Developing a Multicultural Treasury Team with Adam Boukadida

Welcome to this week's Treasury Career Corner podcast where I interview treasury professionals about their treasury careers. Every week I talk to treasurers about how they built their careers, where they are now and where they see both themselves and the treasury profession. Going to next this week's show, I'm delighted to be joined by Adam Bukadida, Senior VP of Finance and currently actually interim CFO at Etihad Airways. Etihad is the national airline of the United Arab Emirates. The airline was actually established by Royal decree back in 03 and wholly owned by the Government of Abu Dhabi. But I'll actually get Adam to describe a bit more about the company and some of the things he's done there as well. Adam, as I say, I've known each other for a number of years back since, well, this sort of Kimberly Clark slash Tesco days when Adam was based in the uk, but he's made this move, he's actually based over in Abu Dhabi. So actually if we go back to the beginning, let's have a leisurely walk through the background of Adam Bukadida and how you've made your choices within treasury leading you to a very successful career over there. And we'll jump in with some questions as we go through. So Adam, it's over to you.

Thanks Mike. So, as Mike said, I've known Mark quite a while. Starting off when I worked at Tesco, prior to Tesco and start off my career was actually in banking. So I started working for Royal bank of Scotland when it was a small Scottish bank. So prior to NatWest and fortunate enough over the seven years I spent there, I managed to cover a number of different roles all across the treasury and capital market space gave me an opportunity to work on projects on systems, on managing small, medium and large science teams. And it also gave me an opportunity to see what life would be like working with a corporate. It then led me to a number of career changes or career opportunities, especially with Kimberly Clark being obviously a large corporation that we all should be aware of. And this was a more of a project based role which was establishing their European Treasury Centre as part of their broader finance shared service centre based out of Brighton. So that involved a shift for myself at that time prior to marriage and kids moving from London to Brighton, which I did for just over 12 months. Now that was a great opportunity to go in and help establish, as I said, the first European Treasury Centre that was previously outsourced to an external provider. This also included setting up the systems, processes, policies and recruiting and training up a small Specialised team. I then met actually the previous group treasurer at the time a number of colleagues at an ACT event from Tesco and I was very interested in. Tesco obviously is a well known brand. It was quite close to my hometown being from the London borders and Chesant and it was a great opportunity because they had experienced dramatic growth and was looking to invest heavily into the team but also again into the systems operations and catching up really with the rest of the business.

So Adam, you talked about making that move from Kimberly Clark and then into Tesco's, but how did it, what was the difference? Cause I'll have guys listening now that maybe are in a similar situation. They might be working for an RBS or someone like that and you're making that move into the corporate. How do you find that changed or how was treasury different certainly in those days and then coming through that.

So if I answer a couple of different parts then I think having worked for and I'll sort of touch on after Tesco, two banks obviously working for corporate, you get to see a lot more of the end to end business, which is really what I found personally interesting. I think working for a bank you get a lot more detail into a particular part of treasury or particular part of Finance or investments or mra. But working for a corporate you get to see a lot more the role of which treasury plays within Finance and finance plays within the business itself. So I think that is probably the main, the main difference and probably exciting element for me personally. I think for the right individual it should be little to no negative change for them. It's how you grasp that opportunity, always ask the right questions and always challenge the status quo.

And then you know, you joined treasury at Tesco in a period of let's say change systems and controls are coming in. What was it like before? And Tesco is known as a big retailer but how was it evolving?

At that time it was substantial growth. This was the time of international growth in Tesco, including US, including Asia. Re implementation of the treasury management system. There was changes in reporting requirements, there was bringing in new treasury related Pacific graduate schemes and one area in particular I found extremely challenging and rewarding was leading the offshoring of the support functions within Tesco treasury to the already established Finance Shared Service center based in Bangalore, India. So again it was substantial growth, challenging market conditions. Tesco at that point in time was obviously the lead in the industry. And on the back of that treasury and Finance had a key role to play and obviously we had to look at both the processes, systems and our cost base in order to continue to.

