Building a Fulfilling Career in Treasury with Timothy Hesler

Foreign.

Welcome to this week's Treasury Career Corner podcast where I interview treasury professionals about their treasury careers. Each and every week I talk to them about how they build their careers, where they are now, where they see both themselves and the treasury profession going to next. Let's get on with the show. This week's show delighted be joined by Tim Hessler, the assistant treasurer, Global banking, cash management and treasury operations for New York University. Now, before I go into Tim's background and give you an outline, Tim was a very gracious guest recently on New York Cash Exchange, which he'll also talk about. He's got a great wealth of experience to go through at New York University. He's responsible for global banking, cash management, debt, the whole range of things. But he's also the current former president and chair of the executive committee for Pinnacle Consortium of Higher Education, which was established way back in 1980. He can explain about that. That's an interesting part of his role as well. But as I always do each and every week, I'll shut up. Now I hand the mic over to Tim. Tim, I know we've had some great conversations about you pivoting earlier in your career, but take us back, if you would, about how you first started in your career and then you discovered finance and treasury, slightly unusually to many of our guests. So over to you, sir.

Sure, sure. And thank you, Mike, and thanks for having me on such a terrific podcast. Yeah, this, it's, it's really interesting because as I reflect upon the early career path and how did I get into finance and treasury, it takes me back to some pretty good memories, maybe not all of them great, but was an electrical engineer. I worked at nuclear power plant. I even heard about that Chernobyl when it happened at the job. But I decided early that just wasn't for me. I went to Columbia Business school, got my MBA, and this was maybe the late 80s, so the first big crash, 1987. The job market was really tough. I mean, it was kind of the opposite of where we are now. And I worked briefly for an environmental consulting firm that really wasn't for me when I got the opportunity, believe it or not, going to Wichita, Kansas to work at Pizza Hut World headquarters, where I had kind of the cool job, I guess it was sort of cool of overseeing a staff of 18,3000 bank accounts or 5000 restaurants and doing a lot of accounting, which was a great introduction to finance. But I wasn't really used to reviewing and approving journal entries. So that actually brought back some of the stuff I did at work. And I think one of the hooks there was that at the time PepsiCo owned KFC, Taco Bell and Pizza Hut. So I got to start to talk to the PepsiCo treasury folks because here we are generating cash for headquarters. And I think that was kind of my intro to getting a credential in the field. And that hook with PepsiCo was good for me. It was kind of kicked me off to my career later on to Novartis and PwC Advisory, McKinsey and Company and where I am now at New York University.

Tim, go back to that time you were coming out of PepsiCo and then making that first move to Novartis. There you were Senior Treasury Manager, but at that same time you started to look at your education doing ctp. That was quite a while ago. So CTP then different to now. And also there's the growth of treasury as a profession. So you were literally there for it. What was that like for you in terms of the qualification? And then maybe let's deep dive a little bit more into Novartis and then we'll bring people because you were, as I said before the show, corporate practitioner. Then you made a move or a couple of. Couple of roles there. But then you made a move across to consulting, which is an interesting move, which I want to explore. But Novartis and ctp, if you would.

