Treasury Career Corner LIVE Dublin 2024 - Treasurers from Tate&Lyle, Smurfitt Westrock & QatarEnergy

Now, I need you all to be here, both mind and body. Anyone got their phones on them? Fantastic. Put them away. How often do you get to see three amazing treasures? Sorry, Two amazing treasures and Paul. It's all right. Here's our all my pack. Don't worry. Three amazing treasurers and get some career advice from these guys. You don't. What you're going to get to see tonight are three amazing treasurers who are going to talk about their treasury careers, talk about how they've made their progression, how they've grown their treasury careers and where they see the future of Treasury. And as Tony Robbins says, success leaves clues. So listen in, ask some questions and actually take advantage of talking to these treasurers. You are going to get to see them in the bar afterwards, but share some of the knowledge. So a couple of people have asked me, who am I? Why am I Here are my Richards, as it says here, exceptionally large head on this. Oh, no, sorry, before I do that, we're going to thank our sponsors. There you go. Keep an order to State Street. Can you give your hands up, please? There's a lovely Jackie, she's gonna assault you with a notebook unless you take one. But then David will give you some lovely chocolate to take away the bruising. Chatham Financial. Where it leads us, love, is there. Sarah, These guys are buying the drinks later as well. Be nice to them, otherwise they won't buy your drink. Standard software. There you go. Some other back. Being lost in your own understanding is very posh English and tis. But we got you guys. Lovely. And Gert as well over there. Thank you very much to our sponsors. There you go. Who am I? Irish has run the treasury recruitment company. I recruit you guys, move you from one seat to another seat and then send out a bill. Been doing it for 25 years. I then thought, I love talking to treasurers, even Paul. And so. Oh, there's the rest of the team as well. So you've got Katie Hardy. Where are you? There you go, there's Katie. When you need a job, move. Later on, after a couple more drinks and whatever you said to your boss or colleague, call Katie. There you go. I started talking to treasurers 20 years ago and then I thought, I'm enjoying it so much, I'm going to record it. With their permission, of course. And it became a podcast. I thought maybe we'll do 10 episodes. We're now 330 later. I've spoken to treasurers across the world about exactly that, their treasury careers. And it's rather popular. 160,000 downloads, which is just incredible. 2 to 300 a week. And again, each and every week, I talk about how you treasurers have developed your careers. That then led to this live event where these lovely people share the stage with me and I ask about their careers. We go through it and these are some of the questions we're going to talk about. They get them to introduce themselves, talk about education and qualifications. Some of you want to know about that, but you also want to know about some keys to their success, what they've done, how have they made it, some of the decisions they made and everything else from that as well. We will then go to Q and A. We are then afterwards, we've got some great key takeaways and I know that there are really good takeaways, so we could probably get to takeaways a bit earlier this evening. So I think there's some really good advice for all of you here. So, first of all, I'm going to let everyone introduce themselves and talk about their careers. Got lovely. Erin Cole. Now, you have to be nice to Erin because she is slightly nervous. One of her first sessions. But we are going to start with your story about starting in Laundro. So over to you.

Thanks, Mike, and thanks for inviting me here. Pleasure to be. My name is Erin Cole. I'm group treasurer at Tate and Lyle. It's a food and beverage ingredients company headquartered in the UK. I'm 37 and I've worked in group treasury for 13 years. Not quite as tenured as some of the prior guests on this podcast. And it's the first time I've told my story in public, so getting easy on neat. So I was going to take a different approach and not start with my degree. And what happened when I left university. I'm going to go back to the primary school day.

I've never heard it before. It could be a long evening and we might have to warn the ferryman. Stay open late, but carry on.

I was 11 and my first experience meant the principal of the school, Mary Mitchell o' Connor, who many people in this room will remember as a former Irish government minister. She approached me to go on and win two scholarships to two very prestigious schools in Dublin when I was 11 and I had a big decision to choose Beat Kit. And Posh School was never really on the cards for me, but my parents supported me all the way, which I think is really where the seed of ambition was planted in me. And I just knew that that's all right, but.

Yeah, but that's the way you're developing but you also then told me about the story story in the laundrette that was one of the key ones that I loved that you said your first exposure she was an early foreign exchange.

Yes.

