The Importance of People and Systems in Treasury with Janko Hahn

Foreign. So, 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 Treasures about how they built their careers, where they are now, where they see both themselves and the treasury profession going to next. Now, in this week's show, I'm joined again by Jan Kohan, the head of treasury operations at Ortoneum in Wintertur. He can explain a bit more about the group, but they are a global leader in a acoustic and thermal management for vehicles. Basically. He can explain a lot about that, but actually headquartered in Switzerland and everything else now, you might not know this in 127 + episodes. We never had this happen before. We, Yanko and I, we've already done one episode and we got to the end and it hadn't recorded. And he has very kindly agreed to come back on the show. Hasn't held it against me or we'll see later on. And he's very kindly agreed to, yeah, go back through his background. We had some great points, we talked about it. Janko really believes in systemization, about education for people. So really deep dive into some of those topics. But as always, Janko, it's literally your story. Can you perhaps take us back to the beginning of your career and how you first discovered finance and then got into Treasury? So over to you, sir.

Yeah, many thanks, Mike. I'm happy to do so. Originally I studied economics in Augsburg, which is not so far away from Munich in Germany. Afterwards, I was looking indeed for a job in finance and it was more the classical areas. Controlling was something I had in mind. My wife, she's from the border to Switzerland. And so I said, okay, let's. Let's go there and see if we can find something. She said, I will never stay in a city like Munich. And I said, I will never leave a city like Munich. But obviously she was, she was winning, right?

She's in charge.

And then, yeah, already at this point of time, it looks like. Yeah, yeah. And then we moved to the border here to the, to the Lake Constance area. And I was indeed finding then a job offer at Timberland. Timberland, Switzerland. That was the Yellow Boot Company as a cash manager. And that was something where for me something new started. Because I honestly never heard during my studies of treasury, it was still a niche. And so, yeah, that was where everything started. And after some years of development in Timberland, I moved in on in 2010.

Mate. Yanko, before we move on again, for some of the listeners, they'll want to know they've heard Of Timberland. They've seen it as a chain maybe and things like that, retail and everything else. What was it like there? What was the sort of Treasury. So you started there in 2005 so crumbs. Yeah, sort of 15 years ago. What was the treasury set up there like? You know, was it. Was it quite system, was it quite advanced? What was the sort of the background with the team there?

Yeah, so it was. I mean Timberland was I have to say because it was acquired some years ago by a different company. It was a US headquartered company close to somewhere, Philadelphia area, Boston. It was indeed only an outpost. So I mean I learned all the basic topics from in and around treasury so that was good. It was a limited responsibility at some point of time and limited responsibility not in the meaning of level of things to be done or taken care of but you know the full corporate finance topics have been done. In the US we didn't have a tms. We worked on accel. These aspects brought some. Some limitations. So yeah, that was a very basic treasury setup I would say also decision to be made on cash flow hedging program which was interesting and very relevant we learned about but we didn't have rule based decisions at this point in time. It was more a feeling or a decision of the CFO to take the one or the other direction in the cash flow hedging program. So yeah, it was different for sure but very good to get started and to get the first insights into Treasury.

I understand it and obviously as you say it was a basic treasury set up. This Excel did that then give you when you were starting to look round at that stage, were you thinking know what? When I go to my next role I really want to embrace technology. And that's a key thing about you know, because I know that's a big thing for you and straight through processing and trying to automate a lot of things. Was that that where it was born or was that just a more fundamental thing for you?

No, that that the technology aspect really came more into the game when I was a few one or two years then with my. With our next company which was Autoneom and we had this decision about the ERP TMS project that was more when my technology, you know link started to important or not. But at this point of time it was an opportunity as my previous boss who hired me in 2005 left in 2008 and had a nice opportunity in the company then in 2010. And so that was the point of time when I had the chance to move on as a Treasury manager.

Okay, can you just explain for people, the group and things like that, what did the group do? I give a very brief outline, but over to you.

