This is a podcast titled "The State of the US Treasury Recruitment Market with Craig Martin" recorded in November 2018. It features Mike Richards hosting a discussion with Craig Martin about the current US treasury recruitment market, career planning for treasury professionals, and the importance of professional legacy. The conversation also includes promotion of a global treasury salary survey and insights from a recent AFP conference.
Hello, it's Mike Richards here from the treasury recruitment company. I hope you're enjoying the treasury career corner. If you are great news, perhaps you give us a rating on itunes or wherever you consume your podcast content. This means that even more treasury professionals can benefit from finding out, or by finding out about how treasurers have achieved their career goals. The link to Rate our show will list at the bottom of our show notes. And please remember as well, the show itself is as much about you as it is about us. There are specific questions you want us to ask or there's feedback you want to give. Please drop me an email. My direct email is mikeresuryrecruitment.com inventibly enough. But anyway, that's enough from me. Let's get on with the show. Great. We're here at the AFP 2018 conference. What's the current state of the US treasury recruitment market?
Yeah, it's quite active, actually, as we were talking just the other day. Right. There's a lot of jobs that are out there available and. But there's a tight labor market. Right. So I think candidates need to, you know, pay attention. But also companies who are looking for candidates need to help sell themselves. Right. And tell their story about why somebody should go work for them. So it's a very active and competitive market in the US right now.
What sort of roles are you working on? Treasury analyst or group treasurer.
So we actually have currently two live searches going on for senior managers, one with Franklin Electric in Fort Wayne, Indiana. Both that and with senior manager Global treasury for Under Armour. Both of them have a focus on foreign exchange. As companies, as you know, are becoming more global and more global, they have foreign exchange exposure and so they need good FX people.
We did the speech earlier today. It was packed with 250 people. Any highlights from the speech you'd like to mention?
Yeah, I think the, you know, it's. Our talk was on investing in your treasury career. And I think the key was the very first, first bullet of, you know, you need a career plan and people don't do that. I think we talked about the fact that, you know, when you're working, you're not thinking about your career and when you're out of work, all you're thinking about is getting a job when you're in your job and where you need to be thinking about the next step and the next move and you need to look outside and you need to try to think about a career plan.
I hope you're enjoying this week's show. I just want to interrupt briefly to invite you to be part of what we know to be the best global treasury salary survey in the world. They're bold words, I know, but it's true. We're just approaching the 500 participant mark, so it's a survey of real value, but we still need your help. All you need to do to take part is visit. Treasurysalary.com takes about two minutes of your time from start to finish. And as a reward for taking part, you receive a free copy of our 200 page global treasury salary survey. It's a real practical use to you, whether you're a Treasury analyst in Chicago or a global treasurer in London. We give you the numbers you need. In the simplest terms, our survey helps you as a Treasury professional understand what you should be paid. We benchmark your treasury compensation in relation to your peers, both locally and globally. So when you are next asking your boss for that long overdue pay rise and you know you deserve one, well, you have the practical facts you need. Just visit treasurysalary.com and I look forward to sending you the next copy of the survey. That's enough from me. Let's get back to the show. You spoke earlier about why you feel you need to work on your professional legacy. Could you describe that for us?
Yeah, I do. And it's funny, you know, it was a year and a half ago at an event that I put on for AFP called the Corporate Churches Council Forum. And we had a person there who's an executive coach and a mentor, Corey Shanahan. She had a book out called Be it, mean It, Do It. But she talked about personal, brand and professional legacy and she did a workshop there and I was there with everybody else. It was a room full of treasurers and assistant treasurers and I was sitting at a table with everyone else and I was talking about my career and what I was like, what was my brand before I was at the afp and all the people there were saying, what are you? They didn't even know what I was talking about. They're like, right here, this room, this is you, this is your brand and this is your legacy. And six weeks later, I was no longer at the afp, but I knew my identity and I'm with the treasury recruitment company. It's exactly what it sounds like. And I'm still in treasury and I'm still following the financial markets and corporate treasury and finance and that's what I love to do. So that's. I think it's important you don't sit down when you're 25 years old and decide what your brand is. Right. But you should think about that as you go through your career because it is important.
What's your advice? If someone's thinking about making a move or not moving straight away, should they be talking to you now?
No, I think they should because one of besides trying to work with companies to fill positions and talk to potential candidates. Right. Mike, one of our roles and part of our job is to talk to those people who are out there who are currently in a job in a role. But what are they looking for? The question you just asked me, what's the market like? They should know that. So they should call us. We want to know who those people are out there as well because you never know when a good opportunity comes.