So when I thought back to my early days I actually had exposure to treasury so cash management and fx. My parents always instilled a strong work ethic in me so I worked since I was 14 and my first job was in the dry cleaners and I managed the dual transition from Irish funds to urines out of my little cash register so I had two sets of notes and coins and my little calculator on the side and that really was where my first entrance to treasury started and I had loads of jobs after that I worked making breakfast rolls in the local day the DIY store where I learned customer service how to mix paints, how to do adopted think which I think everyone should learn to say everyone should work in public fear when.

They'Re younger and then how did you discover treasury or where did it come.

From So I went to Trinity College I studied business and economics graduated in 2009 when everyone thinks back Ireland was not a very nice place to be.

Looking for a job.

The global financial crisis had really taken hold here and for business grads really the only options out there were I never wanted to be in the this is a long story I'll try and keep this healthy I was really lucky to secure a place on the advisory team at PwC they offered me the role and as quick as they offered it to me they took it back and paused it for a year they gave me cash compensation so I took that and I booked myself a one way flight to Bangkok and I had a great time in Zoke lstasia traveling around the world with my oysters just finished college didn't really know what I wanted to do well I don't that PWC road to fall back on fast forward 18 months and I'm back home I'd had my my daughter at 23, my little girl Ezra and I was solo parenting a little bit lost I'm trying to figure out the nemsta I knew it wasn't going to be the intense rally in PwC with coupled with ACA study at the weekends, in the evenings at the baby it just wasn't going to be practical especially on 24k a year I struggled for a few months thinking what I wanted to do and I came across corporate treasury postgrad in BCA and that really appealed to me it just seemed like a really Practical way to learn about funding in the debt, capital markets, advanced risk management, investment analysis. So I signed up for that and then by a stroke of luck, almost simultaneously I was offered an internship at Getty Images by Cara Killian, mentor and lifelong friend who Mike knows well. Yeah, I hired me at Getty and I was so lucky to help CAR I had the gold standard intro to Treasury. Getty was privately held at the time working under private equity. It was super fast paced. We went through two leveraged buyouts which meant billion dollar multi billion dollar debt raises. Cara gave me the keys the Bloomberg and Arvid you have the billion dollars of interest rate swaps and building models. She brought me to CFO to work outside in Jonathan Klein's office, San Jose when he was doing the earnings call out of New York. Yeah, I had an amazing experience, just couldn't have asked for more. But the time came where we'd set up the EMEA treasury in Dublin. Cara was then moved to New York to head up investor relations and I became the only finance person in the office and Cara gave me really good advice that the one thing she was missing on her cv. So looking back at that finger, I don't regret not taking PwC because I've immediately doubled my salary by not taking it. But actually that's a big gap for me not having no accounting qualification. So we knew then the next step was going to be for me to leave Getty. Eventually I did spend time with a famous Dublin treasury recruiter who shall be named nope. And just wanted to validate, you know, how should I navigate this? What's the best way to do it? And I figured out that I was going to go and do the ACA through industry on what they call the flexible route. I just needed a firm to take me in and do that. And a few months later he contacted me with a role at James Hardy Building Products. Seasoned finance professional, loads of chartered accountants in the office and it was the right environment for me to go in and get that experience. And then as well as that I had experience with final bonds and interest rate swaps and working at rating agencies. So that's what I wanted to take for them. And they were doing lots of really exciting things. So going to the high yield market for the first time. We syndicated Aussie bilateral debt into like a US Star revolver. Lots of interesting things like that. And then once all of that was locked down, there was loads of time for me to start moving a bit laterally and I ended up working on, you know, broad finance project as well as keeping my day job going as well. I went to California, worked on the HFN and consolidation tool implementation, went to Australia and New Zealand for a manufacturing project and one of my last projects there was spending a good bit of time on the finance integration for a big acquisition that they did in Germany. So leading the finance integration Roastery and that was amazing experience but it was very hard work.

Yeah. You. You got through that and you thought, you know some time out. Which you did. Yeah. Talk about that and then bring us up today with Tayona things.

Yeah. My time at Jingfear did a natural conclusion. I left. It was a bit of a risk because I left with my job to go to and I took time out, went back trapping around a lot of miracles. My daughter, she was eight at the time and we had the best friendship within 2019.

That's it done.

