Leading a Dynamic & Diverse Global Treasury Team with Tomer Amitai

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 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 joined by Toma Amatai, the svp, corporate treasurer, head of insurance and risk management at Teva Pharmaceuticals. Now, for those of you who don't know, Teva Pharmaceuticals have been developing and producing medicines to help improve our lives for over a century. A portfolio of 3,500 products. Around 200 million people around the world take a Teva medicine every day. But as always, I'll let Toma explain that a little bit later in the show. He. He's got one of the most amazing experiences when you go back and we were just discussing before the show. So Deborah came up as an intelligence officer, then lawyer, then Citigroup, and then joined and worked in Treasury. So, you know, if anybody else has got a background on that, I'd like to hear about it because this is amazing and this is what we're going to deep dive in soma. It's enough talking from me. Perhaps if you would take us back to, well, your history, because it's so diverse. It's absolutely brilliant. So over to you, sir.

Thank you, Mike, good morning and thanks for that brilliant introduction.

No, pleasure.

Yeah.

So look, you can say that I indeed had quite an interesting career so far. I'm a strong believer in diversification and pursuing your deepest interest. You know, I always, since I was little, you know, I knew I'd want to be involved in the business world one way or the other. Didn't necessarily know it's going to be in finance, but eventually ended up this way. But I think it very much sits on my sort of set of strengths at this stage and largely into my career.

So found myself, indeed in Treasury, I.

Started in law school. Indeed, as you mentioned, I do believe that law as a profession gives you maybe the broadest set of tools to engage the business world. The understanding, the reasoning, not just the actual practicality of understanding law, but actually these extra tools, this way of thinking, way of analyzing things, way of addressing complicated problems that really gives you an edge in dealing with complex situations in the business world.

So is that the sort of analysis side of things and just that you analyze what the other person on the other side of the table is doing, or where does that come from?

Yeah, it's that it's being involved. I was a corporate lawyer so it's being involved in highly complicated transaction, understanding the underlying business rationale, negotiation skills, obviously verbal and written communication, communication skills, et cetera. So all of this really gives you a set of capabilities. Again in my mind very few degrees can actually give you.

But you did that. But did you already think actually I'll do this for a while and then go into business or did it then just happen naturally or what happened?

Exactly, exactly. The thinking was really that I'm going to do this and then find the right opportunity and timing to move on.

To the business world.

I also learned by the way, economics. I have my BA in economics so I knew that the, you know, the opportunity would present itself, I'd pursue it.

And it presented to two and a.

Half years going into my sort of me practicing law, the opportunity really to move on to Citibank. So completely different industry in general. And it will also be part of what I'll describe in me moving to Teva. But I'm also a very strong believer in taking, you know, some, some courageous moves in managing your career. I'd say that this was one or first courageous move, sort of or quite, you know, fundamental move I did. So moved on to a completely different discipline, banking. These were very interesting few years in my career. Citi was sort of, I would say a mid size, even a small size branch of a huge global corporate which was sort of in the phase of establishing itself. And the opportunity that I stepped into was one in which, you know, we essentially built a completely new business to the Israeli market almost from scratch. So it was sort of a startup mode within a huge global corporate which also exposed me very much to the Israeli capital market, to the Israeli infrastructure. Lots of work with the securities authorities, with the local exchange, with many market players. So very interesting few years there.

And what was the sort of, what was the state of the Israeli market then? Again, it's not something I'm familiar with, familiar with the London markets all the way through, long established, but sounds like they were still developing or what stage were they at, would you say?

Yeah, indeed. So I would say that the Israeli market in general has opened up dramatically over the last, let's say two decades. Foreign players much more than ever before. And again, that particular business that we opened was exactly geared towards facilitating better participation of foreign actors or foreign players in the local Israeli capital market which again, you know, I'm proud to say that we're a part of making, making it happen.

You know, what was banking like then? You know, again you'd made this move from lawyer to a banker. You know, what was the, what was the shift in thinking, dealing with people and things like that? Because, you know, before you became then treasury, you know, how was it?