Sure. It was kind of a risky move because my wife, myself, we moved into the middle of the country and, you know, I was trying, maybe I could get into PepsiCo, which is right outside New York City. And I could not get into PepsiCo because it was kind of tough to go from a division to headquarters. So I took a risk. I left work for a few months. I actually got that credential, which I think used to do the ccm, which is not a CTP certified Treasury Professional. I aced that exam and I was out there. I moved back to the East Coast. I actually responded to an ad at Ciba Gagi, which Ciba Gagi and Sandoz became Novartis, but that time it was Ciba Gagi and I answered an ad in the New York Times. Believe it or not, I was actually selected for the job as an intro into Treasury. So I was doing really core treasury activities and foreign exchange hedging and investments, et cetera. But I did this in a resume pool of about 500 resumes, though I must have done something right because there was no recruiter or anything like that to get selected for that job. And it was a terrific organization and it was Kind of cool because I was dealing with, with Novartis, the Old Sea Bagi in Basel, Switzerland. So again more, you know, I was the large US division to the headquarters in Switzerland but I learned so much and the magnitudes are quite large. Nice working for a triple A rated company that was well known. And then the company merged and I was one of the 30 people that still got picked for Novartis because somewhat split off to a specialty chemical company. So there's a lot of turnover going on. I left for a couple years and went to a company called CK Witco just to further my experience there. But I felt I was a little bit at a standstill. I really liked being a corporate practitioner. You know, I was in charge of things. I had line management responsibility for financial assets. That's a great deal of responsibility because you're acting on transactions. And then an opportunity came from PwC which had just come out of a merger itself and Cooper's a library and I don't know if these names ring a bell anymore. My family was young, but I was still willing to take a chance, try a new career and jumped into business consulting, management consulting, what have you. That was kind of my lead in to a future of 15 years in.

Consulting with PwC and then KPMG. And you did that sort of for a number of years and you just mentioned there touched on. We've interviewed a number of consultants on the show from when I first started doing the, the podcast three, four years ago now. And I then talked to some of those guests about the fact that in consulting you sometimes have to travel the country, you pack up your suitcase and you've got those demands of then having a family life. How did you balance that off and what was the reason for you as a Treasury professional wanting to go into consulting rather than continue within a straight corporate role? What did you feel that that was right for you?

I think PwC was our auditor. I enjoyed talking with some of the folks and I wanted to just broaden my Skill set at PwC. Terrific firm, you know, leader in the industry, leader in the big fours. I just wanted to get my skill sets out there. I even reflected back when I was at Columbia Business School because I was in the management consulting club and at the time I was probably too young, I was clueless, didn't really get that. And you're right. So Mike, I mean I traveled extensively for 15 years. I was probably way two nights a week. It's tough on the family. But you do learn to multitask. I mean you have to. Because if you're not going to be a successful consultant, you're just, you're going to get fired. I mean the bar is very high. It's good because you're getting the very technical work, you're getting into tough situations. I remember going to a crisis situation with a big retailer and partners like, oh, you're going to be presenting. And it was like octagonal room where room was filled with all these CEOs. Wish he would have told me in advance, but I was fully prepared because I knew my material was able to present the findings, which are pretty tough findings in this situation.

And when you talk to other corporate treasury folks and they're saying, oh, consulting, I'm not sure if it's for me and especially I was talking to someone the other day who is in consulting and he actually quite likes the trouble this thing that he likes about his role. And I heard there was a mixed messages pre pandemic, but he was saying, you know, I want to get out there, but I think there's now become more of a balance there as well that he was used to 80, 90% travel, you know, he's saying, but now going to zero and now he wants to come back and he would. He's actually quite up for saying three, maybe four days a week, which I think is quite unusual. Most people saying, we proved that we don't have to be there all the time, but maybe some of the time and that can be a couple of overnight trips and doing it quite regular basis, you know, because seeing people face to face as you give people, talk to people about your career, you, you embrace that sort of thing. What would you say to people if they're listening today saying, oh, maybe I should look at give consulting another thought. What would you think?

I enjoyed the travel, I enjoyed going to different clients. You know, my spike was, my functional spike was corporate treasury risk management. So what I did as a practitioner worked really well. But you did have to change your skill set. You had to be able to have that executive presence to present in front of the room you, all those communication skills, whether it's verbal or writing reports. Working with team, I mean I had teams to do the work but ultimately I was responsible for making sure the risk management was done with the client, that the report was written well, presented well. And let's face it, if you don't have a thick skin, consulting may not be right for you. I remember getting yelled at by many clients. They didn't like all the findings. You always like them to go right into implementation. And sometimes you're given this great report and all these super findings and then they would sit on it. So that was a little tough to deal with. But you know, each engagement had an endpoint. So you weren't doing it for five years, maybe doing it for three months or a long one, might be, you know, six months or maybe there's a three week one. So that variety I think was terrific because I was doing all the different industries except for really financial services. I wasn't doing banking, but I was doing everything else, including insurance. So that makes your confidence level go up because functionally there's a lot of similarities. But you're also learning about those industries, which I thought was really fantastic for me to learn.