We went from May until she had to go to school in September. Such a good time. And I wouldn't have come home from. Left from Costa Rica. Wouldn't have come home when we first you had to go to school. Then we got to like November. I was still not back to work and there weren't many interesting opportunities coming from dubbing. I got a call from London recruiter and my brother had a spare room in London. So like this might be something to try and we're asking me like what's your day rate?

So day rate.

Never been asked that question in my life. But after I started at Tate as a day rate contractor working with Oli Wudette it was like tobacco filler and direct director role initially and within a couple of weeks which I took eventually and then was promoted pretty quickly from. I went from senior manager to director of treasury and corporate finance and then group treasurer since the start of last year.

So Tate and Ly can you just for the audience again what might know of or have an impression of that trading sugar and everything else. But they really changed the company. Haven't you so.

Well, we sold the sugar business in 2010.

Yeah.

So we're.

We are on transformation journey and I was actually quite lucky that I came in at the very start of the recent big transformation piece. So when I signed a contract to work there permanently I had an NDA put in front of me because those who are on the journey to. To look at Dynamics primary products business.

Yeah.

And that's the more commoditized business. Sell ingredients like high fructose corn syrup in the U.S. yeah. So we sold that. That all closed down first of April 2020. Two and we've now just announced an acquisition so we will hopefully be closing that in the next few months we're going to buy CP Calco from JM Huber so really exciting stuff going on just syndicated about $900 million of new debt and it be going into the USDP market to take that out as well.

Yeah so okay so we're going to move on to Paul now Paul I know has got a bit of a cough which he's been. Would you prefer to have the microphone or are you okay with that? Okay cool. So Paul, over to you Paul Hussey.

Thank you. If I fall ASleep apart it's two flights from D.O. to and from Dova and the NAS to come here today.

I just going.

To talk briefly about the career I have an important spread outside of but my background's central bank finance as a fund management for eight years I watched it then I went back into banking went into Croatia, back into the iing back so the journey effectively is it comes to understand I think if I hire people they have to have a banking fight now nothing Sarah Ste and love it to woods and Acock and it's also about the people I've worked with I'm not particularly clever, I'm not particularly good but what they do is the other thing and that's the most important thing look okay I've done over $100 billion it's bring down to people that we work with John Morton's not here tonight he's bringing treasure for me it's working treasury it's just a title it's actually understanding what we can do as a team what the team can do with me Peter Schader in Kinsamen we integrated Sigrade Salmon when I was in was it Tyco Peter? Yeah that was like 15, 18 years ago so it's working in partnership Pressure is simple. It's really simple. It's a bit cash we can make it a sexy and super details as we want but it's all about cash. At the last few years I've been working in this mic up in Sabic Aramco at the time the largest company in the world now they're kind of the largest LNG which is the company in the world but it's all about cash it's actually understanding where cash is the utilization of our cash if we do a bond issuance or even being penting difficult it's not difficult it's actually working as a team to understand she gets to think of in short for me working In Doha it's working with the people. The only reason I got to this level is because working with the students of this world, working with the Jones, working with the John Bortavist as well because we're as a team we succeed and as a team we fail and it's very fun. One of the guys wants to die this morning about treasury, what is Treasury? Is it true that you should find us console innovation but it's massively congruent and I think that's something I planned. I was in Clap the Ryan's the euro crisis in 1980, you know after 2008 when I was sitting in Dancer Mooney we've gone through the Ukraine war, sitting in Cataract Energy 2022 when everything Delta turrets but it's actually understanding the risk, the cash and the people that's behind it. So for me that's treachery.

Right, we get it. We'll also dive into these guys and their education as well and some other things, elements of how they develop their careers and we'll come back to some of those Eva, I'll pass across to you.

Sure. Hi, I'm Ingmar Murnan and I'm STB treasury in Smurfoot Westrock previously group treasurer of Smurfit Catholic Group.

We very recently did a large merger.

