The Importance of Learning and Being Adaptable in Treasury with Mark Hirst

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. In this week's show delights to be joined by a good old friend of mine, Mark Hurst, the group treasurer at Dr. Martin's PLC. Or as we like to say in England, they're a brand known for their rebellious self expression. Yep, I got that from the website, but it's a really good description of what is an iconic British brand. Founded in the 60s in Northamptonshire originally for workers looking for tough, durable boots. They've then gone throughout culture. I certainly grew up with them if you like. There are punks, there was lots of other people but the company itself. And where Mark they listed on the FTSE, well the FTSE 250 company so listed on London Stock Exchange back at the beginning of 2021. Recently Mark joined the group as they around the time I think they were publishing their first year results. So it'd be an interesting one for us to go through later on in the show. As always, I'm going to go back to the beginning. I'm going to stop talking. I want Mark to talk and talk about his career today. Something to say about how you got started in treasury. But we were just talking before the show. Mark's got a more diverse background than many of my interviewees, if you like. Mark had an unusual start insofar as you were all in languages and international side and then eventually discovered later on the world of Treasury. So as I say, I'll shut up. Mark, over to you. How did you all get started with your career? Sir?

Yeah, hi Mike, first of all, thanks. Thanks for having me on your podcast. I have listened to a few others and you've interviewed people or you've had people on your podcast I've worked with previously. So it's good to be kind of in that company. So in terms of backgrounds, diversity, I guess by education you'd probably say I was a linguist. But actually I've got a bit of a passion for learning things and I have ever since I was told to buck up my ideas at school by my teachers and by my parents and really kind of buckled down to my GCSEs and from there it's kind of progressed. So I do like to kind of tease and read my treasury colleagues sometimes because often they've taken finance or accounting or economics at university. Whereas I always say I chose to do something I was really interested in, passionate about at the time and also got to spend a year abroad in Germany and Russia.

Awesome. And that international flavor, obviously Treasury, I've talked about this as well, that it's very international focused. Do you feel that as a natural precursor in some ways with that diversity of different people and international flavor of things? Was that something that became a theme for you, would you say?

Yeah, I think so. I think certainly culturally, understanding different cultures, the way people work and behave in different cultures and how they respond in a team environment has helped languages. I mean, I won't pretend to say that I've been able to use my language necessarily in a business, business context, whether it was from the start of my career to where we are now. I guess typically the language of business is English and therefore it offers few and far opportunities to practice languages. And mine are somewhat rusty now anyway, but certainly a lot of the work I've done, certainly when I first started out in treasury was international. And that again, keeps things interesting. It ticks boxes for me because different countries, different markets, different cultures, different expectations. It's just really helpful for somebody like me to kind of go down that particular path. But yeah, it's kept things interesting. And then obviously, you know, the. You got Treasury, Treasury's core. You know, there are core elements or components of treasury which don't change necessarily from company to company or sector to sector. So the international challenge is something I've always cherished.

So you started with your degree and then for the guys that haven't clicked on your LinkedIn profile, take us through. Because you then went to professional services and went through that path. Maybe give us a whistle stop tour of that bit if you like.

So I guess I was always interested in business. I just never chose to do it as a discipline at university, as I said, you know, I was very much into my languages. I ended up doing German and Russian as a ba, got a first class honours in that. And I saw a very good opportunity to kind of jump across, as it were, into business through the management consulting graduate scheme at what was then Coopers and Lybrand is obviously now PwC. Very select kind of bunch of people with very different backgrounds. Seven or eight of us on the graduate intake that year, as opposed to about 300, 400 auditors that they were recruiting at the same time. And it was an opportunity, and certainly in interviews, opportunities to use my languages, I think, but. And then interviews with partners and directors and all of the Big six, I think, as it was then, you know, there are always projects abroad. Come and work for us. You can use your German, you can use your Russian language skills and naturally, you know, the expectation versus reality is always a bit different. Once you get. Get in the door, you quickly find, as I said previously, the language of business is English. And actually I probably didn't use my langu very much at all in my professional services career. You remember even the first assignment, client assignment, being in Germany with Siemens. Bizarrely enough, a couple of my colleagues on the graduate scheme were chosen to go across and work on that project despite not having German language skills, and I went off to work on something else, just the way the cookie crumbles, I guess.

And so you moved then through professional services for a number of years before, then you moved into industry. You know, can you walk us into that? Because it's definitely something that you and I, that's where we first encountered each other. When you started work for Tesco's, Talk us through your progression.