And you moved through, you were PwC and then you moved to KPMG and then you moved on to McKinsey, quite a different firm. Can you just talk us through that transition if you like. That's the right way to put it?

Oh, sure, sure. And I was good 10 years at PwC. I'm still a strong alumni supporter of the firm and even helped the firm win some engagements or act as a reference because some of my friends are still partners at the firm. I think for me, and this is probably an error in judgment for myself, because in end of 2008, 2009, it wasn't good times for consulting during that financial crisis. All discretionary spending went basically to zero. And all of a sudden I was used to being 95% utilized and bringing in revenue, millions of dollars on engagements because I was actually getting that work and seeking it and bringing it to the firm. I jumped ships, I went to the competition and it was a pretty bold move to do this. And I think some of my colleagues followed me afterwards to different parts of the big four other consulting firms because we all kind of felt you had a little bit of a bullseye. You're in the financial crisis, you're relatively highly paid, you travel a lot. That travel went to zero, which is interesting because, you know, 10, 12 years later, it's kind of similar. So going to the competition I think was here I'm thinking same industry, it's going to be very similar to what I was used to. But I think when I reflect back upon that, the culture is different, the ethics were different and it probably wasn't for me. Just because you're in the same industry and consulting, it just didn't click for me. And everything I was trying to do just kind of bounced off. And then I had to, whether as luck or a good recruiter got the opportunity to join McKinsey Company and I was, you know, a seasoned consultant. So I was probably older than your typical McKinsey consultant. But that was a significant and excellent jump for me.

What was McKinsey like? And I've talked about this in the past, actually. I've had a couple of people that pass through there. And you've got world leading brains. Probably the best way I can put it that some of the guys there, you know that I've read some of their books and things like that. It's absolutely amazing content and things. So that's definitely something that's always interested me. What was it like for you?

A little bit of a shocker. I think you kind of referenced a little point because my entry class was a little off. Cycle came in in January and I came in with all the PhDs and MD. So I'm like, oh my God, I just have my, you know, my MBA from Columbia and like three of the folks had PhDs from MIT and Stanford and biochemistry. I'm like, oh my God, they speak like three languages. Those are a little intimidating. And then there's a medical doctor from ucla. I'm like, why is he joining the firm? You know, I kind of dug in like I did because when I started As a consultant PwC, I was terrible. Took me six months to kind of figure out how to do it. I was like, oh, maybe I made a mistake. But I dug in and got through it. And I think the travel was a little bit different for me because instead of travel domestically and maybe some international, most of my travel was to Rio de Janeiro, to Copenhagen, to, you know, it was more global travel because it's one firm. I think the thing I had to add was I, you know, I had some, some white or gray hairs and the teams were younger than I was. But the clients really wanted someone with corporate experience, someone who had done it and been on the ground. So I think that was a differentiator for me. That was a really a great start for me at McKinsey.