So a few very interesting things. So first, you know, you move from serving many cases in many people and being a lawyer and being, you know, sort of all over the place to very focused, clear agenda of establishing essentially your own business. So that's obviously completely different from what you do as a lawyer. So that's one sort of very fundamental thing that happened. The other thing which is also very interesting is moving really to the global corporate world, which to me was, took me a couple of years to fully assimilate what it really means to work for such a huge complicated corporate within the context of again of a small subsidiary that's working to sort of progress its agenda and everything it needs within, I would say, the processes, the systems, the mindset, the people, the infrastructures that, you know, we all know that global.

Corporates are so, so good at.

So taught me a lot these first.

Few years on how to manage within.

A global corporate environment.

So then Tomi, you made the move from banking to corporate treasury and you went into this working capital manager role. What was behind that? You know, you were at Citigroup doing well, you know, a move to corporate treasury or how did it come about? What was the situation?

So to me, again, that was another sort of courageous moves. I move I referred to before and first, you know, understanding that, you know, opportunities for progress within global corporates when you're sitting in a very small subsidiary are very limited. I was three years into my career with Citi, so that's was one thing. And secondly, I was very much attracted to the, to the corporate environment. We were serving many corporates, I got to know many of them. So for to me to move on, again, serving in a corporate environment was the sort of the natural next step of my career. And when sitting in Israel moving, you cannot ask for much more than moving into Teva.

Teva has been and still is the.

Largest by far Israeli corporate, the most complicated, the most interesting, one of the most famous success stories, corporate success stories in Israel. And to this very day, again, with all the ups and downs the company has undergone, Teva is still considered to be, you know, the sort of the common people stock and everybody is interested and everybody knows about Teva and what's happening in Teva. So for to me, me to make the move as a sort of a natural next step in my career was natural. I had a friend that brought me into Teva back then. And this is really when my journey with Teva began.

And with that you say about the sort of the common people, stock of the people, is it just that it's so well known because everyone use the product and it's just, yeah, that's the place to work or what's the situation?

So Teva is by far the largest provider of medicine to the Israeli market. So every Israeli household has Teva products one way or the other. But it's not only that. It's a company that against all odds, started as a small manufacturer in Israel and then essentially broke all limits, expanding dramatically across the globe to become the huge corporate it is right now in more than 60 markets, one of the biggest players in the US, in many countries, in Europe. And when you think about it, again, coming from such a small market and against all odds, it took a huge vision and also some superb execution along the years to get the company again from a country like Israel to become.

The global leader it is today.

Yeah, it's amazing. So, Tomi, you made this move, the right move, I would say, from banking into treasury joined Teva and it was an amazing success story and a company that lots of people know. But maybe explain if you would what Teva is and then just give us a whistle stop tour of your treasury career because you've got promotion. Promotion did really well. So talk us through the company and how you are interlinked with that. So over to you, sir.

My career with treasury in Teva spans essentially two horizons. I started my career in Teva for two years in treasury and then did sort of a whole circle which we can definitely talk about to come back to lead the organization to two and a half years ago. Quite a story there in between. But maybe before that, you know, so a few words about the company. You mentioned it at the very beginning. But again, against all odds, a company that grew out of Israel is now one of the biggest pharmaceutical companies in the world, selling in excess of $17 billion on an annual basis in more than 60 markets. We're the world leaders in generic pharmaceuticals, have been sold for many decades now. But we also have, and that's something that, you know, people don't always acknowledge. We have a very big specialty business, an innovative business within Teva, quite a big one in which we actually either buy or develop our innovative products in various therapeutic areas. We also have a big over the counter business, over the counter medicines and also one of the biggest providers of active pharmaceutical ingredients which are the building blocks of medicines to the global pharmaceutical industry. So we're essentially backwards integrated. But the beauty about Teva is that the company developed over, I would say the last three decades. We're very, very aggressive mergers and acquisition strategy which again good both geographically and also from a product standpoint. And again one of the key challenges in the treasury world, but also in many other worlds was how do we move from being very diversified M and a focused company over the years to one global company with the best practices that we need to implement, being the global corporate we are. And if I take it really down to the treasury world, one of the nicest things that happened to my sort of two tenors in treasury is that I joined the group again almost 10 years ago where I would say we were midway in our journey and I've established many of sort of the working capital practices and the best solutions that we've implemented ever since. And then I came back again two and a half years ago to lead the group in a much more advanced stage. And I want to believe that over the last again two and a half years we've made significant progress to pushing the organization even further into what it needs to be, which is really a world class group within a world class company.