Yeah, absolutely. And Mike, you still, you still never bought me that beer. So I was.

Well, I was, I was very prepared to do. And then this thing called a pandemic came along. It was really annoying. I can't wait to. You can hold me to that. As you know, I'm always there, first of the bar, last to leave it, like all you treasury fellas. That's what I love. So that's bought. Ready for you. So. So talk us through.

I probably, probably spent a little bit longer in consulting than I really wanted to. There was a bit of inertia towards the end of my period, I'd say, with PwC and the kind of deciding what I wanted to do next. But I always say my first proper job was with Tesco, which was my next move after professional services, where I got talking to a friend and stood that there were some roles available at Tesco, roles in treasury where I could explore further the career of treasury and get the education and the training. So I moved across to Tesco pretty much without hesitation. But at the time, we then CFO Andy Higginson had a bit of a thing about newcomers to the business, especially in finance, going through internal audit for a small period of time. And actually it was surprisingly fun. So I kind of did my first 12, 13 months at Tesco in internal audit, being sent around the group, looking at the way various financial risks and operational risks were managed. As I said, that was surprisingly interesting and good fun and it also helped me build very robust network within Tesco, which Then set me up for my career in Treasury. Tesco, which again was very much international.

Focused with that did it gave you that view. And then again as people will realize that you sort of then went into treasury in the UK but then went to Asia. So talk us through how treasury at the time works and what I mean by that is how did you navigate your way and what were you learning there?

I'd obviously say probably treasury at Tesco was probably one of the bigger teams that I'd been involved with. There were clearly the UK business on its own was a very, very big business, sophisticated and lots of risk to get your head around and to manage, but equally on the international side of things, especially in Asia were pretty significant. I jumped at the chance when offered to move myself across to Asia with my wife and that was pre kids. So very, very helpful to spend about two and a half, three years in Asia, based in Bangkok, looking after the Asian businesses from a Treasury perspective. Now some of those businesses in their own right were very, very large, sophisticated business. Tesco Korea, Tesco Thailand. And there was always lots going on. Great move for me personally and probably one of the best things I've done in my career so far in treasury terms.

I spoke to Peter Jones many years ago and he explained to me about how totally different way business operates over there versus a lot of other places. And I've been over there with more into Singapore and some of the other places there. But what was it in treasury terms? What was the level of sophistication, if you like, or you know, treasury was developing at the time something. What was it like?

I think for me that Tesco was one of those places where the UK centre exerted a disproportionate amount of control, command and control. And often what you'd find in many of Tesco's international businesses were expats who were there not just to help grow the business, but also coach and mentor local employees and partners, bring some of that kind of group expertise to bear locally. And I guess in many ways it was no different for me when I was out in Asia, I was working with obviously still part of, still very much part of group, but building a relationship between group and the local teams and the local sds. And a big part of my role was again working with those different cultures and coaching, mentoring. In terms of treasury, you know, a lot of them were more mainstream finance type people than specialized treasurers. So to a certain extent, you know, helping them with the technical stuff, helping them with the treasury knowledge and education was Was, was a big part of.

The job and so you did that role for a number of years. Great experience out there and then you headed back to the uk. Talk us through coming back to the uk and then you made some really interesting moves with Thomas Cook, William Hill and then your most recent role. So give us a walkthrough. I'll interrupt as we go along.

Yeah, sure. So I came back to the UK and I think probably like a lot of expats, you know, came back and felt sat there at the mothership thinking things were a bit different now, feeling a little bit deflated, but of kind of missing the things that I'd really enjoyed in my, in my years out in Asia. And I did land a very good role when I came back. It was sort of a operational stroke commercial role with a focus on payments and banking from, from a Tesco Group perspective. Really enjoyed that and did some really interesting projects around customer payments and interchange as relates to customer card payments with Visa and MasterCard et cetera. So that was helpful. But then I think probably after about 12 months or so of doing that, I was chomping at the bit, a little bit. Went to have a conversation with Thomas Cook who I know had been through a fair challenging time at that point quite recently and even a few years before that were pretty much on a cliff edge as regards the business. Spoke to a guy called Joe o' Neill. I had a couple of interviews with various people at Thomas Cod. Seemed like a very exciting challenge remit to effectively rebuild the UK treasury team which was headquartered in Peterborough. So I ended up kind of spending two days in the PLC off in London and three days in Peterborough doing the daily commute. Worked with chap who you've had on the podcast previously, guy called Chris Corner. So both kind of group deputy treasurers but my, my remit was. Was to look after the UK and Ireland which obviously, you know, was, was a fairly big segment within the Tomsco Group at the time.