Support the business and then talk about the progression. So you started within the sort of treasury back office and that systems control role, you know, how did it then evolve sort of thing, you know, because then you begin Treasury Ops. How did those two differ? And, you know, what was the transition like for you, taking on more, you know, responsibility? I was asked recently in Luxembourg and someone said about you go from being an individual and doing your day job to them and being a contributor to actually managing other treasury guys. And, you know, last week you were sitting alongside them, suddenly you're now sitting not above them, but maybe above them and actually mentoring them and everything else. How did you make that transition? What you like as. What you like as a boss.

The first role I did at Tesco was similar yet different to what I helped contribute towards in Kimberley Clark. So again, it was very project focused, very transformation, change, related ownership, if you like. And it was part of the broader middle office and back office function over time and probably establishing trust with the management there at the time. I was then asked to take on the back office function as well as the systems and control elements. There was an opportunity to take on what was called then head of treasury operations. Again, treasury operations can be different depending where you are in each company. Treasury operations at Tesco at that particular point in time meant all front office, cash management, banking, relationship management. So it's a great opportunity for me for something that I had done on the flip side, that is in the bank, going back to where we started now, and now managing this, obviously for Tesco being one of the largest UK corporates. So it's a great opportunity. Yes, there was team management involved at that time. It was a small function with a part of it obviously being outsourced as I touched upon earlier. But it was probably around 5, 6 people in the UK and a much larger team supporting us out of Bangalore in India.

And what was it like having, you know, so you got direct management day to day. Probably an easier task in some ways that if you need to give someone feedback, you just, you know, grab a coffee or, you know, sit down with them. What was the remote management like? What, what challenges did that throw up again? You know, we've got listeners who are going, God, I've got to do that soon. What, what tips would you give to people? Sort of.

That's a great question. So, I mean, in every, but many, many businesses now, across different sectors and across different locations or parts of the world, outsourcing. Insourcing is a key requirement or question that is asked by many challenging boards or many challenging owners of organizations. So this was very different for me because I hadn't done that before and I'll come back to what we did and how we've done it. But having said that, it's a great opportunity now because every business since Tesco that I've worked for have either largely insourced or outsourced parts of their finance operations. So it's definitely a skill set and an opportunity, if that does arise, that I would recommend people to explore and to get involved with at Tesco. Going back to the first part of the question, it was challenging at times. These were again probably similar to myself going back a few years and at this time, especially from a corporate treasury capability in India, there was some limitations. So what we found was the best way to resolve that was to actually hire in some experienced treasury banking professionals with obviously a lot of the banks at that point in time outsourcing a lot of their back office and operational work to India. So we recruited some guys from various different international banks, RBS being included, and we basically brought them over to Lovely Chesam in North London to train them up in what is required from a corporate treasury perspective. We also added in some fundamental training and, and the entry level from an ACT perspective in terms of qualifications so that when you're speaking to your counterparts in India they was able to talk 1 the same language but 2 more importantly understand what the expectations was from the head office treasury function. This did involve in frequent amount of travel, I wouldn't say excessive and obviously the use of technology, open dialogue and communication to ensure that everyone 1 is aware of what is expected but 2 to ensure that the remote team feel part of the broader team which is obviously key in making this successful.

You mentioned there that with some of those guys, you guys trained them and got them involved with the ACT which was. It's not known so well in that region but obviously you were bringing those guys and putting through. Did that make a real difference, did you find?

I think it really helped with, as I said, ensuring that the communication was clear, understanding is clear, but also in terms of making them feel part of the team. Tesco at the time were big supporters of qualifications in training both from SEMA and both and secondly from the act. So again the expanded team, the remote team being part of that broader team environment and feeling more part of one family, it really did help in that aspect also.

So actually sponsoring their studies brought them closer to you guys because then you're perhaps Speaking from the same sheet and understanding the same terms and things, did.