There are two things I wanted to ask. The first question I have tremendously successful as a company, isn't that, doesn't that just make it easy in treasury you put lean back, everyone wants to talk to you, everyone wants to deal with you and that's relatively easy. But you then also took a slightly different path because you more CFO ship and the global Finance group, would you recommend that to people? So treasury first of all was that relatively easy or what was the situation?

So back then it was quite challenging because again we had to establish, I had to establish many transactions, systems, processes, even deals that we've put in place in an area. Again the working capital management of the company which was essentially non existent. So that was really exciting and it allowed me to get some great exposure to the company, to its people and to its process. And then I took a series of roles over the next, I would say six to seven years which took me away from treasury and into general management. General management at first of, of the finance organization and then general management. You know, generally speaking I was the right hand man for Teva's CEOs. There were a few of them in my, in my tenure, but I was sort of the right hand man for, for quite a few years. And going back to your questions, I cannot tell you how an Amazing of an experience it was and how important it was for me to come back to my role as treasurer and really carry it out in a completely different way if I didn't have that experience. Why is that? Because look, I think that treasury today has a critical role to play at the decision, at the strategic decision making tables of the company. Not just the financial one, but also the business one. And you cannot be a true contributor, a true strategic partner to the decision making table if you don't deeply and fully understand what is it that your company is doing, how is it doing, how is its financial situation, how does the industry look like, how do the peers look like, where are we heading from here, what do we need to do and how do we as a Treasury group need to support the financial strategy of the company? So to me again, these few years that I spent in general finance and business management were absolutely valuable in successfully carrying out the role that I carry out today.

And you've got a wider role. You know, some treasurers are just, just got treasury, you know, that's their only silo if you like and you know that's the only thing. But you also cover insurance and risk management. Now I'm assuming by that they've, they've merged or they've, you know, grown because they're obviously risk to the group and everything else. Or how was that created that you do corporate treasury, you do insurance, you do risk management. Why is the group combine those or put them under your umbrella if you like.

Look, it was an evolution over the years of just thinking in terms of the right structure. So these groups actually in the past sort of reported in to other places. But I think that the understanding was that in terms of capabilities and also synergies to be created these two groups, so insurance and risk management find a very good home within sort of what we call the TEVA Global treasury umbrella. And it's proving itself very well. You know, I have a management team that comes from both the treasury insurance and risk management disciplines that's functioning very well, that's feeding each other with information. Again, there are many sort of areas of synergies between the co treasury group and the insurance group, between risk management and financial risk management, between risk management and the insurance group. Two words that sort of live one by the other. So, so despite the fact that it was sort of an organizational evolution that led to the situation, I find it extremely beneficial today and I think so do my leaders in my team.

You talk about the leaders in your team, that's a great way to introduce it, you've got a team of over 50, so a lot of people to sort of lead, manage, coach and things like that. How do you do that? Or what's the sort of the structure for you guys coming to the people and talent aspects? What do you see as the key challenges there?