And when you're there, you've been there, you've worn the T shirt. How do you balance that off? When you go in to meet a client and they ask for your advice and you try and give your advice and hopefully they're open to listening. But you know it, you've been there, you sat that side of the table a number of years. You've seen 100 other corporates doing that. I'm not saying how do you present it, but You've been in a tricky situation. Give the practical example. Talking to someone yesterday, they've just made the move from corporate, they're doing an independent consultancy role. And I said, oh, how is it, you know, going from that? And now you're going to consult with lots of people. Chris Hill, who is now the global CEO or CEO of Hargreaves Lansdowne. I placed him many years ago, GE Insurance and Treasury, and I. I'd taken him out there of Arthur Anderson. So that's a while ago. And I said, well, what. What frustrates you? Tell me, said Mike, you'll show the client how the ingredients of the. The cake and you help them. You stand there as you both bake it, just as you're about to get us. No, sorry, you're the consultant. Off you go. And then through the glass window, you see two or three scenarios. One, this, our lovely cake, but we prefer this one. They put your cake just up on the shelf, saying, I'm not doing that. Or they say, oh, yeah, we'll do that another time. They lock it in a cupboard and say, look, we've ticked the box. And then the other frustration, sometimes they weren't frustrated. The fourth, so they actually did and implemented the other one was they would just look at it and say, oh, we'll just take a little slice and the rest of it will just let it go. So you're in that. You've been there. How did you not deal with the frustration, but how did you get them to go on the journey with you, if you like, as an advisor and an expert?

I think that's a really great question, Mike. You know, there was a little bit of a difference where if you're at a PwC advisory, your team is getting hired by maybe the CFO, treasurer, comptroller or something like that, but at McKinsey, you're being hired by the CEO of the company, the board of directors, cfo. So there is a higher level of engagement and urgency to do things. Also, one of the things that was great about the firm was you may finish that particular engagement and you're working with these terrific team members who are doing the work and putting in the hours, but then they would rapidly turn right into implementation. So let's say you're in that kind of the closing meeting. They were really good and I enjoyed this. Let's start implementation tomorrow and you'll be ready to stand there. And you sometimes should have to kind of force them to get moving because they're thinking, oh, they were just there to do a particular industry overview or there's a merger or something like that. But there was that call to action I thought was really different for me. And I really enjoyed that because, you know, I was kind of an action guy. That's what I did at corporate. You know, I was in charge of things. I had line management and doing investments and making process changes. So I think that was a something different that I enjoyed and I still do.

And so you did that. And then talk us through, if you would, the move to New York University and also Pinnacle as well. And explain that because some people understand, some won't. I didn't until you very kindly explained it to me previously to this. So talk us through if you would.

Yeah, I think I was probably Here I was 15 years consulting, was starting to feel the need to be in charge of things again and not just engagement teams and in client work. So my kids were in college at the time and wife saw an ad for New York University and here I was in New York City. You got two large great institutions like NYU in Columbia and I actually, this time without a recruiter, just interviewed with our CFO and did that. All of a sudden I had the job And I left McKinsey on a Monday and started NYU on a Tuesday. Really would have wished I'd taken some vacation, but there was a desperate need to get the work done and I kind of jumped into it with full feet to do it. And then meanwhile A month later McKinsey calls because he still wanted some part time work to do that, which I did for a number of years. So without even planning it, I've got a full time intense work at nyu. Terrific institution, I just consider one of the best in the world. Got three global campuses. Meanwhile, I'm also doing a little bit of consulting on the side. So I'm keeping those skills up. And then about a year into it and I was told to go to some meetings in Bermuda for an insurance company. And I was given zero context to do this. Here I'm in Bermuda and I'm already getting yelled at the first meeting because I came 10 minutes late because the other meeting ended early and I couldn't figure out why there is a Genesis insurance company in Bermuda and why there was a Pinnacle insurance company in Vermont. But I soon kind of got thrown into that and found that NYU and 17 other universities, world class institutions like Princeton and University of Pennsylvania and Columbia, Dartmouth and Brown and Johns Hopkins and NYU and University of Vermont and all these George Washington University and Howard, then we were an owner in this 40 year old company. Before I knew it I was like the finance chair, chair of the Finance Committee and the treasurer because I guess I must have said some of the right things and use some of that questioning that I was doing at consulting, you know, that probing and getting in there. So all of a sudden I had three jobs for a number of years. It wasn't planned, but I think if you have a willingness to take some risks and look at other industries, it can be very fulfilling.