You find exactly both again from a technical perspective, but also from a staff morale and engagement perspective. It also really did help, yes.

So it reached 2011 and you got a phone call or how did. What happened? You decided you had enough of the beautiful British weather and I'm speaking here today as it's. Well, it's been raining virtually all day. Living the dream out here and you went to sunny Abu Dhabi or how did that move come about?

To actually link to that last point, we were talking about in terms of the shared service centre, so having exposure to frequent international travel. The wife then and I, we just recently got married. At this point in time we're speaking and exploring many different opportunities internationally. It was something that I, we have always wanted to do and I was actually approached by at the time, the national bank of Abu Dhabi, which is now first Abu Dhabi bank, about an opportunity in something similar, but a little bit different to what I had done at Tesco on a much larger scale. So it's a great opportunity. We had been to the uae, we've been to Dubai a couple of times. We hadn't been to Abu Dhabi. So after a couple of visits to Abu Dhabi, we decided to take that opportunity. The opportunity there was a lot more strategic focus and a lot more leadership and my management responsibilities than I had had previous organizations. So I had a team across Europe, Middle east and Asia. So three different locations. Again, I had had that, some of that experience with Tesco being London and India based, but with a team of around 200 people. This provided all middle office back office support for all areas of the bank. So that covered not just treasury, it covered global markets, capital markets, secured lending and various parts of all of the wholesale banking, including custody and other areas that I hadn't had direct experience in. So it gave me an opportunity, one, to get that international exposure that I was looking for, real life experience of working across cultures, which is something that interests me from actually studying my MBA that I completed and was sponsored by Tesco, to managing a large diverse team, as I said, and three, it gave you an opportunity to learn something a little bit different. I think it is important to continue to obviously challenge and stimulate yourself, but also to learn something new.

And how did you feel about the shift back to. Well, you've been banking, you established your foundations there, but then you done a number of years in corporate treasury, core corporate treasury. But it was a move back into banking. What was a crossover? Were there any concerns you had There then you made a move back into corporate. So those transitions, talk us through those again this is more for the. There'll be people listening, going actually oh, should I, can you do that? You know, people say oh, they went to bank it. Well, that's it. You made a shift across. Can you shift back again? You know Connor from It was originally HP been started Barclays, hp, RBS made one to the other. But you've done both sides. So talk us through that.

So I'll also add a couple of subsections. So firstly, yes you can. We could always change and I think change is good. At that point in time I was prepared to take a risk and obviously hopefully with risks there are rewards. So my advice to anybody would be to take the right amount of risk, calculated risk if you like. But again if you have something set in your mind then to take that challenge and to go with it. And again, as I said, the reasons outlined the international large team exposure, something a little bit new was very appealing to me but also from a family perspective having the opportunity of moving to a new location I was interested in. So everyone has that opportunity. Yes, it is a little bit nerve wracking. This was again changing back from corporate into banking. It was also changing company obviously but also changing location and country that myself and at the time actually an eight month baby and wife was complete transition. But again we looked at that as an exciting opportunity rather than looking at potential, any potential concerns or risks associated with it. It has still been a great state again for the reasons I outlined. Big leadership responsibilities, very strategic focused, that is playing a core part in the bank that was transforming. And again lot of growth, double digit percentages, growth year on year. And again there was a lot of requirement and focus on developing young talent, introducing young talent, enhanced processes systems, but also focusing on what a corporate client's need. And I think the best way to bring that sort of area of expertise into the business is to look at somebody that has worked in corporates. So again you have seen in the banking sector a lot of people from corporates moving into banks and vice versa. You see a lot of positions now, senior positions within finance where you've got ex investment bankers, ex corporate bankers, ex M and A bankers that are moving in because it is a transferable skill set.

And so you transitioned across and got a lot of that skill set. And then what happened? How did the role come up at Etihad or you know, what happened there?