With one of our prevention to make us the biggest listed hacker pathogen company in the world. Now listed on the New York Stock Exchange their primary listing s and P500 eligible and also their standard listing in London. I think one thing that I had in common with I think the guys up in this stage and some people that we were chatting to earlier is I'd yet to meet a treasurer that didn't fall into treasury and I was one of those people and again came from a banking background. So when I left university a little bit before you Erin, so I'm not going to say when but jobs were not easy to come by in Ireland either. I remember saying to my mum the one thing I do not want to do is go into banking. That's the one thing I do not want to do. And then I spent probably the next 10 years in banking and I worked initially and this will age me with Bankers Trust when they move their back office over to the im. Then I worked in bank of Ireland for a while. I moved to London and worked with Montague Private Equity. They were HSBC Private Equity when I joined them and during that time I was doing my accounting exams. My qualification from university was European Studies from UL and then I did a grad dip in Applied economics and I have to say probably the most useful qualification for me and the one that got me into treasury was accounting because I to move back from London and I met. And especially if you were with Dansby, you probably knew the. Well, Paul Regan and Brendan Glynn in Smurfoot Kappa were the two people who interviewed me and I had come over and I'd done a couple of banking interviews and then I was meeting these guys in Smurfet and I really. I was sitting there thinking, what the hell am I doing here? I've never worked in a corporate. Should I just leave or is this going to be really embarrassing? But we got on really well and I think even Aaron talking about mentorship and everyone talking about teams, you learn so much when you work with people like that. Paul and Brendan were legends, I think in corporate treasury in Dublin, Paul was 30 years group treasurer. Brendan similarly is the assistant treasurer. They were such a great duo and indeed when I took over, what made my life very easy is I inherited a fantastic balance sheet from them. Balance sheet I'm inheriting now is a little bit more challenging, but at least I learned from the best in terms of how to work a balance sheet and how to create a good balance sheet. And I think that's really how I got into it from going to. I'm never working in banking. I think it must be terribly boring to doing a roundabout into Treasury. And I started off as a Treasury accountant with them and I did that for about seven years and then became the head of treasury accounting before then when Brendan retired and took over as assistant treasurer and then Paul retired, I took over as group treasurer and then luckily they decided on me for SVP treasury when we. We came together with Westrock.

So all three of you, as we go up on here, had exposure. You've got accounting there and you've done the same as well. And Paul, you've got. You then have teams as well. What advice? Because we've got a full mixed audience here. So we've got some who are thinking about studying or partway through. You're saying everyone needs to be an accountant. Does everyone need to go and do treasury exams or what are your thoughts on them? And it's changed and it's evolved since you guys. We'll start with Aaron and move across and then I'll actually pass the Batman when we go. Some other questions, but what are your thoughts? You've got a team. You've got teams. We were actually talking about this last week around Poland and where can they get education how do you coach them what are your thoughts I do think.

Education Trump's experience but it helps include employers they converting it into a CV it shows that you've got commitment and dedication but you're serious about the career I holding on east brand there yesterday I found if you're lost the answer's education if you're educated the answer's execution kind of you're executing the under and all that was really good because everyone wanted one right So I went back into Kendry exams because I fellow I didn't want to be forwarding going for going why didn't I just take the PW economist 23 and get it out of the way but that doesn't have.

To be yeah there's no one but also no one can take it away and that's one of the things when I've talked to employers as well and they're saying you know although they sometimes do get a bit stuck because they're saying we're encouraging this but I really like this person but they don't have the qualifications what do I do and I know that Paul you and I have talked about things like that in the past what are your thoughts I.

Agree with Aaron I think education is box basically it's all about experience like P1 guy work on the end goat and he's a CM he's a status.

Really status thank you don't worry I will be editing this.

You know not saying the church of the world I think that's really what it is today's experience the best people I've come from you saw something you don't song you down the dignity experience with the guys that work with me that raw hired the geography firm found in that very little it's found astounding again from back what is our area sound here stuff as I mean but we will talk about it later but treasure miss significant because Mike knows that when I was in Sabakota took courage from 76B4 happened in the world's largest pundits of 50 and cooking trick trees it's gone many AI dysphony and panic and talking about that if I was pushing any very intensive pain in the education it's like an editing at the moment it's treasury people that have delayed scientists they have to punish that it's not about having HTC 8 or it's not about it's actually understanding botany Marin time technology found mining that and the perfect sample is the Middle east that's the way rad's found that's where fabric's found Cabinet's down the day searching 40, 15, 60 become the leading further back the economists understand the risk of but that's what I'll be.