Yeah, absolutely. So, I mean, first of all, it was an interesting situation. I moved in 2010 to the company called Rieta. It's a Swiss traditional company company headquartered in Winterthur, not far away from Zurich. And at this point of time Automotive was one of the two divisions. One was Textile, one was Automotive. And a year later we had a separation, a spin off where the division Automotive became independent and stock listed at the Swiss Stock exchange as Autonom, which is the name of the company still today. So that was interesting. I started in a new role, but had an opportunity to see something really seldom I would say, something which does not occur so much a separation, a spin off of one, one of half of the company, so to say. And that was very interesting. You had to, you know, duplicate the treasury, rebuild it, rethink it and. Yeah, so Automotive was, was the sector and Autoneum today it's a, it's a globally active tier one automotive supplier. We are producing heat and noise insulation products for all big companies, you know, from Ford to BMW to Toyota, Honda, all those are customers and we are represented in more than 25 countries from South America to Asia.

And when you say about the duplication, just, sorry, just to step back onto that. A lot of times when there is a separation duplication they say, right, you must adopt different systems, you must, if we're on this treasury management system, you must have a different one. Was that the case or could you.

Just replicate at this point of time? The treasury system we had at Rieta was also very much outdated. It was a tms, it was from teacher native, but it was really time for something new. Nevertheless, at this point of time we just duplicated and replicated everything we had because we said anyway, we need to rethink the system we have. And that's what happened then in 2012. So the situation in 2010, 20, beginning of 2011 was really to work with the existing systems and then copy. And after the separation onwards we had then the chance to rethink, to redesign, to improve and to finally move to SAP as our new system landscape, so to say.

And how come you chose SAP or drifted towards that? Because I know that, you know, SAP many years ago recruited for Colgate and they were one of the only people in Switzerland to have SAP as a Treasury system. And it was sort of quite challenging to get a lot of treasury stuff because it was more accounting focused. I know that seems to have changed in recent years. Was that the case with you guys? Or, you know, was there quite a lot of customization, tailoring or how did you get on with it?

Mm. So the initial start for this was that the board of directors of Autoneum decided that we need to do a process re engineering project. What does it mean? We produce in many countries the same parts, the same products, the same things, but we did everything in different ways. Spain did different tasks, processes than France and China did it differently than Spain and that was very inefficient. And automotive is a high cost pressure industry, as you know. And so that was something where we needed to improve. And SAP, that was chosen as the instrument to make this happen. Standardization by going for a new erp. At this point of time we had started to evaluate a new TMS. We had a look at, you know, Berlin and IT2 and whatever you have in the market. And we came then to the conclusion that having this SAP as erp, then it makes absolutely sense to also move to SAP as tms, because if every legal unit is on the same system and on the same system version, then you have a lot of benefits of integration and you don't need to think in interfaces that much. We have all data accessible, you can drill down and so on and so on. So to cut it short, that was the point of time when we had to move also to SAP here. I just can say at this point of time it was already more a Treasury system already from my point of view, which is why we have chosen it. Of course, graphically, user friendliness is different. That's of course a big advantage of these standalone tools. Nevertheless, if you're a bit flexible and you say, okay, I create some nice reports, then an BI tool or so, then it's really, it's really good. And anyway, it's a really good tool. Right. But it's in the way of handling or user friendliness in graphical layouts, design reports. That's of course something where you would need to invest heavily if you want something here. But if you can live very much with standards, that's absolutely doable with not a too high investment, I would say.

And you've talked a lot, I know that, you know, we meet a lot of the time at different conferences and various other things. And one of the things that you really, you really, really push forward with is this centralized concept and everything else and, and it works for you guys. Again, from the listeners today, if they're listening in and thinking, oh, actually that sounds like something we should do. What sort of what way would you tell them to approach it? What would be on your checklist or what was on your checklist that you think you need to repeat as it were.