So I was fortunate enough to work with Etihad as one of our big Customers, as you can imagine. And Etihad again. So same sort of stories at this point in time. I joined here January 2014, about two and a half, three years at a bank. I was approached by the, at the time group treasurer and CFO that I knew from Etihad about their change agenda and what was happening within the business, you know, and Etihad as well as being the national airline of the UAE, based out of obviously the UAE's capital, Abu Dhabi, it plays a much bigger role than Border Abu Dhabi Dynamics and it is a key, pivotal part of the Abu Dhabi vision. And I just thought this was a great opportunity to be part of, part of that success story of Abu Dhabi, but also again as part of a growing business that is a key contributor and enabler to the economy here, but also the role that it plays in developing the region itself in terms of obviously one, transporting people in and around the UAE and Abu Dhabi, but two, showing Abu Dhabi to the rest of the world. The sponsorship and tie ups that it has with the likes of Man City that people in the UK would obviously be more familiar with.

And then as you grew your role there, were you always saying, right, I want to be more senior here or how did your sort of career progress? You made some great progression. Just to give people an idea that are listening, you went Deputy Group Treasurer, acting Group Treasurer, currently the interim cfo. How have you got those opportunities? What's been happening?

So there's been significant change, there's been taking the opportunity again, I'll continue to say a key term. It was said to me actually by a previous boss I worked for and I've actually inherited that message and continue to use it now, continue to challenge the status quo. So you know, sign off here, as I said, it was Deputy Group treasurer, which is pretty much fairly similar to what you have as a corporate treasurer as such, and looks after the group's corporate treasury and insurance functions. So the group treasury when I first joined here was very, very different to for example the Group treasury of Tesco or that of Kimberly Clark that we've touched upon. So the group treasury here at that point in time looks after tax structured and corporate finance, corporate treasury, insurance and investor relations. So again, a little bit different to what you may see especially back in the UK or functions that I had exposure to. So again it gave me an opportunity to look at areas like tax. Obviously when deputising for the group treasurer at that time, there's been some natural movement and succession planning and you know, with any deputy, the plan is would always be that the deputy steps into that individual's shoes when they're not there. And again if the plan is successful when that person moves internally or moves externally for a better opportunity, that the ideal candidate should be the deputy person based on them obviously successfully delivering that role for a period of time. I was fortunate enough again on that point based on delivery and challenging status quo and successful in that role for a number of years that I took on the broader group treasury role which then looked after corporate structure, finance IR as I said, and also taxation from then. I've taken on two other positions since then. So the SBP finance role looks after everything within the group treasury function as I've just touched upon, but also other areas of broader finance which includes what we call credit control financial operations which again links back into my background at Tesco and banking, especially focusing on global accounts payable or global accounts receivable, GL reconciliations, master data management, etc. And also the transformational part both from a finance that is balance sheet transformation and restructuring but also from systems and processes where for example I'm leading on and sponsoring the global SAP rollout from an ERP perspective, not just focusing on.

Treasury perspective and as a manager of people, leader of people rather than you've gone from that same manager to become a leader, what's your ethos around that leadership role? How are you people again listening and wanting advice, thinking actually how did he do it? Because how many people do you directly coach and lead now?

So at the moment I at the moment I'm performing a well being stream cfo. We have a new CFO that's due to join any day now in the capacity of CFO. There's around 850 people in the broader finance function of which at the moment I have probably around 220 direct reports. This is a combination of going back to my day role if you like, of SBP finance which is the biggest role of Senior Direct report of the CFO where I have nine direct reports at around 300 people and then on the combination of the rest of the finance leadership team so probably another 10 and their supporting staff of around another 450 that all roll up into the interim group CFO. Again a couple of points that I would probably like to highlight. One is treat people fairly, treat them as you'd like to be treated. 2 It sounds quite simple, regular transparent open dialogue and again I've had people, managers and leaders in the past that have been very good at that and some not so. So I try and you know, learn from previous good experiences where people have done that. So I continue to do that myself. And three, going back to the point of challenging status quo, doing a large role with a lot of people and leadership responsibility, that's not withstanding obviously external relationships and stakeholder management internally, with all of that combined, you don't have a lot of time always to do stuff, if I can call it that yourself. So therefore you've got people doing the stuff for you and you know your role is to appropriately challenge and challenge them, but also why and ask about how we've got to that decision.

