience for their end customers.
Below are highlights of the interview conducted between World’s Leaders and Hans Langenhuizen:
Describe who you are as a person, inside and outside of the workplace.
As a real Dutch person, I am a very direct and open person. What you see is what you get! I love to have fun, and I do not have a very long attention span. I really like to have a full agenda, and I always try to do three things at the same time, which, of course, is not always working well, all to get my brains fired up. Stress is not what I feel, and living on the edge is always great, not meaning taking too many risks, but the best flowers are always just over the edge.
Describe your past journey, and what did you do before you joined in3 company?
Before joining in3, I worked for several payment companies like Worldline, Ingenico, Wincor Nixdorf, and Aevi. Started way too long ago in 1995 with Cap Gemini as a Cobol developer and is growing fast towards becoming a P&L responsible manager. From CIO to COO to CCO to MD to CEO in all different sectors with local Benelux, Europe, and worldwide responsibilities
Tell us about the inception of the company.
The company was founded almost 8 years ago as an afterpay solution. As this was not very socially responsible, we looked at how we could turn this into an offering that would be more socially responsible and came up with an installment payment offering in three installments where the first installment had to be paid directly. 5 years ago, we started with the installment solution called in3 and stopped the afterpay solution.
What has made you successful? What do you value?
The success I had was always based on being yourself and adapting quickly to new challenges. I always stand by my beliefs, and even if it costs me my job, I’ll never give up my beliefs. Related to that, you should also practice what you preach and fulfill the promises you make. Do not lie, and I saw every job as a project, so I never wanted to stay in the same company longer than 5 years, as that is normally the maximum timeline to have the “project” done. I was also in the early stages of my career and very clear on where my strengths were, and that helped me choose the right jobs. What I value the most is honesty, directness, open communication, and fun, but all while still being professional and making things happen.
Which are the major services of the company, and how do the company to get ahead in the competition? What value-added services does the company provide?
We offer installment payments to buyers in a B2C and B2B environment. All are based on a socially responsible way, so we only make money on the seller (merchant fee) and do not make any money on the buyer. Not in the B2C environment, and also not in the B2B environment. We do not use this as a marketing instrument; it is embedded in our core process. The reason for this is that we do not want buyers to be overcredited and that they get additional penalties for getting deeper and deeper in debt. We want the buyers to get better cash flow management, so for example, if they need to buy a new washing machine, they can have it spread over three salary slips, which gives them the possibility to buy a more energy-efficient machine, which gives them a benefit in the future without jeopardizing their current cash position. Further on, we believe our solution is not for all sectors, and therefore we block certain sectors from doing business with us. As an example, if you buy a Christmas dress in November and you spoil the ketchup on the dress in December and you still have to pay in January, we believe this is not the way to go. Therefore, the in3 solution is best for durable goods. Last but not least, we work together with partners, so we do not have direct contact with our sellers, but we do that via our payment server providers, which helps a lot with faster rollout and easier integration for the seller, or we help our partners like Rabobank and Allianz to offer a solution to the market, which we run as a white label.
What are the most important aspects of a company’s culture? What principles do you believe in, and how do you build this culture?
We believe in an open culture where we can say everything respectfully to each other as long as it does not offend the other. So also towards the management team and managers. The team is more important than an individual, and hard work is okay as long as it means you get energized, but private time and being well are our priority number one. We also believe in having fun together, so a nerfgun competition is something we really like to do. The whole team also wants to make the payments world a bit better due to the social responsibility we have in our core DNA.
What is the significance of innovative ideas in the company?
This is one of our top priorities, as the payments industry is a fast-moving industry, so if we stop our innovation, we can stop our company as well.
Give us your opinion on; do organizations rely heavily on individual heroics or team processes.
It is always a combination of those. Sometimes you need an individual hero to get the team started and motivated, but at the end, the team is always more important than the individual, and one cannot live without the other.
What advice would you give someone going into a leadership position for the first time?
Do not take it too seriously; be professional, but do not let the company dictate what you have to do. So be yourself and list your employees and customers very carefully, and have some fun!