Perfect. So phase one was really to see what we have as requirements and that was what we had in the system so far. The usual aspects, modules, cash management, hedging, risk analyzers and so on. So the collection of modules we would like to have was pretty easy. What we did in advance and that was a good decision was we also licensed the in house cache module, which we already knew at this point of time can only be a stage two or stage three, having an in house cash solution in place. And for sure, at this point of time, 2012, we have been far away from this. So we did an analysis. What does the tool need to have? Where do we see the must haves on the list? We did a kind of an, you know, if Q before with other tools and then we just said, okay, let's discuss now more in detail when the decision was done with SAP, how we can map it best. I think one key success factor was to find the right implementation partner. So this is something everyone thinking about ERP TMS implementation is to have a good implementation partner. And we have been lucky. There's a big market in SAP. There are many bright guys of course, but there are also many perhaps parties which are not really so successful or advanced in knowledge. And we found luckily a very good one. So looking for the requirements, make sure you have everything covered and then look for a good implementation partner and make sure you have the right persons informed the stakeholders internally so that you get the support for your treasury rollouts as you need.

How did you health check that partner? What I mean by that is I was given the chance and I spoke at Euro Finance a number of years ago and we were talking about the elements of effective team management and positive things. And I'm usually the opposite end, I see people ineffectively managing teams. I spoke to Jean Philippe de Wenner at Johnson Controls and I got some great ideas from him. And one of the key ones was just as you've talked about, there was having an implementation partner, but also with systems as well was about, we talked about reference, you know, if you reference a new member of staff, you deep dive into their background, you find out everything about them with a Treasury system or with a someone bringing in, you know, you just go, yeah, that's great. Or you know, how did you health check them again this is to give some tips to the people listening today. They go, oh hang on, we've got that coming up. I wonder what Janko did. And again it's a tip sheet for those guys because that's what I want to make sure that you're giving amazing value. So how did you sort of make sure they were the right ones?

Yeah, very important for us was to ask him, the partner for references and for known references in Switzerland or Germany and we spoke to a few of them and that gave us most part of the confidence. And then of course we sat together and asked a bit more detailed. How do you approach such a process or such a project of implementation? What are your key focus areas? Where do you see your limitations are aspects you can't do. The openness coming from these, from this team, the honest communication or where you where you heard not only nice marketing stuff but also additional insights, additional comments out of the normal box. I would say that was giving me then the sufficient confidence where I said okay, let's try to push through this partner for the implementation.

And then we just talked about the two stage journey. Then moving on to stage two. What was it like after then?

Yeah, that was then. The last few years rolling out the ERP and with this we did our treasury part around the globe. So in January we have the last go live, then our project is finished from ERP side and from treasury side. In this project, phase two I would say we focused on standardization, harmonization of payment processes. We implemented a payment factory with the Service Bureau, Swift and Ebix Service Bureau. And so we went for, you know, reducing of banks, focusing on core banks, standardization, the payment format. So everything today is already xml. We don't have US formats or such stuff anymore. End to end integration for payments statements, payment confirmations, I would say that was biggest part over the last years.

You're not just a technical guy, you are very strong in your technical stuff and everything else but you've got this, you know, you've got a team and you work with very well with people and everything else. Talk us through if you would. You know the team and you know what you're like as a boss and things that obviously going to say you're brilliant boss, we know this. But joking aside, you know what sort of your, what's your philosophy as it were.

Yep. So the team at Autoneum, that's now 2.4 FTEs, that's not much. But because we only have 0.4 FTEs more than we had in 2010, so to say when I started and the company was a lot growing since then and is much different company and much more active in difficult markets like Mexico or so in China than it was 10 years ago. I would say indeed we have a good team, it's a good cooperation and I think the most important success factor perhaps was this more to say. I'm not sure if laissez faire is the right word, but perhaps it fits that you say, you know, you realize that you have a good atmosphere, you have trust. When you have trust, you can say, okay, let's design the targets for the coming year or the coming years together, make sure of course, the CFO supports them and then, you know, let people go, give direction and to the target and then let them go. And if they feel the trust and the confidence and the freedom to work in their own directions, in their own speed, on own priorities, then I would say these aspects are a big factor for success. So giving them freedom to act independently, showing them perhaps the targets or the way, but then let them go and get the things done in their style.