What were the treasury challenges? Because at the time you alluded to it a little bit there and you know, I don't want to go into confidential company info but travel business, as you say, it was always been through some very challenging times with the foibles of the market, if you like. What was it like for you in Treasury?

Yeah, I'd say tough, I'd say really tough because you know, the business was still at that point where things and liquidity were major concerns. It was very much knife edge type stuff. Was it going to succeed? Wasn't it going to succeed, Was it able to change its business model quickly enough to get it to where it needed to be? Could it actually eke out cash and use that cash to invest in its proposition? Yeah, I'll be honest, it was a tough time at Thomas Cook. We did some good stuff, we built some good stuff, but ultimately it came down to the business not being able to evolve quickly enough and get its offer right for it to stay in business effectively. We did a lot of financial engineering in Treasury. Some of it was not what you'd want to do typically in a well performing treasury team or function, but it was kind of a needs must all hands to the pump type of scenario. And I think after a while it became clear that business wasn't able to turn itself around quickly enough and these sticking plaster type solutions were soon ripped off and the business was exposed from that point onwards. So it was tough. I look back on some things I did at Thomas K and think, yeah, that was good, that was great. But yeah, a tough environment.

And we talked actually quite extensively, as you say, with Chris Corner about that and what I'll do in the show notes for people listening today, I'll put a link to that show as well because Chris went through very similar times and different, you know, different angles but not dissimilar and he described it very well. We'll put that in the show notes so that people can connect to that. Just looking at yourself because we then come on to William Hill but you've been in again for some of the internationalists. Tesco's are a big retail chain grocery and although changed a few times, you know where Tesco bank and then no, we're not going to be a Tesco, we're going to be actually a superstore and everything else and retail and things. Thomas Cook obviously holiday business and so you've moved through those and then William Hill, you know, so you've made some interesting choices in a positive sense for of industry. Talk us through that next move and how you've seen some of those transitions, if you like.

Yeah, sure. So again, one of my personal mottos or mantras is that every day is a school day and it's a bit of a trite saying but you know, for me it's what keeps me going, it ticks the boxes. So I do like to move from sector to sector, just find it a bit more interesting in terms of getting my head around how that sector works, how the company works, the economics of the sector. It's just, it's just far more Interesting than going from same sector to same sector. And gaming and gambling certainly was interesting. It was another rebuild job effectively to rebuild the group team from ground up. Really everything was manual on spreadsheets separate from the group, group corporate office, selective focus on engagement on issues and business units, et cetera. So it was a great time at William Hill. Did some really interesting things, again, some really good stuff. But also the challenge there was in a sector that's legitimate and completely legal in many countries around the world, the issues and the relationship challenges that you have with your banks and your capital providers and other financial partners just takes up a lot of time, absorbed a lot of my time. The kyc. I mean I know as treasurers do moan about, about things like KYC and bank documentation, but you know, in that particular sector it's just off the chart. It really is. And it's incredibly frustrating because you often don't have the capacity or the team resource to deal with it in a timely fashion. You know, you've got to get it done. And the banks because of the sector will go into immense detail about different aspects of the business and the industry and the way that example we due diligence our customers and KYC and how we comply with regulation. But it does, it does absorb an awful lot, lot of time. But as I said, great challenges at William Hill. Interesting perspective on things, some interesting treasury challenges as well.

Let's dig into those treasury challenges because we've talked about this before. So you're having to deal with that not increased workload but that different kind of work pressure. That's probably a good way. But then be this effective treasurer. What, what sort of were the treasury challenges that you were facing and having to implement and go through?

Well, the biggest thing for me was building the team. Right, so, so building the right team for the roadmap and the strategy we put in place treasury at William Hill and that was the big foundational enabler I think for us. And that's what helped us get getting the team in place, doing it quickly, getting the right people with the right blend of expertise and experience. And again, not necessarily sector specialists, but you know, just treasury specialists with an open mind and the right attitudes to help us get where we wanted to get. And it's like, you know, just get them on board. They're great people, some of them I've known previously from other companies, etc. And just let them get on with things. And that helps, that really does help. And I think sometimes the banks are a little bit out of control with the way they do KYCs, different angles and different ways to look at things. And often you end up answering the same question but with different ways of doing that to satisfy individual banks. But we had a very clear roadmap after only, you know, being at William Hill for a couple of months. That was the roadmap I presented to the CFO and then to the board and we delivered against that roadmap and agenda and we got stuff done. Then Covid happened and then Caesars came in and bought the William Hill Group and only really wanted us business. There was a lot done in that two and a half, three years I was at William Hill.