So Adam, you've made these progressions through your different roles there, you know, succession planning and things like that, because obviously you came into these roles and you've grown and grown and grown. What's next for you or what's also next for other people coming behind you? Where did it continue from here?

There's a couple of points to raise there. So one, working in the uae, working for a government owned entity, we have clear commitment which we all buy into in terms of developing young Emirati talent. So we have a clear Emiratisation strategy which I lead for finance here. We also have a finance graduate scheme which again if we recall back from probably five, ten minutes ago, we spoke about Treasury Pacific one, we have here now linked with sema, a dedicated two year program where we take fresh graduates out of the local and international universities here and train people up as a talent pipeline of the future. We also again have a Treasury focus linked with the ACT graduate scheme, again linked over two years, separate but similar to the broader finance FEMA related program as I just mentioned. So I think again it's key to always have talent planning, if I can call it that, as a key part of your DNA in terms of people and HR management, but also to look at a key way of ensuring that you've got succession but also with talent. This is one of the perfect ways to managing that. Obviously there's going to continue to be unplanned gaps in your organisation structure, but having the key criteria, let's say the key 5, 10 roles within your broad organisation, when you have a large organisation or key one or two roles in the small organization and ensuring that there's a lease, contingency plans, but also providing a bottom up growth opportunity for some, let's call it middle management or lower management employees, so they see that there's that long term plan and they see that there's long term commitment from their management and leaders. I think that is key in Any.

Successful team and you talking there about team and being successful and it seems like you got. I don't know if you just went out and bought a new trophy cabinet and decided to try and fill it as much as possible. But for anyone that's listening, and I'm just reading down through here some of your recent honours and awards and it's like literally, you know, it's a who's who's award. Corporate finance solutions, different things. Was that a deliberate thing or did people just start recognizing it for what you were guys doing or what was the situation? Because again, you've got loads of awards. Where did that come from? What was the driver for that?

I think it's firstly, thanks. I think you're very generous.

There's a lot of them, There's a few.

And again, a lot of these. There's a number of individual awards, Mike, and there's a number of team awards and you know, we have been the standout treasury function in the Middle east and Africa for a considerable amount of time now. I'm very proud and pleased with the team that we have here in the corporate treasury function, the structured corporate finance team, the tax team, but all of the broader finance team, we have a very, very good, mixed, diverse function here. Some of the awards on there are nominated by peer group, some of them are transaction driven. The surprising one is probably the most recent one. I am under 40, so I got nominated for an Airline Leadership 40 under 40 award. So probably a few question marks. Is he really, is he really under 14? Yes, I am. But all joking aside, it's great to get recognition, it's great for the team to get recognition because it is hard work and I think treasury and finance, looking at both parts of my role sometimes go unnoticed. You know, let's call it. Some people call it corporate function, some people call it back office or support function. However, if done correctly and embedded and supported within the business, treasury and broader finance can be key contributors and game changers in any dynamic and challenging industry.

And just looking at you in a wider sense and things like that, when you talked about the big leadership team and everything else, when you're looking to bring people into the team, obviously, as always, we're hosted by the treasury recruitment company. So interested about recruitment and people issues or people management and team development things. What's your ethos? What are you looking for? Is it, you know, I saw this post on LinkedIn today that CVs don't matter. That's it, you know, just chuck them in the bin. Well, Actually, no, they're a good indicator of some of your progression and that's going to give a measure and that's also a good way to explore. You know, I'm using a CV to go through as a pointer. It's not the only thing I'm looking at and we're talking about, you know, it's a jumping off point. There's hooks in your CV which actually, oh, that's the progression of this person and why did you make this move? And it provides an interesting thing about someone's motivations. It's not the only thing, it's part of the toolkit and I didn't go back to it because I don't get involved in these arguments on LinkedIn. But you know, for you, when you're looking at recruiting people and bringing team members on board, what is it you're looking for? And is it the personality or the CV combination of both. What are you into?