I want to come back to the people aspects in a minute because I think that's very interesting and we'll talk about education because I know that's a big passion of yours and qualifications and getting people up the scale, as it were. But just before we do that, I wanted to pick up on something you mentioned there. Obviously you then systems, you roll out globally, you've got more challenging, you know, you're a very globally focused group despite, as you say, having a small, small team and things. How have you dealt with, you know, the challenges of, you know, different markets because you, you deal on a global basis. So you've got Asia Pacific, you've got South Americas, you've got things like that. What's that like? If you would.

Luckily, this is an easy point. When I joined the company in 2010, so to say, we had the big crisis from 070809 behind us. That was also true for the division Automotive, which was now Autoneum. Everyone in the organization or in the finance organization knew already at this point of time that a good relationship with treasury is important and that treasury needs to understand the needs of the legal units and that the treasury is cooperative and supportive if communication is honest and transparent and clear about needs, reasons and requirements for special needs. And I just can say that since then we never had perhaps one or two exceptions. I mean, it's always not only. It's not only targets or topics or money, it's also atmosphere and chemistry. And of course, you have always cases where. Where chemistry is just not working. So I can say that in 95% of the cases where we have our stakeholders in the finance teams, in the legal units, it's working very good. They understand us, we support them, they know they get the cash from us, we know they are precise with the outlooks as far as they can. They are precise and honest with the requirements, with the reasoning. And, yeah, it's a good atmosphere, it's a good cooperation in finance.

I can say, brilliant, great answer, as it were. We just. Let's go into that people aspect again. Quite weird for me, because this is like. It's like I'm sitting here thinking, I've already asked you this question. I haven't. I have asked you before. We've. We've already gone through. It's a great rehearsal, doing a full podcast and then you very kindly agreeing to be on a second one. I'm like, yeah, I've asked Janko this. Hang on. But, you know, let's deep dive on that, on the people aspect, because you're passionate about that and also about coaching people and learning. Could you explain how you've, you know, taken that to the next level, really, with, you know, the qualification and some of the other bits? Because I thought that was really interesting for us to discuss.

Yeah, yeah. So I think one very important aspect, just because it's important for me, and I think it's the same importance for the team, is to make sure they have the education they need. It means you shouldn't stop at the cash management education level if you are in a Treasury manager role or whatever the title is. I mean, that's the relevant point. But you need to make sure they have the information, the knowledge, the capabilities they need to be not just making their job, but to thinking ahead, thinking outside the box, doing the next step, coming with new ideas, coming with better ideas. And so education, I think, or, you know, it could be participation in conferences, because I think this is very important to network and to exchange with peers and other aspects is in the trainings. And what I realized together around four or five years ago with a colleague who was. Who's also a treasurer, was that we are missing, we, the two of us, we are missing education in the area of tax or legal aspects in treasury and around treasury, like transfer pricing aspects, company law and such as. And I think that. So fascinating about Treasury. Treasury is not an island. You have to do with everything. You need to know a bit about tax, you need to know a bit about Legal, you need to know a bit about controlling and so on and so on. So treasurer is not only a treasurer, he's really having multiple aspects in the, in the capabilities or that's a requirement to have. And so we went to the EFZ in Zug, that's part of the Horseshule Lucerne here in Switzerland and told them that we said, hey, you are doing the education as a Swiss certified treasurer, like you have to VDT in Germany doing something like this or, or you have now you have Schwabe like Reiner doing treasury educations. And so we said why don't you do a shorter course at lower budget with more specific qualifications in regards to treasury and to tax and legal aspects around Treasury. And then they liked this idea and after some discussions a half year later, so it was really decided that they want to do this. And so this year, actually just some days ago, the fourth course, four years, we had this course now with between 12 and I think 18 participants or so was, was completed successfully again. And I think that's, that's a nice track record because they also say, well, not every practice course we offer is always taking place because there are not sufficient registrations, you know, to make it happen. And now this course was successful for four years. So obviously we had around, I don't know, between 50 and 60 or so or 70 participants who enjoy to develop new facilities and aspects and insight, so to say about different aspects of and around treasury. And I think that's great.