And with that initial roadmap, I had one of my previous, not a guest, actually, one of my listeners who said he'd been going back through a lot of our shows because it's a question I often ask about how do you walk in the door? What is your roadmap? What you know, what do you start with your checklist, if you like as well. And he was going back through and we've talked about. He said you should do a book about this or at least do we going to be putting together an e book with some of the lessons from some of the treasury professionals we've learned. But when you walked into that. I want to go on to Doc Marty's in a minute. But when you walked into William Hill, what was it like? Tell us about that roadmap. Explain, you know, just in words, if you would. What? Right. The end destination is cash here or risk here, or what's your checklist or what's your. What does the roadmap actually look like?

For me, I guess the starting point really is going into the business and just listening to the people in the business. What's wrong? What could be improved? What are we not doing that we should be doing, you know, what we're doing that could be improved. And that wasn't just within the treasury of finance team. That was believe every, every good treasury team should be visible outside of finance. Right. So it should be not part of finance, but part of the company, the business. And I was very much in listening mode for two weeks. I barely said much, if I'm really honest. I just sat with people, I spoke to people about their challenges, their issues and I just listened and took notes and documented and that was the starting point for me. And then I dropped cfo, a couple of informal emails at the end of those two with some initial observations and then I spent another couple of weeks hearing out the rest of the business and digging into some, some kind of high level stuff and then I produced the plan for the next 30 days. So I went to the CFO and formally presented this, said this is what I'm going to do now for the next 30 days. Tell me if you disagree, but I'm just going to crack on if you don't, if you don't disagree. And that, that was all about them putting in place a bit of a strategy. It might sound a bit of a grand word when you think about the size of most treasury teams and what we do. It's often clearly defined but there was a strategy there, there's a strategy you should be able to articulate to your stakeholders in the business. So I use that, as I said that initial that extra two week period to decide where I wanted to go with the roadmap and effectively we laid out a 24 month roadmap for the business in terms of where treasury wanted to get. So, you know, it's the usual kind of buzzwords around a modern digital treasury operating as a center of excellence based in HQ in London but there to support every of the group. Right. So products and services, risk management, it's all centralized with the right people, the right experts, expertise and the right experience providing those services and products to group. Regardless of where you were located or regardless of how you felt about the group functions and group finance in particular, we were there to help and support everybody. So the roadmap itself didn't take that long to come up with. Right. But it gave us that was the plan and luckily nothing set in stone. So we were always happy to go back and reprioritize things or add new initiatives to the roadmap. As we found out more about the business and the challenges and risks, I think it went down pretty well in the business. It gave everybody a clear view of where treasury as a function was going.

And what was the complexity of treasury like before you arrived. And that's not to comment on your predecessors, it's more, you mentioned it there. The banks are coming to you, the treasury management system providers, some of them listen to the show as well. I want to do it anti that, not anti vet, but it's more. Where did you see the. Somebody I was talking to someone the other day and they said oh, we need a new treasury management system. And I was like oh right, so, well, because ours is 10 years old. Do they still exist? You know, and they said yeah, it's, it's actually worse than, than I thought. And I was like oh wow. And they said, well, we can't apply any updates for it because there's been so much customization. We basically need to reimplement it. In fact, what we're doing is we're going to start again. I was like blooming heck, just again, without company secrets. You block and tackle or you think about different things. How was it for when you got there? Because again, that will. Then that's what I want to move into. DMs and Doc Martens, how was it there when you arrived?

I think as I said, it was completely manual. Everything was on a spreadsheet. And the thing I didn't want to be rushed into in my initial weeks and months at William Hill was going out and getting the tms. And as you said, you get bombarded with emails and calls and invitations to speak about various TMS systems. I tend to be fairly cynical about TMS and the benefits in terms of what you get for what you pay. But I won't go into that. It's not the time or place. The key thing here is don't be rushed. Have a look at your environment and examine your environment very closely. It's for sure it's on the roadmap. But actually I'd question these days, given all of the available technology, whether a TMS will do absolutely everything for you that you need it to. And certainly some are more flexible than others and some are modular and some are in the cloud, etc. Right. So often what you don't want is spending the business or the way that treasury operates to the way that TMS operates. It's a tail wagging the dog. You want it the other way around? Absolutely. And I'm always, as I said, but slightly skeptical. I don't think we've cracked TMS yet across the profession in terms of this is what we pay for a system and this is what we end up getting and can it do this, can it do that? For example, cash flow forecasting in many TMS is pretty rudimentary. It's not always fantastic. But then there are some really good tools now on the market where they specialize in cash liquidity planning. It's part of your technology picture or stack within Treasury. All these to be considered in the round. As long as you get to a place where you're integrated, then you're going to be in a good place. But to say it's one size fits all with the TMS is probably not the right thing to say these days.