No, no, I agree to a certain extent and I disagree to a certain extent I think would I be where I am today without having an accountancy qualification? I probably wouldn't have really got in the door if I hadn't had it then you have to use it though. It's performance. It's not enough to have the education. You actually have to apply in the education again. Would I be have become a group treasurer without having done ACT exams? I think they gave me a technical knowledge on different instruments that definitely gave me a bit of an edge compared to perhaps people who haven't had the interest and some of it may have been that I was just really interested in it, very passionate about it. I actually. My husband thinks I'm the biggest nerd in the world. Is I actually really. He also works in treasury and he's what is wrong with you? But he enjoys it. But I actually really love it, which is why I've done that. So I think it definitely gives people the edge. But I don't think education has to be formal. I think there's a whole host of information out there. Podcast you can just put on your radio, listen to a podcast, 10 minutes. The FT News briefing gives you pretty much in a nutshell what's happening today. There are all these political podcasts, different business podcasts. All of that is the same type of education. So you've actually, I think, more access to knowledge, the type of things that you maybe had to go to university to do before. There's a lot more at our fingertips now. But I do think. I agree it's the application of it is. Is what comes down. Because while people mightn't. If you're a guy with geography is his primary degree, he probably is educating himself though all the time on treasury because he's interested in treasury and it doesn't have to be a formal thing. So I think it definitely gives you the edge. Definitely probably gives you that foot in the door and I think that is still the case. I don't know if it will always be the case because you say it's rapidly changing, but it probably I would feel. Would I be where I am now if I hadn't done continuous education? Probably not. So I do think it certainly helped me.

Mike, I'm going to ask you a question. What Are you going to hire for, in five years, quote, the person you're going to hire for in five years?

I think it's going to be either of two things, really. It's either someone who's a Treasury expert, but then again, we were having the conversation before because we're going to get onto it, AI and everything else, and the rise of that at the moment within Treasury. But everyone's saying, oh, are treasurers like yourselves all going to be replaced by robots? I certainly hope not, because otherwise I'm out of a job. You can just go and create a robot and that's it, you're done. It's not that treasurers have always embraced technology, always used it to your advantage and everything else. And I think it's actually helping you get more done with less as AI is brought in. And it's not just AI. Aaron and I were talking about this. It's about the use of data. You guys are great translators. You are talking to. You've got big sets of data. I did one of my sessions earlier this year in New York with Dana Laidhold, the global treasurer of a nasdaq, and they now use machine learning to scrape their daily exposures for Nasdaq and they keep it controlled and everything else. But what was taking one team member and a couple of team members probably a week to do now they do in seconds, nanoseconds. And it actually makes their jobs more interesting. That's one of the key things, I think that's being lost in a lot of the stuff that you see in the press and everything else. AI is making your jobs as treasurers easier. It's elevating as well. I think there is going to be an issue that more junior staff, treasury analysts, you are going to maybe look for people from a data science background. Also know that when I've talked to a couple of US clients in particular, one guy, he, he had a couple of his son's friends and they were saying, oh, I'm going to go and study economics. He went, don't do economics as a major. Do a split major with that computer science. And the guy, oh, really, really, I'm not really. He said, just use it for yourself sort of thing. And I think one of the questions will come back to the AI bit and, and what I wanted to get from you yourselves, looking back over your careers now, Paul, you've moved internationally, you, Erin, you've done different moves with different companies. I just want to reflect on maybe some of the choices you've made. As I say, what's been key to your success for you Paul you've made moves across the world and just got up and got on the plane sort of thing as you said you've done three back to back flights to be here that's why I'm having to buy and drinks later but that aside you've been there and you've made different choices between so Paul will start with yourself and then come across then come back to Aaron. What what would you say Paul with.

Yourself Very simple to see a boat what does he want? What does he want him Treasury I think alludes to where we are when the guys sends him out to me they're not attractive I hope I mean that it's again if you look at the crisis country only when the CFO wakes up and goes Christ fears my cash phone I don't want to leave and I think we need to get better of actually selling the story as regards what a treasurer actually does what is the main prowess is to protect the underlying ass issue and then I talk about oil wells are not so evolved and Helen such the value world I'm talking about where the cash is what we do with the cash how we use loads of cash again it goes back to it's very simple treachery is very simple we can make it as complex as we want but in the CFO and I've worked for I've worked in a lot of companies working absolutely dire CFOs but I've forcing for some very CFOs and it comes down to the Tom is that the treasurer is only as good as it was or her boss and that's actually come.