You know, and how long does the course, you know, you talked about transfer pricing coming, specific areas, how long does the course take? And you know, is it over a number of months or is it short, sharp or what's the background to it?

Yeah, it is mainly a course which takes. Could be, could be done in three, four days. I think we did it of course digital this year split among time horizon of three or four weeks and taken then a full day, you know, having speakers from EY or kpmg, having lawyers speaking, having tax aspects speaking and also some, you know, best practice sessions where then, you know, we had some companies telling about their transfer pricing system for cash pooling. This year I was talking about API technology and how it could benefit at Autoneum so that you also have treasury aspects which coming no more into the game. Digital digitalization, not only tax illegal but also what's next in treasury sort of.

Yeah, before we do the what's next in treasury because that's something it's good lead in. But just you talk there about and this is, it's fabulous because what you're doing is, as you mentioned there, you're wanting to get closer to the business. You don't want to treasury to be an island. And I've got to say, when I first started in treasury, treasury became ivory towered. You know, that was a key thing. A lot of treasurers were like, oh, great, if I'm this specialist area, this is great. I can get a pay rise and I can be this specialist treasury person. The con of that, that was the pro. You got more money and everything else. The con was you were separate from the business and actually didn't get involved. And I think I've seen Treasury kicking and screaming for the past 20 years to get back to that bit where, you know, wants to be involved in the business. And it sounds like this qualification is certainly a part of that. How else do you make sure that you're really close to your business or is that just part of the ordinary and way sort of thing or, you know, is that right?

And that's something I always, for me, 10 years, I mean, 10 years, 15 years now, for me it was always like that. In treasury you are automatically involved in things going on in the business. New legal units founded in new countries, new markets opened, potentially acquisitions taking place. Treasury is always involved because you need to think about money or forecast or liquidity or banks or relationships or treasury systems or ERP systems which then has some linkage to Treasury. So now I think we have in treasury, you are not so far away from the business if treasury has the right place in the organization. Nevertheless, of course, even for me, I mean, when I go to our showroom, I know what to say about the showroom to the people coming from the banks or so. But on the other hand, side, if I'm able to join a session where again, our product specialists talk about the products, I always say, oh gosh, I didn't even know. So, yeah, it's. Staying close to the business is not so easy. That's, that's true. And I realize sometimes how far we are still away from, from operations, which is why whenever we have, you know, something to do in a certain legal unit visiting us, visiting China or Spain or uk, I always insist on also having the chance to do a plan tour and to learn more about our situation in this, in this country and how production is done, you know, you.

Get to know it as well. Yeah, yeah, we're talking about the future. I want to split this in two actually. I think, you know, because I'd like to cover a bit of the fintech and you know that's obviously a big thing that you're very much involved in. But you also mentioned there about with a here within treasury of networking virtual versus the real world. I wanted to come back into that. But if we just look at the future of where you see treasury and whether maybe that is the fintech world, we just explore that briefly. What are you seeing coming down the line? Because a lot of treasurers they used as the front man by the CFO say look, can you go and do that yank, can you check that out for me? Is that what you're finding or what are the things that finding coming at you and on email every day.