And tell me if you would the job of the assistant treasurer at New York University. You and I have spoken about this. There'll be people listening today with maybe preconceptions about what it involves and things like that. And I know that you again had Tim previously on we did a live session for New York Cash Exchange. Brilliant. And it was great. And we were talking about some of your, the staff there and the way that you incentivize them and things like that and manage them. But also when we had our pre podcast call as well, you said the breadth of this job was just blooming brilliant, you know. So talk us through if you would. What's it like?

I think it's very much like treasury work. Treasury and financial risk management. Just like a large corporate because we're, we consider ourselves a 10, $15 billion organization. So functionally the work is as if we, you know, I was working in the chemicals industry or pharma or something like that. So I think that's a big attractor to me the magnitudes are not insignificant. So we're talking some of our investment portfolios I'm overseeing are billions of dollars. Short term debt, lines of credit are hundreds of millions of dollars. The global nature is campus in New York, main campus, New York and Brooklyn and then campus in Abu Dhabi, campus in Shanghai and 10 other global sites that have students going on. So you're dealing with 60,000 students and 15, 20,000 employees. Very large medical center on the east side of Manhattan, World class institution medical school ranked, you know, a few years ago, ranked number one in the world functionally. It's exciting because I'm doing all the things that since I was in corporate and yet I'm intensely in a new industry. You know, I've been there nine years and I'm really into the industry. Higher education. If you think about it, it's always on the COVID of the Wall Street Journal. It gets a lot of play. You may be talking to folks and they always talk about where they went to school or where their kids are going to school. And although education in the US is very expensive, they're getting these fantastic students and world class faculty winning Nobel Prizes. So it's really top of mind. So if I think if you adopt that industry which I have, it can be very thorough to use the word fulfilling again. But then you also start to talk to your peers in the industry. I'm fortunate with Pinnacle that we talked to all those other owners of the schools. It's really an exciting industry and the pandemic wasn't necessarily good for it in the first year. But a lot of the best schools have come out of this very, very strong and showed that they're flexible enough to do hybrid, do a remote, go back in person, continue their research. That's pretty awesome.

That was great. Actually covered the, you covered the pandemic, which is, you know, we touched on, talked about it. You started to come out that now what do you see as the recovery for yourselves and for treasury on the whole? Tim and I, we did this virtual session.

We.

I did a speaking session yesterday morning in front of a group of 60, 70 treasures. God, it was great to be back in the room and seeing those guys. What are you seeing as the recovery again? I'm going to be AFP Philadelphia with Tim, hopefully later this year. What are you seeing as next? Is it this getting back to Face to Face to actually thrash out some stuff or. Pandemic has proved we don't need to be in the same room, but we want to be. What are your thoughts? Because again you're chair of the AFP Body of Knowledge Committee, you've done a lot of other things. Talk us through if you would.

I do think the thing we that's a real challenge for us is turnover. I mean it's tough in our industry and other industries. So it's engaged us to really retain your best employees and also be more proactive at recruiting new folks in and maybe you're not going after the same folks. And we just brought someone in from banking that maybe we wouldn't have thought of a few years ago because we want them to have that intellectual curiosity to get in there. And you're right. We actually the pandemic, our treasury department and risk area was relatively boring and I talked about this with our CFO and I think we like that it was boring because we weren't the group that was very high maintenance. We weren't the group that was making mistakes. We were a group that was in charge of financial assets for the university globally and we kept it very tight and Secure. And we did a lot of newsletters and education on cybersecurity, which was a worry beginning and now in corporate treasury departments or in accounts payables, et cetera. I think because we just nailed the functional expertise. We had our processes, we already had a business continuity plan, we already practiced it. So when the pandemic hit, we were already using it from day one. I think we did underestimate having folks read it because you weren't. You didn't consider that your teammates could have been sick with COVID or something like that. I think everyone found that out, that maybe they were a little unprepared for that. What I also found that you would engage yourselves to be very cross functional with your other groups, whether it's internal audit or accounts payable or payroll or endowment office or the budget group. Being a good citizen with the other departments just makes it, I find terrific to work with them because they may be struggling a little bit more than our group. Maybe they've had more turnover, maybe they don't know how to do scenario analysis or on liquidity testing and things like that. So I think we took some of that leadership and it's made our team even deeper and broader in our expertise because if you're cooperating and collaborating with your colleagues in other departments, I think the whole ocean rises for everybody. And hopefully it might be good for your career too.