So I've got to break that down again into three parts. So we're looking to recruit here and if I just keep this a little bit generic as financial treasury, but obviously treasury is always in my heart and part of my DNA, I think I look at three parts. So one will be experience. So one A, I would probably put that as direct role functions, organizations that individuals have worked on, have they got similar or transferable sector experience, which is quite relevant depending on the industry you're working in. Linked to experience, probably 1B, I'm calling Grey hair or Battle scars. What do I mean by that? We don't want someone that's, that's had it easier all the time. You look for somebody that's seeing dramatic growth or dramatic decline or a merger, takeover, you know, complete upheaval. There's a lot of knowledge, experience and actually gives you a different outlook on how to operate in the organization depending on the circumstances that's in front of you. So if I call it battle scars. Yes, on the cv, definitely the qualifications as well, both with a balance across academic performance, professional qualifications, depending on which particular role we look at and then based on that generally obviously being based here in the Middle east and Aberdale, depending where the individual would be located. I would then generally do a Skype technology permitting or a telephone screening call with the help of our recruiter or HR and or HR function here. And then a lot of it will be down to actually the individual personality. We like again, I like again to have a balance of both introvert, extrovert, right hand side, left hand side of brain, thinkers so again, looking at the broader dynamics and how you can have a diverse team is also key. And see how this particular individual's personality will fit in one into the team to the broader company as well.

Great answer. So, as we wrap up today's interview with you, Adam, as we discussed before the show, we'll put Adam's LinkedIn profile in the show notes so you can then potentially, if it's going to be useful to both parties, Adam can connect to you and you to them and things like that. But the question I close every episode with is simply someone looks back at your background and say, actually that's the sort of career I'm going to pursue, following your footsteps and things. What would you give as a summary piece of advice? One piece of advice that or a couple of tips that people should think about when they're looking at thinking, right, I want success in my treasury career. This is what I need to do. Treasury, your finance career, as you ably demonstrating, what would you say?

I'll probably Summarize that into four takeaways. I find this Mike. 1. Always have a can do attitude. Times are not always easy, but I think again, lead by example and show that you're there. The good and the not so good times. Two, and I've said this a couple of times already, always challenge status quo. Just because someone tells you it's A to B may not be the right answer. So therefore always challenge what people are telling you appropriately challenge. I'll probably extend that too. 3. It sounds quite strange, but actually put your hand up to get some battle scars, as I called it earlier. They will last a long time and actually if embraced in the right way, will leave you with a good standard going forward. And then probably fourth. And finally take that calculated risk. Again, there is good risk to be taken as long as there is the benefits or rewards that you're going to receive if the risk is managed correctly.

Wow, great advice. So that was brilliant. Just like writing down some of the notes to also go in there. I think the key ones I was going to say is say don't be afraid of getting those battle scars, you know, if it's worth it. And then that again links into don't be afraid of taking that calculated risk. And like all good treasury professionals, your risk management knowledge needs to be employed also for your personal career as well as your professional career and your profession. So fantastic. Thank you for today's chat, Adam. We finally did it, but there's been a few. He's a busy man, is our Adam. The problem is you're always on stage accepting another award. That's one of the problems, I think.

Maybe on stage or up in the air on an airplane.

Yeah, exactly. Just traveling everywhere. Adam, thanks for your time today. Been great to catch up. And if anyone, as I say, we'll put in the show notes Adam's Link to his LinkedIn profile. Connect with him if you think it's going to be great on all parties. I wish you well with your continuing finance career. Thanks very much.

Thank you, Mike. And I hope it's been useful.

It's been brilliant. Thanks.