So for us I think in at Autoneum to talk about a level three now you know we had level one and two. Level three for us is really to implement the in house bank module of SAP and go for a payment on behalf, collection on behalf landscape to further, you know, reduce bank relationships, bank accounts, standardize more, automate more that in regards to the near term future so to say. But of course there are new technologies getting more and more important and that's for me a bit too. Treasury is small, it's a niche. Then of course you have always budget constraints and you, you know, doing a big rollout of S4HANA now the new SAP technology that will take some while. We have cost pressure here, we can't do it immediately. And so I always try to see, to ask my questions, to ask me and the team, what can we do better? What is not going good in treasury at Autoneom, what can we change? What can we improve? Where do we lose time? And the answers to this then are driving where we should go perhaps in future and or digitalization or innovations like APIs, open banking cooperation with fintechs. These are then indeed aspects which might help in the one company, not in the other one, which might help in the one aspect of treasury, perhaps not in the other one. But there are for sure some a lot of potentials and at least I think with asking the question what is not going good? What should we do different or better leads to the question how can we do it better? And then you are at the point of time where you look out for new solutions, new technologies to support.

I'm just, I was looking around making sure we weren't on webcam then because I've actually just written here straight through processing open banking, the future of that. And you, you were stealing my ideas. Hang on, I was coming back.

Yeah.

But, but on that where do you then see because this brave new world, this future of banking or financial systems and landscape, it's obviously changing massively. And, and you know banking 15 years ago was one thing, you know, it was all about relationships and the bank would take this over. Da da da. Is it seeing that you've got access to the open banking tools that you guys will utilize them much more to reduce your reliance on the banks and things like that? Is that the way it's going or using them as your partners? What are you finding? What's your thoughts?

Yeah, I think if we talk about, take an example like the APIs. With APIs you have just faster access to instant real time data. For us that is something which our current ERP or TMS cannot handle in the way we have it installed now. The future might, but so I'm using, looking for solutions to build small, in a small way around my big oil tanker SAP, which gives me in the short term, short term some additional insights in the company, in the numbers in financials and so on. So these are some aspects where I just see near term benefits. I still see the cooperation with our banks very important. We are on a net debt position and that's typical for automotive, I would say automotive supply. So no surprise. And so the good cooperation with the bank is still important. But perhaps access to data might be easier and faster if you can use technologies like, like open banking and APIs. And in regards getting having less need of banks. Well, interesting is there's there are some fintechs and one of the fintechs we are talking today are thinking about peer to peer lending and peer to peer corporate to corporate lending is something which you know was always in discussions before, it's not that new. But the company now obviously is closer to develop a certain solution which might work because today you know, we have the board of directors where we have two anchor shareholders and they are having also a big stake in a different company here, not far away from us. Nevertheless, if, if I would ask him to lend me $50 million for two years he would say Yanko, no, that I can't do. And so the future might be that we perhaps can open additional sources of funding with having a working structure of peer to peer lending that of course could help us to a bit the dependency on banks and put more cost pressure on the banks, improve pricing, but it wouldn't make banks obsolete.

From my point of view, no, I'm talking.

So that's something I hear from time to time, but I don't see this coming into the game.

I have the same with it. Will robots replace treasurers? No, of course they won't because they still need to be operated and everything else. You hear it as well, don't you?

Absolutely. And robotics, I mean just to follow this example from you is exactly in point where we say in treasury we had a look at where we can we do things more automated RPA way and so far we identified one topic where we can do, you know, some, some FX deals for one of our Winter two headquarter companies where you don't need to think, you just need to take the account balance. Is it delta? Is there a delta to zero? And then you buy or sell exactly the delta. So that's an easy one. But if we look for more cases, cases it's hard to find in treasury because you don't have monotonous, repetitive, non way of thinking tasks in treasury or not many.

Yeah.

And so I have say no robotics. There's a potential to support some of the functions or tasks in Treasury. There's no fear at all to say treasury might be replaced by robots. I fully agree to your statement.

Yeah. And actually we, I've done a short video on this as well and we'll put that in the show notes where I say, you know, will robots replace treasurers? And then I explain why it won't because I've taken advice from great treasurers like yourself who have reiterated what I knew anyway. But it's about leveraging technology, not replacing.

Yes, absolutely. Leveraging technology to create additional benefits for your Treasury. And as mentioned, perhaps we see some potential to reduce some time we spend on monotonous work work. But then we can finally use this time to think ahead, think outside the box again and say, hey, we need to, we need to do this or we need to do that to make treasury more professional and more beneficial for the cfo.

