Fintech sits where financial services and specialist technology meet, so it feels the pressures of both. Across technology, businesses took a cautious approach to hiring through a subdued 2025, yet clear demand hotspots held firm for specialist skills including AI, data, enterprise applications and cyber security Computer Weekly (tech recruitment outlook 2026). Fintech draws heavily on exactly these skills, which keeps competition sharp even when overall hiring slows.
The regulated side raises the bar further. In financial services, recruitment was generally for Regulatory Qualification Framework (RQF) 6+ roles rather than RQF 3 to 5 GOV.UK - Temporary Shortage List: Stage 2 report. That points to senior, higher-skilled hiring, the kind of work where getting the wrong person is expensive and slow to put right. Depth matters, but so does the judgement to apply it inside rules and controls.
Some roles carry outsized demand. IT business analysts, architects and systems designers, a group of 193k workers, are among the occupations in critical demand, with three of five indicators in critical demand in 2025 Occupations in demand 2025, Explore Education Statistics, GOV.UK. These are translator roles by nature: they turn business need into technical design and back again, which is why communication sits so close to the technical work.
Pay dynamics also split by role. The Migration Advisory Committee found that top technology firms can pay sizeable wages to skilled migrants, pushing pay well above the salary threshold, while engineering professionals on the Skilled Worker route sit broadly in line with the UK average Professionals in IT and Engineering (Migration Advisory Committee), GOV.UK / publishing.service.gov.uk. For fintech, that signals real competition for the most sought-after technical people, so a clear, fast hiring process counts.
Start by writing the role around both skills. Describe the technical problem honestly, then describe who the person will talk to: compliance, product, risk, customers. If the job needs someone to defend a design to a regulator and ship it with engineers, say so. That framing attracts people who already blend the two and screens out those who only tick one box.
Then test for both in the process. Ask a technical question, but also ask the person to explain their answer to a non-specialist in a sentence or two. Use a short, realistic task over a long abstract puzzle. Keep the loop tight, because the most in-demand specialists move quickly and a slow process loses them. Clear communication from you, fast feedback and plain next steps, mirrors what you are hiring for.
We built Reed.ai to carry the hiring work while you focus on judging depth and communication in the people in front of you. Our recruitment agent manages recruitment end to end for 8% on a successful hire, with no monthly fee and no upfront cost. If you are hiring in fintech and want the right person who can build and explain their work, start a role with us today.