So maybe two words on structure and then I would say the challenges. So essentially, so I have these three groups again reporting into me. The Global Risk management is a small team on the corporate level based in HQ in Israel. The insurance group is slightly larger, but again most of it is central in Israel. And through a few good years of improvement, we've sort of centralized the entire scope of insurance activities worldwide into that team. And the treasury group is built essentially of two separate legs. That's also where the weight of the people lies naturally. So I have three centers of excellence, treasury centers of excellence that reside close to me in corporate. One of them overseeing financial risk management and cash management, the other one overseeing the debt aspect and banking relations. And the last one which I've put in place and I find very important is a small group or small team that manages treasury systems and some elements of our core processes. So these are centers of excellence. And then I have another quite large group which are sort of on the business partnering side. I have. So TEVA is divided into three regions geographically and I have in full alignment three regional treasurers that serve as business partners to each one of these regions. Europe, North America and what we call international markets, which is essentially everyone else. So that's sort of the structure. Look, the challenges on the people and talent side, other than corona, in the last eight, nine, ten months that has put huge new challenges on our capabilities as managers and leaders. I would say generally speaking, it's setting the right strategy. It's promoting the notion of business strategy and business partnership, which I constantly promote within my people. How do we again always strive to generate and provide more value to the business, better business partnership, better proximity, etc. Etc. You know, also, you know, create the right opportunities for people either in terms of their internal development, also from external sources to continue and develop. At the end of the day we're a small group so you can definitely always develop up the, up the ranks, but you know, the opportunities there are limited. But on the other hand, you know, I always push my people to also develop, also horizontally and become a much more diversified contributors employees so they can also form a good talent pool to the broader finance group and not just to the treasury organization and they can.

Move across the SILOS as well move across the pillars, if that's the right of the centers of excellence. So you get them to move across each.

Exactly, yeah.

And you talk there about developing talent and looking to the future and you then touch on treasury systems and we again, I talk on lots of shows about. I've seen that the treasurer has been increasingly put forward by the cfo, pushed in the front of technology and at one stage everyone's going on about blockchain, which seems to have died down a little bit, but robotics and AI and actually simplifying a lot of those processes, that's definitely the forefront. I've heard that from a lot of people. But there's lots of other things coming up, treasurers and things like that. What do you see as the future of treasury or the challenges that are coming your way? Have to deal with this or. Right, we need to go forward, guys, and look at this technology or other areas.

So look, technology is definitely a large enabler of everything. At least I'm, you know, I'm foreseeing we will be required to do today and into the future, I must admit, and I've, you know, I've been asked a lot this question but you know, I don't think that all these concepts, AI, robotic, big data, etc. Have matured to a level that's, that's, that's usable enough. At least that's the way I see it. Many of them are still sort of in the sort of the general slogan ballpark and I see very limited applications to our day to day sort of business. But I do believe that eventually they'll mature and they'll become much more useful. To me, the focus today is really in automation that's geared towards reduction of low value, highly transactional work and shifting my group's activity more and more towards the strategic elements of what we can deliver on through using technology. Plus the challenges and integrating many sources of data. We're a company that has multiple ERP systems, very complicated underlying system landscape. So our challenge is to get real time, accurate data, whether it be exposure or cash management or many other things, aggregating it quickly and then applying the right set of analytical tools to it to deliver highly valuable products. And again today we've done lots of progress and we're sort of, I would say midway as far as automation is concerned, but still we have quite a bit of manual intervention here and there and our analytical tools are very good, but they're mostly based on people's capability right now. And over time I want to augment it more and more by system and data tools.

Do you think, you know, this is just me checking it out there? Do you think that. I really like the way you said, you know, it's some sloganizing. I've increasingly spoken to a lot of treasurers and it seems that the, you know, you guys have got problems first and then the solutions are coming second. And I'm finding, you know, I've just been, you know, emailed this morning with a couple of, oh, this company's doing this, this company's doing this and they're all coming up with these solutions, but not necessarily for the problems that I hear you guys in treasury telling me about. You know, it seems that they're, oh, we can do this and we'll only charge you this. But it's, Hang on, have you actually sat down with that corporate treasurer? You really deep dive with the team to say, what are your problems? Do you see that? You know, it sounds like you do when you're talking about your team. You know, it's limited by the team having to get through it, but perhaps not being given the right tools. Would that be right?