And on that, you give back and you give wider. But say I'm in the position of an exceptionally busy treasurer and got life, got kids, got everything's going on, but someone like yourself, you managed to then squeeze in giving back to afp. You've been the president of T Money Treasure Management association of New York. You've done tmi, you've done various other things. You very much into this. And again, we do it on top of everything else. But I just enjoy talking to treasurers and that's why we do the podcast. So why, why do you then? Why do you think that's important? If you are, one of the treasurers may be listening in. And I spoke to Tim before, I said, you know, sometimes about the war stories and some of the things they've been through, but they say, oh, well, I'm so busy, I'm so busy, we're all busy. But how do you make time? And why do you think that's so important? Maybe again to persuade, even if we persuade one of those listeners today to go, do you know what, I'll put my hand up next time I'm asked to contribute. Why do you think that's important?

I think volunteering and doing work for a not for profit is important. To do it if you have the opportunity. 25 years ago I volunteered to be on the board of team. They turned me down. It was just like, I'm like, I was like a little put off. I'm like, you know, I'm probably a pretty decent resource. And then the next year there was a new president and brought me in. And yeah, like you said, I was president for a bunch of years and things like that. I think I enjoy it because I'm talking, I'm networking and networking is so key for your career. And these are my friends. I'm talking. I may be the only higher ed on the board. You got real estate companies, you've got company like Kariba, you've got bankers, you've got all these folks in all these different industries. Is an opportunity to give back. I mean, we did so well at our New York Cash Exchange that we're going to give money back, we're going to give some donations. So I think that philanthropic focus is good because I find I could just get lost in the work. And like you said, everyone's working hard and I'm one of those crazy people with two different jobs. But why not give back? Why not network? Why not spend some time on thought leadership and speaking in front of others? That's going to add your skill set, might give you a little nervousness. I think that's exciting for the future.

We talked about this again in our group session that was with lovely John Engelman, bless him, who as we said, came down with COVID and Mr. Rosenthal. Steve, he's again, we're gonna have some catch up podcasts with those guys have been previous guests. We'll put links to their podcasts in the show notes. But we were talking in that session about the future. Someone asked me a question, it was really weird the past couple of days about cyber and cyber attacks. Was I asked by CFOs to get treasurers with cyber background? No, no, I'm not. They were, oh, okay. I said no, that's. There's something they have to do and you know, be aware of and go to things. But that's not necess front and center. What do you think is front and center for treasurers? You're there talking to this wide variety. You're hearing people in New York Cash Exchange and various other bits. What were you hearing? What was the feedback? What are the people saying?

Would you say I believe that knowledge of the marketplace, the Markets, what's going on in equities and fixed income and money markets and foreign exchange still very, very essential. Especially because we're in some pretty volatile times. So being able to react quickly and follow that. I remember when I was consulting, we had young consultants, they weren't reading the Wall Street Journal, they didn't really know what was going on in the news world, in the marketplace. That's super essential. So I think that is being able to react quickly and not take inordinate financial risk really important for high performance. I also think I kind of talked about a little bit collaborating with your other cross functional groups because they may need you for your expertise on cyber. I do some newsletters internally which makes me learn more about cyber and social engineering because I had to do the research and I put that into the newsletter and do some training. So I like to get in front of folks. I wasn't, many years ago I was a terrible public speaker. I wasn't confident. But with practice you do get better. So if there's not participants to get in front of an audience. We just kicked off a mentoring program. So I kicked that off and there's folks and our DE and I committee here. I wasn't, I was kind of volunteer for the DE&I Committee. It's absolutely fantastic. I've learned so much from that, being able to just do something that's outside of my comfort zone. But folks just like, oh, we're not ready for a mentoring program because everyone's disassociated and we can't get the level of engagement because it's working virtually. We just piloted it, we just kicked it off and already we're making some strides here because why wait? Why not just do some action? There's, I think those core skills are so important because if you're in treasury, it's kind of a given that your technical skills should be really good. But it's a focus on communications, maybe speaking, getting in some committees, learning about some of the other groups, volunteering I find just so important to my professional life.

