September 30, 2026
Busayo Babalola is a Senior Payment Risk Operations Analyst at Adyen where he works on card-scheme compliance and card payment security: the rules and systems that decide whether a payment is safe for customers. He also represents Adyen at the PCI Security Standards Council and from 2025-2027, holds a seat on its Board of Advisors where he helps shape the global standards that protect card data.
He'll share more of his personal story with high school students during his talk at PreparationTech's AI Tech Skills Day event on Friday, October 2nd in Amsterdam.
Although not a software developer by job title, he uses AI every day, both at work and in his spare time. At work, he builds new tools and improves how his team gets things done. Outside of work, he builds personal projects ranging from work and security tools to useful and fun AI tools. In his spare time, you will find him supporting Manchester United and Ferrari, playing video games or behind a camera.
Busayo grew up in Lagos, Nigeria and studied Industrial Chemistry for his Bachelor's degree. He was sure he would end up in a lab. Instead, after roles in operations and people management and running his own small business, a stint at a sneaker company introduced him to data and he was hooked. That led him to the Netherlands to complete a Master of Science in Business Administration in Business Analytics.
Right after he arrived, he landed a remote job at an American fintech company after reaching out to the founders online. Some months into his Master's program, he spoke with two alumni of his university who worked at Adyen. They recommended him for an internship and he has been at Adyen ever since.
His advice to high school students on how to prepare for an AI-dominated world: "Start now. Use AI to develop something you actually care about, because that's how you learn what it is good at and where it fails. Let it research and challenge your thinking, but do not let it do your thinking for you. As AI does more of the work, what will set you apart is judgement: knowing what's worth building and spotting when a fast, confident answer is wrong."