In this video, Mike Richards explains how his Treasury Career Corner live events evolved from traditional presentations into highly interactive, peer‑driven roundtables that deliver tangible career value for treasury professionals at every stage. After a candid conversation with his business coach Brian, Mike introduced roundtable sessions where participants bring their biggest challenges—typically around technology, people, or debt capital raising—and the group, under Chatham House rules, collaboratively works through solutions. The format proved successful in London (24 participants) and was later expanded in New York with 36 treasurers and an evening networking session of over 100 attendees. A memorable anecdote illustrates how a participant avoided a costly treasury‑system decision thanks to the peer discussion. Inspired by this impact, Mike and his team, now partnered with law firm Herbert Smith, are scaling the programme, extending roundtable hours, and adding dedicated peer‑discussion circles for early‑career treasurers where three senior mentors rotate among small groups every 20 minutes. Mike also clarifies that Treasury Career Corner is more than a recruiter: it offers salary‑benchmark surveys, a 420‑episode podcast, and a community ecosystem supporting professionals from 1‑year to 30‑year careers. He concludes with a call to action, listing upcoming live events in Texas, Dublin, Amsterdam, London, Chicago, and New York, urging viewers to invest in themselves by attending.
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So this week's newsletter was about not concentrating on the empty spaces. It was about being there in the room. So I'm going to come back to that and explain how all this started. I'll take you back to last year. I was sitting with my business coach, Brian. I'll pop up a quick photo. There you go. He said, Mike, your Treasury Career Corner live events are great, but they're not that good. Hang on, Brian, you're meant to be my business coach. What are you saying? He said, they could be much better. I said, okay, why don't you do some round tables? Okay, get some treasurers in the room, get them talking to each other. I was like, okay, that's pretty good. Talk about their challenges. I got asked by actually someone at one of the associations, said, what did the sponsors choose? I said, there were no sponsors. They said, what? I said, no, I just had, as it was, 24 treasurers sharing their challenges. And they chose the topics and you guys will choose the topics. So we'll come back to that as well. You were learning from each other. You came in, what we did was we asked the group, said, come in with your biggest challenge. And actually the sessions we ran were about technology, unsurprisingly, were about people, and they were about debt capital raising. So we went round the groups and each person said, this is my biggest challenge. And then the group decided, they voted for that person's biggest challenge and they, as a group, They then answered it. So it wasn't, it was Chatham House rules. Everyone got in there and everyone said it was amazing value. We did it in London and then we repeated it in New York recently. We had 36 treasurers in the room and the feedback was incredible. Although one of the stories actually I keep regaling, telling people about was one of the treasurers said, how was it? Said, Mike, that was terrible. Okay. And he said at the same time, it was brilliant. Oh, why? He said, we were about to make a decision on a treasury system, but being in that room made me realize we need to go back a stage. Not all the way back to the beginning, but we could have made a mistake, or I could have made a mistake. What I need to do is reassess. I've met all these other treasurers. I'm gonna talk to them a little bit more and actually find out exactly what we should be doing. And then we might still end up with the same system, but it might be different. And you've helped me not make that mistake. So thank you very much. I was like, Okay, well, pretty pleased with myself. So next stop, New York. We did it. 36 treasurers in the room, around in the round tables. Then we had over 100 in the evening. Incredible energy, amazing conversations. And then that was the moment where I was looking there. I've been getting emails throughout the day saying, oh, sprained my toe, don't get my homework, can't be in the room. And I was like, for a moment, I was like fixated on that empty chair. Then I looked at the 4, the 44, the 50, 100-odd chairs that were full, and people's beaming faces, and everyone was happy. And I suddenly thought to myself, hang on, don't worry about that, think about these guys. And that's what stuck in my head. So then a couple days later, getting on the plane, heading home, I'm thinking right there, 30 treasurers in a room, 100 in the evening. What's better than 30? 