I think it is because you're the treasurer at the End of the day. And that's you're calling the shots and things. Right, so let's then step into this most recent role. And I joked with Mark before the show that Doc Martens one product company and I said, well, I'm going to pose this question to you for you to sort of knock it out the park and explain exactly who Doc Martens are or as you said, DM's internal pilots. Maybe go through that and then why you've joined this question group. Over to you, sir.

I suppose it's a multiple part answer. I guess I like to work for companies or brands that are tangible. You know, you can touch the feelings. Clearly a lot of people have shopped at Tesco, but previously people have taken package holidays. Thomas Cook, William Hill had the odd flutter on the grand national or a football accumulator every other weekend. And then the Same really for Dr. Martens. I had a pair when I was a teenager. They last forever. And I'll always remember that pair of boots I had. And it's a great brand. It's, it's a very, it's an iconic brand. It's gone under the RA radar somewhat, I'd say some of the last 10 years. There's so much there. I mean, there isn't much in terms of product range, I guess you'd say there's a fairly self contained product range and that's very much deliberate. There's a huge amount of headroom in our key markets. You and some of your listeners will be surprised about what some of those key markets are for Dr. Martins, but there is immense headroom still in those markets and we never felt that expanding the product range necessarily, especially at this point in time, was the right thing to do. When you've got so much to go out with your core product. It's based in Camden, which for me is the new work destination. It's quite an edgy feel to Camden still. It's not the city, it's not the West End, which is what I'm used to. It's retained that edgy feel to it. And it's also incredibly diverse as a company, especially compared to my last company. It is so diverse. I'm amazed at the diversity at Dr. Martins. And again, it's a bit like the way I recruit teams. You know, I like people from different backgrounds with different ideas. Dr. Martins feels the same about the way it recruits people. Different backgrounds, different diverse people bring different ideas.

And Mark, you and I had spoken a few weeks ago prior to our rehearsal for the show. If you like, and things like that. And at the time you were in your previous role, but you had some views about we've been through the pandemic and working from home and flexible working, and you'd expressed to me that you felt that it was a temporary thing, everyone was going to come back in and everything else. Has that changed at all? Or do you think everyone post pandemic will, or what are your thoughts on it?

If you like, maybe this is the companies I worked at, but I think the watchword is flexibility and I think nobody's rushing back full time anytime soon. I saw an acronym, an interesting acronym, the other day, actually, for people who only come in either Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday, and it looks a bit like a swear word, but I guess what you don't want to get to is a place where people feel compelled to come into the office. Here at Dr. Martin's, Tuesday is our team day, so it means that everybody's in the office office on a Tuesday. And that at the moment is all I expect of the team. And it's a small team, but whereas I'm trying to do two to three days in the office in Camden and a couple of days at home where I can without distraction. Easier said than done when you've got two young kids. But I think that that is very much the word. It's flexibility. I think it's treating the issue sympathetically and empathetically. And Dr. Martens, I think he's no different to William Hill in that respect. Clearly William Hill, for me, still very much recent memory. And again, exactly the same approach there. Yeah, look, I mean, whether that changes again in 12 months time, who knows? It depends, I guess, on a few factors, not least the development of COVID itself. But I'm quite happy. I think people have demonstrated they can do their job basically from the home. Or a hybrid certainly works. I'm not a micromanager, so there's no way I'd want to be speaking, looking over people's shoulders anyway, 24, 7. So it works as a summary.

Yeah, and I think that's exactly right. It's not one size fits all as well. I think there's no template for it. It's like I'm recruiting ahead of a Treasury position in the Midlands and they know it's a difficult location, but they've said that be two days in the office. But that's not because you must be in the office and get there. It's two days in the office because there's a team of six treasury professionals who need coaching, mentoring, supporting and at differing levels. You've got some guys that are a bit more they don't necessarily need one to one input. They need someone to have a coffee with and talk about stuff and talk about improvements and and they can action those on the other days versus you and I have talked in the past, the different cultures and different companies and I think it's still an evolving thing. I think it'd be interesting to see where we're at in this time next year, don't you think?

