How to Forge a Successful Career in Treasury with Paul Miseré

Where have you seen treasury develop over the time you've been in it so far and then going to next, you know, what have you seen as the key developments and see as the developments going forward sort of thing?

When I started in 2002, definitely somewhat a sophisticated setup with a host to host connection. But I mean I was sending wires through a modem. Right. And using a floppy disk to encrypt it and sending fax instructions for export deals kind of things. Right. I've seen and we've been implementing quite some technology here and there to further automate that and streamline these activities and I think we will continue doing that. We are in the midst of rolling out globally a tms, a Treasury management system. What I foresee and that that's something that my opinion is that we would like to get rid of all those recurren activities as soon as possible by implementing the TMS and other functionality. Which means also potentially a change in the mindset of team members. Right. I would foresee us being much more involved in analytics and insights providing that not just to other team members within the organization but also to other functions like shared services. When it comes down to having more facts based analytics and insights on working capital initiatives like in AP and AR than we are doing today, I think we have access to so much data but we haven't been using it to the fullest. I think there's still a lot of value add that we can show towards the organization by further automating recurring and operational activities. I think back in the days we actually collaborated much more with shared services than with and apartments like tax and legal. I think it's now the other way around. There are much. There's much more interaction and collaboration with tax and legal to some extent finance, lesser extent accounts payable, so the shared services because most of the work has already been done. I would say at the same time though, we as a company are also penetrating into new markets. It's not the Germany, but it's like Egypt, think of Egypt and Pakistan. And that definitely brings along new challenges which makes us collaborate again much more with shared services than before. But I see where you're coming from. It's considered same as tax department considered a bit as a niche. Right. A specialized function. I think as a result of that we do have a seat at the table for most of the initiatives. But I also see the constant need for me and others to explain why we are adding value to the organization. If you have a general interest in Treasury, I mean you should reach out to people like me and others or within your organization to get a better understanding of what that exactly entails. Right. If you want to be successful in treasury, but I think in general can be in finance or any other function. I think what I experience at least is that you shouldn't be afraid to. How do you say that? To take advantage of an opportunity when offered right. At the same time though, it needs to feel right. I'm a bit of a. I'm sensitive to that. I mean I've for example that certain departments where activities were explored that were not close to my heart, Mike, but the team was and I also experienced it the other way around. So it could even be within the treasury function that there are some elements which I don't know. It's not having an immediate interest. But it could be that there are other challenges that makes it really appealing for you to step in to overcome those challenges. It can be from a people management perspective, but can also be that there are opportunities to further automate and work with vendors and bankers on really innovative solutions. If you look at, at treasury, if you are interested in like working with banks, working with SAP IT on really sophisticated and innovative solutions, I think then you should pursue a career within Treasury.