Out a little bit on the podcast as well Some people have asked me what have I observed from some of the more successful treasurers and I've said it's not just about management downwards it's also about management upwards. You know going making your boss look good sort of thing now you've been very successful is that one of the keys to your success managing upward as well?

I'm not sure I've always been great at managing upwards and indeed I've made as many mistakes as I've and look lady luck plays a little role in everybody's career success luck can be shining on you at certain times and at the right times. One thing I would say is probably if I look back at the turning point in my career because I had always and I think it's a little trap that a lot of us fall into if I work really hard people are going to notice they're going to tap me on the shoulder and they're going to go, you're great. Here you go. I'm going to offer you everything. And it doesn't quite happen like that. I think you have to be a good performer. That, that's. That's a given. But someone said to me one time, and I thought it was very true, she said, performance plus perception equals promotion. Because you don't have to just be good, you have to have. People need to realize you're good. And a turning point for me was a good few years ago now, and our technical accounting manager, who was a fantastic mentor to me, called my ceiling, who actually was. Yes. And wasn't a qualified accountant, was probably the best accountant I ever knew and his daughter still is. So it's. So he was a fantastic nudgeon for me. And we got chatting about derivatives and as I said, I am a complete nerd, like all the pizzdog and I love all things, chatting about all of these things. And Paul said to me, I think you should do presentation on this Emer, because it seems to be quite complex, trying to making it really simple. And as you say, it is actually really simple. People get a bit frightened. So anyway, I said I would do it and I was in the canteen one day and our friend Ian Curly at the time, came up behind me and said, emer, I hear you're doing that presentation on derivatives. It's one thing I always think I'd like to know more about. So I'm going to be there and I will never forget my stomach hiss, my. My ears. I never felt more nervous. But he was there. And when the head of treasury accounting role came up, I was given that tap on the shoulder to go for it. But it probably wouldn't have happened had people not seen me at the derivatives presentations. There's luck, there's taking a bit of opportunity and there's also having great people. And our CFO again, Ken Bowles, again, a fantastic mentor, has come through the organization, worked in many different roles and he trusts his people. He trusts that his people are good and do their job well. And I think with every company having gone through so many different crises, the world is almost crisis after crisis. I do think treasury has raised, I think, itself in terms of profile with the C suite, with the board of directors for exactly what you're saying, where is our cash? Do we have enough cash? Can we get cash? All of these things? And when they can trust that you want the expertise in this and that they know that's all safeguarded and future liquidity is safeguarded. It goes a very long way to building trust but as you say I think it's a combination of things but if I look overall it all extends back to that one conversation that I had Paul McVeely that I think really did just just really make a big difference to my career.

So much there definitely hard work and company are honest with presentation for taking on projects that no beyond it took us but also being at a bit entrepreneurial career treasurers were risk managers were risk averse and a lot of are quite conservative knowing when to take how delays of risk poison your own career can be very uncomfortable But I think that's really important to do as well.

So we've got some great takeaways and actually bit more career advice actually from the panel shortly. So I'm going to do that and I want to finish on time so I'm on to some of the Q and A. So I know that we had 80 you were going to ask them and to sure we were going to get one. That was one we were talking about before role what was that Gross.

Yeah and I think it was something you had up there as well. You know the current and wor when they've been in those hybrid and working from home and I think goes back to mentorship and keeping the brand conversation there. How are people able to execute that success to to build that morale and as a team but then also the short end of the team is perception is positive.

Yeah we're talking about hybrid working and I'll get working for a moment but he might be mentioned go with he with first of all then we'll come back to Aaron and then Paul.

Yeah sure sure.

We have a hybrid system inside we it's the core day is probably three days a week not specific days the standing three days with then some specific exception. We do value the fact that people are in there. I think we might be unusual though as well because we're in global head office so the CFO is in the building. The CEO is often in the building if he's not traveling. So you've all the senior management really in that building and that's where you do get face time you know with canteen where everyone sits down together has lunch together. No one it's not like we can group scotch their own tables. So you could be sitting with the cfo. I don't think you.