Yeah, agreed Mike. I think it will be interesting to see this in 12 months. I guess deep down I also believe that those five days every week in the office are probably consigned to history. I think it's a done deal is my is my take on that. And I guess he would argue that over the years, certainly over the last decade, maybe that one day, the week where you work from home, as has often been the case for a lot of people in office jobs. It certainly was at my last company. Certainly seems to be the case here at Dr. Martens where typically the Friday tends to be the day where you work from home. But I think this has certainly compounded that transition, consigned it to the dustbin talk.

Maybe we've touched on it a lot. We're not that far from the end of the show but before I move to the closing comments, we'll put your LinkedIn details. Things where do you see treasury developing? You're in this new role as well and which is exciting for yourself but you've touched on the people aspects and things like that. A big proponent of, you know, doing study or things like that when you're recruiting. And again you've touched on that and I love it. We tend not to just do this although we are the treasury recruitment company. We try and avoid that on the podcast because there's nothing worse. I know I listen to a lot of podcasts when the people go on about their product or oh how does it relate? How does it so boring. So we don't. But you've touched on some of the recruitment aspects there about where you looked, the blended team and things like that maybe where do you see the future of treasury and team wise and things like that? What are your thoughts?

I think certainly taking advantage of automation and the opportunities that are out there. Technology APIs instead of things like swift messages and kind of host to host connections and all of those legacy type of interfaces. Really what's going to happen drive team size going forward. I don't think even in the biggest corporations or companies you probably won't have the big teams necessarily you may have had in the past. So if I think about my experience of that at Tesco, 25, 26 people in a group function, I think automation will, will help reduce the size of those teams. And it's not because it's about size of team necessarily, although I do find size of team doesn't necessarily correlate with performance or coverage of the treasury agenda. I think just think the automation piece and technology piece makes it a lot easier us to take a bit more of a reduced view of team sizes. And I think a lot of certainly people I worked with over the last few years and the people I've recruited recognize the importance of continuing to learn and doesn't just mean sitting down to do your act and everything else, it just means being open to the idea of learning. Every day is a school day, as I said before, whether you do something formal or whether you do it informally or whether you just do some bedtime reading or you read around your subject, whatever it even extends as far as knowing the business a bit better. So read the trading statements from back to front, front to back, read the annual report, et cetera, et cetera. So for me it's about automation and technology.

Great. I love that mini summary. If you like, we're coming to the end of today's show. We'll put your LinkedIn details in the show notes and a pre warning to people. As Mark put it, he said unless you've got a photo on your LinkedIn profile, he ain't connected because he doesn't think you exist. Because if you're not going to bother with LinkedIn and why should he? And I actually agree with that as well. I know that there is sometimes with visibility and people don't do it, but I think it's a good thing to look out for that. If someone's going to be committed LinkedIn, you've got to lean into it in some ways. But we'll put those details in the show notes. Mark and I said this before the show, but someone's listening today. They're coming through their career. What advice are you going to give them? They say, actually I'd love to have that advice. You know, maybe you're starting a professional services, moving this to be a treasurer. What pieces, golden nuggets would you like to give to those, the guys before they leave today?

I'd say look, just, just approach a career in treasury with an open mind. Don't be put off by people who tell you it's very technical, do financial, mathematics, you need a PhD, math. It's just, it isn't, you know, a lot of it's about oms, it's about attitude and it's about open mindedness. And then the other bit is you've got a desire or a passion to keep learning, then treasury is a great place to be. It changes so quickly sometimes. There's so much to go at. Part of the fun, I think I find with going to new companies, breaking down some of the internal myth around treasury practice. Some companies, treasury will sit in a corner and they'll be left to their own devices and it's all about smoking mirrors. But yeah, just be open minded.

Yeah, I love that. Yeah, just be open minded and open to the ideas. Great, great closing comments from there. Yes, I will be buying you this beer Mark soon, when. When we both are allowed in a pub together, hopefully without a mask because otherwise the beer will go everywhere. Well, amazing. Thank you, sir. We'll put your details in the show notes so people can connect to you. Look forward to seeing you soon, sir.

Thanks, Mike and take care.

All right. 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. 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 and be amazing. Just take, say 20 seconds, leave a quick review of my amazing guests and their great career career stories. We'd really appreciate it. Thanks very much and I can't wait to see you soon.