60? What? So that's what we're doing. We're trying to scale this up and we're gonna do it with your help and support. We do a great job and we do a great job of helping those experienced treasury professionals. I'm gonna come back to that in a moment. But basically what I'm looking to do is I want to, and we're working with Herbert Smith, the law firm, and they're supporting us in this. And what we're doing is doing these amazing sessions. We've had the round tables before, so that happens. We did it 4 till 6 in London. This time we're actually, and actually the other feedback was we want more time together. So we're just extending it a little bit. We did 3 till 6 PM, 3 round tables over the course of 3 hours in New York, and everyone came out. That was amazing. Thank you very much. I said, oh, okay, great. So we're going to do a similar thing in London, and we're going to carry it on for New York as well. So that was fantastic. The other thing I thought about when I was sitting on that plane, we do a great thing for 10 years plus treasurers, and they come along, then you have our sessions in the evening. But if you're a treasury professional with say 6 months, a year's experience, 10 years experience, what do we give to you? You're early in your careers. Do you know what? We don't do enough, but we're changing that. So what we're going to do before each of the sessions in London and before the session in New York, between 5 till 6 PM, the roundtables will run. They carry on as they are and everyone's getting some great value for their, for the more experienced treasurers. 4, the, those, and you might be one of these people, but earlier stages of your career, I'm getting these 3 peer discussion groups in the round, if you like, 3 small circles where you get to ask the treasurer how to navigate your treasury career. So 3 experienced treasurers will rotate around the groups every 20 minutes, and you get to ask them the questions you actually want to ask. How to navigate the early stages of career, what to do next, what should you avoid doing, what was their key to success? And you get to ask them one-to-one. And then after 20 minutes, right, next, move around. So you're going to get to listen to these and interview and actually talk to them face-to-face. I've already got them organized for London. I'm just about to announce the name, so that will be coming out soon, so keep out. Then I also got asked this other question in New York. Are you a recruiter? I said, yeah, yeah. But I said, the difference is we're not just, I'm not just a recruiter. We're not just a recruitment company. Because there's nothing worse, and you might even get that phone call today from someone and say, hello, got any jobs? Oh no, we don't, not at the moment, thanks, bye. Okay, great. Really? Is that what it's about? That's not what we do. We don't say how— we want to know how your treasury career is going. We give you that advice. Need to benchmark your salary? Do our salary survey. 1,600 people do. Want to hear from 400+ treasury professionals about how to achieve career success? Listen to the podcast, 420 episodes, 250,000 downloads. TreasuryCareerCorner.com. Not bad, eh? Do you want to meet over 80 of your Treasury peers in one amazing environment? Well, come to one of our events, Treasury Career Corner Lives. We do them in New York, London, Amsterdam, Dublin, back in London. We're doing Chicago this year as well. Come to one of those and you are gonna get to sit with all of your peers. You then, you come to our round tables. You're more experienced treasurer, come to one of our round tables, sit with your peer group and actually discuss your challenges face to face in the Chatham House rules environment. So you feel comfortable, safe, and also you get to network as well. Want to learn from experienced treasurers? Come to one of our 3 peer discussion groups in London or New York. This is what we do. We basically, we're not just recruiters, essentially we're part of your ecosystem. We support you at every stage of your Treasury career, whether you're now in your early stage of your career, 1 year, whether you're 10 years, whether you're 30 years. We do this and support you because we are recruiters, but we're recruiters who actually help you in your Treasury career, not just one-dimensional, hello, got any jobs? So when I talk about those empty chairs, and this is for all of you that maybe have missed out. Whatever stage in your career, you come to those events, invest in yourselves. You're going to get the value. All we ask for you is to give us your time. So don't think about it. If you're thinking there, you're watching this today, saying I should go to one of those events, the events link I'll put below. Sign up today because otherwise something will creep into your diary. Think, actually, no, I'm going to commit to this. I'm going to invest in myself. So as I say, we've got events coming up in Texas, Dublin, Amsterdam, London, Chicago, New York. Why not come and join us? Put your name down, get yourself in the room, invest in your own treasury career. Thanks very much.