Yeah, I'd say that. Look, all tech companies, whether it be small or large, have definitely the right intentions and we are engaged with them always in conversations. But I must admit that again, you know, the big ticket items that trouble me as a corporate treasurer are still, I would say, largely unresolved. For example, the holy grail may be of things that corporate treasure deals with cash flow forecasting today, still, the solutions there are very, very minimal to provide me with what I need. So I apply lots of brain power and manual processes to support that. The same for FX exposure capture, which again is a huge area of concern for me. Real effects, exposure capture and analysis. So there are, you know, some good solutions, some better solutions, but still not solutions that are systemical that allow me to sort of completely solve that very challenging issue. And there are many, there are other areas again in ERP connectivity, in data collection, etc. There are good ideas that are developing, but nothing currently that is, you know, systematically solving some of the core issues that corporate treasurers deal with.

And we're not at the end of the show yet, we're not far off. But what I wanted to ask, looking, looking back at you and some of your history and things like that, you know, the end of the show we asked for the top three things and stuff like that. That's not the question I'm asking. What I'm asking here is someone's coming in and they, you've got this incredible background, let's say really diverse. What are you doing with your team to say, right, explore this other areas or are you coaching them to go into, to branch out of treasury or you know, you're saying actually treasury can provide this because you have a better, you know, you know it and you can see that or do you try and coach them on a rotation or what was the situation?

To me it's a delicate balance. So first, again, like I said before, I always push my people to expand their knowledge, their expertise and their understanding of the business, whether it be within the company or outside the company because I think it makes for much better business savvy, thoughtful employees. So that's one thing. Secondly, you know, it's always to me drawing a balance between nurturing the talent pool I have in house to grow within the organization and you know, succeed and develop within. But again, like I said, I keep pushing them also to expand their knowledge into other areas in finance and or otherwise so that they can make for much better again finance people, generally speaking. And if they choose to develop in the organization and become successors of me one day, then great. But if they'd like to become country CFO or the head of the FPA division and wherever else they'll have the set of tools and capabilities and knowledge to do that. So it's a fine line you're drawing but I think it's the right one to do.

Yeah, to be that have specialist skills but you know, then apply them in different areas just as you did very, very well. So, you know, I think it is about time we sort of, Well, I know that we could keep talking for hours and really enjoying the conversation but you know, we like to keep it to the sort of half hour, 40 minutes looking back over your career and then to give recommendations to the people listening today. What are the top things that you would say people should do? We'll put your link to your profile in the show notes for LinkedIn and things like that so people can maybe connect to you if it's right to have them in the network. But as you look back over this, what are you thinking? Do you know what you should be, you guys should be doing this and maybe we put it at a different level. So if you're a junior, junior treasury person, do this mid level, this is what you should do. And looking at some of the other treasures, this is what they should be thinking about, if that's the right way to phrase it. So what would you say to those guys listening today.

So to me, I'd say it doesn't differ too materially from one rank to the other. I'd say a few things. First, I'd say be curious. Always try to learn more. Always try to understand more. Understand the company you work for, understand the industry you operate within, reach out, reach out to people across the organization, et cetera. Make sure that again, you understand the environment you live in and not just the very specific area you're working within or the very specific function that you carry out. So that's one thing. Secondly, I would say don't be afraid to take hard decision, whether it be on the role you're carrying out, risk taking, if it's in a calculated manner, and also if it's fully informed and educated, sometimes gets you to the right place. And the same applies to, you know, to going about your career. So. So that's the second thing, and maybe thirdly is, you know, I'm a very strong believer in the power of people and in the power of teams. At the end of the day, you know, a leader cannot succeed by his own. And the success of a leader, I think, is the success of his team and the success of his. Of his people. So you need to really give people that confidence. You need to promote them, you need to develop them, you need to guide them. But at the end of the day, again, you won't succeed if wasn't for your people. So. So don't forget that.

Amazing. Well, you know, I thought it was gonna be a diverse show because I think you've got this great background tomorrow and I know that you do a lot of speaking at Euro Finance, so people can see you on a stage talking about your latest view news and views. Thank you for your time today. I think people gain a lot from the episode, you know, really, you know, if you do want to connect with him, we'll put Toma's details in the show notes. And thank you very much for today.

Thank you very much for Mike for having me.