Meet Charles Hardaker
Charles is a Fintech and Banking professional with extensive leadership experience. He is a natural leader and entrepreneur, who has had a unique and varied career and life.
The Early Years
Charles Hardaker was born in Sevenoaks, Kent in March 1986. He grew up in this area with his father, mother and two older sisters, attending school at St Michael’s Otford until he was 13 years old. His parents then moved to Dubai and Charles began boarding at Eastbourne College in Sussex where here he enjoyed academics and sports while residing amongst his peers (for our American colleagues - it was like Hogwarts without the Magic). It was also here that he began developing leadership abilities and it soon became clear that he was destined to serve his country by joining the British Army.
Charles finished school and in 2004 proceeded to attend the University of Bath, reading Biochemistry as inspired by Nicholas Cage’s role of an FBI Biochemist in 'The Rock' (1996). His choice of subject proved to be nothing like the film and it was evident early on that he would not ultimately pursue this subject as a career. It was at university that Charles discovered his love for all things American Football, he played wide receiver in American football and was also a hooker in rugby. Charles complemented his studies with part-time work in a nightclub and spent the year after graduation managing the establishment. He learned many valuable lessons about running a business and how to turn a profit; not to mention how to pour a good pint.
Military Career
Captain Charles Hardaker commissioned into the Royal Engineers on 11 December 2009. In the army he led troops on operations in the UK, Afghanistan, Africa and the Middle East and focused heavily on relationship development, cultural engagement and project management. Captain Charles Hardaker was responsible for planning strategic projects in high risk environments and engaging with Jordanian, American, Afghani and Latvian Militaries, just to name a few. He held the Honorable position for the responsibility of managing and motivating 148 Gurkha (Nepalese) soldiers; Charles prepared them for deployment to conflict zones and other operations worldwide, ensuring through foresight and planning that they were suitably qualified. Here he learned to speak conversational Nepali and continues to learn the basics of Hindi. He also had the distinctive honour of Guarding Buckingham Palace and the Tower of London to celebrate 200 years of Gurkha loyalty to the Crown. His final act of military service was in organising the British relief efforts in Nepal following it's massive earthquakes.
Afghanistan
Capt Hardaker RE Deployed to Afghanistan in 2012 to construct the Afghan National Army Officer Academy. During his tour he acted as the Client’s Representative for the British Army and the ANA, managing a budget of $70m. He redesigned the Headquarters under the intent of President Karzai to “create a building to inspire generations.” He was part of a three-man team which acquired $14 million from US funds to buy IT, furniture, weapons, training equipment and gym equipment. He personally established the contracts for the acquisition, delivery and installation of these items. He had the honour of briefing the House of Commons Defence Committee, the General of the British Army and the Ambassadors of the UK, New Zealand, Australia, Denmark and Norway.
Business Profession
Charles left the army on Friday 29th January and started at Citigroup in ISG on Monday 1st February 2016. He led innovation projects within Citi Ventures and managed third-party solutions improving productivity by completing due diligence and managing pilot relationships within Citi, the Vendor and the Client. Built and owned relationships with Bloomberg, BlackRock, JP Morgan, Bank of America, and Goldman Sachs
Always seeking to push himself and the financial industry, he became a Citi Ventures Founder and CEO of Citi Business Connect: automating business development and assisting clients with strategic growth. Accelerated strategic innovation at Citi by leveraging the principles of Corporate Entrepreneurship, Lean Startup, Gamification and the Hook Model; launched a new growth opportunity across Citi's ICG Business Units.
In 2018 Charles continued his passion for personal and professional development and seized the opportunity to become a part-time Associate at a Venture Capital company. He was the first employee in the UK; focused on deal sourcing and due diligence. He established a strong foothold for Affinit VC to start building a FinTech Fund in the UK.
In 2020 an opportunity came along to through him in to the fast pasted FinTech environment; he seized the opportunity to join what would become the notorious Greensill Capital. While the end of this chapter of Charles’ story is well documented by many financial news outlets, Greensill offered Charles the chance to demonstrate his leadership abilities in the corporate world and gain his first experience in a PE-backed growth company that provided complex structured financial solutions & services to businesses and financial institutions.
During this time, Charles completed his Masters in Business Administration 2020-22. This did not come without determination, focus, sacrifice and hard work. More importantly, Charles would not have been able to do it without the support of my family, it wasn’t an easy journey; two years of late nights and long weekends and juggling time between work, home life and studying was a huge challenge for Charles. Especially during the uncertain COVID circumstances that he had to juggle, changing job twice, moving house, adopting a Black Labrador and welcoming the birth of his first child.
After the collapse of Greensill, Charles almost immediately started at Transcard, A privately funded Fintech that provides payment processing and card issuing services to businesses and financial institutions. He was very proud of the fact that he managed to secure jobs for 12 other Greensill orphans. Although he enjoyed his time at Transcard and made great friends across the USA, his passion lay else where and he wanted to complete his unfinished projects in LATAM.
Charles took up a leadership position at KLYM, A rapidly growing VC/PE backed FinTech building a scalable credit decision engine for SME loans. Responsible for all corporate development and growth of KLYM into new markets including USA, Peru, Brazil and Mexico. Establishing regulated legal entities, building & leading newly established teams and developing bespoke go-to-market strategies to accelerate KLYM’s growth.
He is learning huge amounts at KLYM and hopes that this will one day set him up as a CEO of Fintech.
Hobbies & Leisure
Charles enjoys a plethora of sports including rugby, hockey, sailing and weight lifting; his favorite t-shirt displays Arnold Schwarzenegger saying “Come with me if you want to lift.” He pursues his passion for team sport by playing hockey for Sevenoaks Hockey club as a centre forward and goal keeper. Charles believes that a health body is a health mind in order to maintain his fitness for profession and pleasure he is an active member of the Beckenham Running Club. A very keen traveller and self-proclaimed adventurer, Charles has climbed 3 major mountains: Mt Kenya (4,985m), El Misti (5,822m) and Kilimanjaro (5,895m); he has visited over 40 countries so far and ran an ultra-marathon of 106km across the South Downs.
He is married to Madalyn Hardaker from Charleston, South Carolina; she is a Clemson alumni and together they cheer on the Clemson Tigers and Carolina Panthers American Football teams. They have a beautiful daughter Millicent and a lovely Black Labrador Apollo.
Hami Jasto Kohi Chaina