Brilliant. And just. I was listening to you there, Tim. It's quite an interesting one because I do so many virtual sessions and I've done a series of webinars just in the past few weeks and actually it does make you that much better. And, and again, I'm speaking to listeners today because you guys out there, that's what you need to be thinking about and actually getting involved in. Because I said this in Chicago a few years ago, the Windy City Summit and I said Stop the speech halfway through, you'll share this with you. And said, I'm not enjoying this, guys. I don't enjoy public speaking. I didn't get up this morning, hey, let's stand in front of a group of 150 treasury guys and talk with us and do an hour long presentation. I said, that was a lot of work, but the fact is the benefits far outweigh that. Short term pain. Better speaker, spreading education, giving back. You've got all these side benefits, not side hustle, wrong way. But it's taking me around the world doing the podcast. People said, oh, can you come to Finland and speak? Can you this? It's just been a lovely byproduct of that. And I know that you know, and you very kindly invited me to the New York sessions recently. Just loved it. And I think, as you said, so some of the listeners today, if you're thinking, I don't want to get up on the stage, we don't need to, you can do it from your shed, you can do it on a virtual session, be part of a panel for Tim and for your cash exchange, or just be open to it rather than be closed.

I would say if you're on a panel, it's good risk management because you're spreading out the risk, right? You've got a great moderator like yourself and then other, other treasurers and you know, also makes you focus about not speaking too long, you know, being good with your time management. I even had the opportunity. My daughters are in their careers in New York City and one of them was actually presenting in front of a school where her twin sister was actually invited to it and got to see her sister in action. So I would never have thought five years ago that they would have been confident enough to do this. But clearly I was wrong because they're out there acing it. You don't get some rewards without taking a little bit of professional risk.

Fantastic. Well, as always, we keep the show to about half an hour, 40 minutes as it used to be, that old thing called a commute, but people don't tend to commute anymore. But as we wrap up today's session, what takeaways would you give? We talked to you before that. We have some more junior listeners. They're coming up throughout their careers and they look at your LinkedIn profile, as I'll see in the show notes, and say, oh yeah, I'd like to emulate that. So what they should be thinking about. And then again, you've spoken to a wide variety of audiences throughout these sessions. What else should be people be thinking about as takeaways now? What would you give them?

I think you know your job is already taking a fair amount of your time. If you have an opportunity to network and chat with other folks from other industries or other companies, I think you might be good just to go for it because it's going to make it more fun when you go to conferences and I go to P and I conferences and I'm meeting new folks and you might actually get one or two great ideas.

Yeah.

That you can use for yourself or your own organization.

Get out of your comfort zone. Lovely piece of closing advice, Tim. Amazing to chat to you today. Connected him on LinkedIn. He's amazing. Can't wait to see you later this year and very grateful for you being here today. Thank you very much, sir.

Thank you, Mike.

Hello, it's Mike here again. I hope you enjoyed this week's show. If you did, then maybe you want to follow the show or subscribe, depending on where you listen, whether that's itunes, Spotify or another great place to listen to the show from. It's totally free and means that you'll be the first to see each and every week when we release a new show. And maybe whilst you're there, you could even leave a quick review. Reviews and ratings are among the most important metrics for a podcast to effectively rank. And as you can probably appreciate, the podcast is a lot of hard work to produce. Every week. It'd be amazing. Just take, say, 20 seconds. Leave a quick review of my amazing guests and their great career stories. We'd really appreciate it. Thanks very much and I can't wait to see you soon.