And let's just, just before we wrap up today's show and we'll do the usual bit where we ask you your top tips for people and we'll put in the LinkedIn detail in the show notes, but we're not quite there yet. What I wanted to ask you before that is about people. You know, you're very people oriented. You know, we've met a number of times and you know, over, you know, a couple of drinks and a couple of beers have been imbibed you is a good thing when you're in the people aspect, when you're networking, but also when you're looking at, you know, People for yourselves and stuff like that. You know, you mentioned about the networking and this year, 2020 has been the year of virtual networking. Yeah, it's boring. We want to actually meet each other. We want to shake each other's hand and then use some sanitizer if they force us to and things like that. But, you know, what do you benefits? Because I know you're a big networker, you like to, you know, get involved with lots of different people. What do you get from that, would you say?

That's also when you hire people, when you look for people. It's not so much the qualifications at this point of time. So SAP is not a must, of course, it's nice to have. But more important is that they have a team player you're looking for. And the people need to have us and a team and not a me way of thinking. It's the personality which needs to fit. And that's what I mentioned before with the chemistry, you know, with almost all of our CFOs in illegal units, it's an easy way to work, to speak to, to chat with. You know, it's like you hit. You have spoken to the other one just yesterday, but it was five months ago. Such an atmosphere is nice. And if people are looking for, you know, the goal of the team and of the group to improve and not individual, individual players, just thinking about the own success. So I think that's key. And yeah, of course, networking, I think for me is very important to, you know, also see what others are doing and permanently also to check what can I do better, you know, what can we do better and benefit from, from, from. From these exchanges with, with others.

And that's actually very reflective of. I'm trying to remember who it was. I'll try and look it up. One of our recent podcasts, I don't know if it's actually out there. One of the treasures I was talking to is very much we talked about having an us mindset, not a me mindset. Yeah, yeah, and that's exactly as you said. It's. It's more thinking around the problem, thinking as a group sort of thing, which I think is brilliant, actually. So we're approaching the end of today's show. It's. As I said before, I'm ever so grateful here. And you're agreeing. Another hour of his poor time wasted on me. But you lucky people, people get to see us again. Been an absolute superstar. But what, what, you know, we'll put your LinkedIn details in the show notes so people can Connect to you and you definitely should. He's a great person having your network. But what the tips would you give to people listening today? And sometimes we sort of give them in levels, you know, so you can be on that basis. So maybe the junior guys think about what they should do or mid level or senior guys listening war stories and things. What are the top things you would say for, you know, treasury going forward?

Yeah, I think there's one question always in the middle of a few questions around the same question. What can we do better? What's next? From which technology can we benefit? Where can we improve? Are we still doing it right? You know, it's, it's, it's just these questions where you permanently challenge yourself to make sure you don't have blind spots. I mean you always have blind spots, but that you realize your blind spots spots and try to improve and with this mindset to say, okay, I think good success, achieved something, I did something, but, but never stop there and always say, okay, what's next? What can we do now? Where do we see? Where is the cfo? Missing help? Where can we do better? Where can we be proactive? What questions are always coming to us and we always are taking a lot of time to answer them. These, these, these kind of mindset. And I think that's true for me. That was true for me when I was a cash manager. I think that's, that's core that you never see stop to be interested and keen on learning more and seeing more and trying to improve.

Great words. You know, as, as we say, sort of. And then looking to have a curious stroke future mindset. I think that's, that's the way I would summarize that. I think it's absolutely brilliant. So Janko, thank you for your time, sir. Very grateful and yeah, look forward to again in the real world next year. Hopefully actually seeing him once again and having that real thing, it'd be great.

Absolutely, yeah. Thanks for your time, Mike. And it felt like we had such a discussion just a few days.

It was. And very weird, but absolute superstar. Thank you for your time.

Thank you. Thank you, Mike. And yeah, all the best for everyone.

Thank you.

Thanks.