Ask Himanshu Dhanak what high performance means and he won't start with revenue targets. He'll talk about trust – the confidence clients and colleagues place in him, and the moment a newer colleague comes to him with a technical question.
Himanshu is a Senior Trade Specialist and Assistant Vice President at Mashreq Bank in Dubai, with over 17 years of banking experience across SME relationship management and trade finance. He's completed 3 LIBF certificates, earning him the Diploma in Qualified Trade Finance Experts.
He shares how formal study sharpens client conversations, what genuine high-performers do differently, and how to build that culture in your own team.
Tell us about yourself?
My name is Himanshu Dhanak, and I'm a Senior Trade Specialist and Assistant Vice President at Mashreq Bank, Dubai, UAE. I have over seventeen years of banking experience, My current role is in the intersection of trade finance and relationship management, especially focused on small and medium corporates.
I started my banking career back in India, as a relationship manager in the SME space, and my job role was typically meeting customers and identifying their working capital gaps and addressing their growing businesses.
The pivot for me into trade sales happened in the year two thousand and nineteen when I got this opportunity, and I moved from a broader relationship management role into a specialist role and a focus on trade finance products like factoring, letter of credit, bank guarantees, and collection documents.
What qualifications have you studied with LIBF?
My journey with LIBF started in the year 2022, and I started with the first qualification, which was the Certificate in International Trade and Finance, and later on, I pursued the Certificate in Supply Chain Finance and then moved on to the Certificate for Specialists in Demand Guarantees.
After having completed these 3 qualifications, I was awarded by the LIBF the Diploma in Qualified Trade Finance Experts.
What does being a high performer in trade finance actually mean to you?
For me, high performance in trade finance is not simply about meeting revenue targets or booking transactions, although these are very important measures. It is fundamentally the trust and the confidence that my clients and internal stakeholders place in me. The ability to combine these to ensure best-in-class client experience is what I consider high performance.
But honestly, the moments that resonate deeply with me is when new relationship managers and new trade finance colleagues come to me for guidance to address a technical question related to a structure or a transaction, and those outcomes reflect the kind of performance I aspire to sustain.
Does Himanshu's story inspire you to study with LIBF?
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Do LIBF qualifications contribute to a high-performance mindset?
I would say it is knowledge, discipline, and a few more things. Before LIBF, much of my trade finance expertise was based on the job experience.
So after I completed these qualifications, I had a strong technical foundation that made my client conversations very sharp and my deal-structuring more precise. The discipline was equally very important because as a working professional and a person who is working with a very demanding sales role, I required a level of maturity that I had to develop deliberately, focusing on these qualifications.
But I believe there is a third element to a high-performing mindset that comes from being a learner on the job and in the classroom. When an entry-level, mid-level, or a senior-level professional keeps up the ability to have his learning curve high, that always helps.
How important is knowledge in building confidence and credibility with clients?
Deep technical knowledge, adds a lot to the confidence and credibility with clients. As part of my role, I have been meeting a lot of business owners and trade finance directors.
So when a client knows that you understand the nuances of trade, it changes the nature of the conversation entirely. And that said, alone, technical knowledge itself is not sufficient. The real differentiator is the ability to translate these technical expertise into practical solutions to address the trade finance gaps of the companies.
What separates high-performing professionals from those who plateau in their careers?
I believe high performers tend to hold themselves to very high standards. They acknowledge the mistakes very honestly and use the setbacks as data points rather than personal defeats. And especially for a trade sales role that I have, resilience in the face of rejection or a difficult month or a quarter is very essential.
So high performers also tend to have a very unique ability to collaborate with different stakeholders within the organisation, be it risk, be it compliance, product, legal. These are the relationships that are worth investing over a period of time. And finally, and this is something that I feel very strongly about, the best professionals I have known are the ones who are generous with their knowledge.
They mentor, they share their experiences, and they invest in the people around them.
How do you build a high-performance culture within your team?
For me, building a high-performance culture actually starts with clarity, what the team is working towards, and how individual contributions connect to the collective outcomes.
I invest a considerable amount of my time working with my team members by running structured training sessions on trade finance products and processes, I also believe in recognising effort and progress, not just the outcomes. Because in a trade sales role, sometimes the results are delayed.
Acknowledging the right behaviour of calling clients, meeting them, and following up with them for their requirements is something that I would always motivate within my team.
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How do you maintain focus and drive during periods when the market is difficult?
Trade finance is deeply connected to global macroeconomic and geopolitical developments.
What I found most meaningful is maintaining a clear separation between what I can control and what I cannot. For me, market conditions, client sentiment, external disruptions are largely outside my control. The quality of my relationships, the calls that I do with my clients, the meetings that I have with them, the conversations that lead to addressing their trade finance gaps, that is something that is within my control.
And keeping my energy focused on these variables helps me maintain the momentum even in a challenging environment.
What advice would you give to others looking to develop a high-performance mindset?
My first bit of advice would be to invest in formal qualifications at the start of your career, because when you invest in these qualifications early in your trade finance career, that gives you the kind of technical knowledge that sharpens your conversation with customers. Secondly, I would say that it is very important to actually build upon the relationships within the organisation.
So be it your stakeholders like compliance, legal, operations, or any other department, it is very important that you work in an aligned fashion with these departments to deliver the best-in-class client experience. And what I would say lastly is that it's important to find a mentor, whether within the organisation or outside the organisation, someone who has the experience, who can guide, and by way of practical knowledge, help you come up with the difficult situations over a period of time.
Would you recommend LIBF to others?
I would recommend these LIBF qualifications to other trade finance professionals, and it has made a very significant and a positive impact on my career.
LIBF qualifications are a global benchmark in the trade finance industry, and for me personally, having done these three qualifications, have been really transformative for me in my career. It has given that credibility signal to my clients, to my colleagues, as well as my senior management.
So I would say that if you're serious to reach the top of this field, the investment in yourself is something that I would really recommend.
Developing your performance
Himanshu's career shows what happens when hard-won experience meets professional training. Here are 3 key takeaways:
- Qualify early. Technical depth changes the quality of your client conversations, not just your CV.
- Build sideways. Strong relationships with risk, compliance, legal and operations are what get deals delivered.
- Find a mentor, then become one. The best professionals are generous with what they know.
Explore LIBF's trade finance qualifications and progress today.
Try our online programmes that fit around your commitments
-
Build expertise across trade and transaction banking
-
Take your exam online with same day results
- Learn real-world skills you can apply immediately