After graduating and a gap year travelling, my first ‘real’ job was on a IT helpdesk and from there I made an internal move into treasury. Like many 'accidental' treasurers, I had limited knowledge of what I was getting myself into when I first started. I was fortunate that my first manager encouraged me to complete the AMCT qualification which was excellent grounding. I later followed this with the Advanced Diploma (then called MCT) course and exams which I found very challenging however most rewarding.
Over the past 20 years, I have worked in many treasury roles across a number of different sectors; chemicals, metals and manufacturing, industrials, housing, media and now financial services/technology.
Treasury is forward looking and no day is the same. It provides great exposure to the key commercial aspects of the business where I am fortunate to be able to make a real contribution to the bottom line.
For my team the top two issues this year are: the integration of US subsidiaries together with bringing US treasury activities onto our treasury management system; and risk management of interest rates for our debt and investments – can anyone tell me if the UK and US rates have peaked? Answers on a postcard!
At the beginning of March 2020, the group treasurer left EQ to pursue another role and there was a three month gap prior to their replacement joining. I was relatively new to the team and had just kicked off a new treasury management project at work, and on a personal front I moved house with my family the day prior to the UK lockdown, so to say things were busy was an understatement! For me, building key relationships at work was essential to getting through those months - I quickly developed a solid relationship with the CFO which was invaluable, and I was also very grateful for all the help and support from the 11 relationship banks in our lending facility at the time.
I really enjoyed working on an Asia Shared Services project while I was at Informa. I had the opportunity to travel to a few countries and most importantly meet my finance colleagues and banks face to face to understand the 'on-the-ground' issues which really helped to contribute to solutions.
Deliver. Nothing else matters.
I enjoy reading The Treasurer magazine.
TV remote - never take it for granted as my family television as a child had 4 manual buttons!
Daley Thompson – so inspirational. He wasn’t just brilliant at one discipline, he was best in the world at 10 disciplines – he was the first athlete that I wanted to be copy and emulate. Daley is a true example of hard work and proof that you can be great at many things!
I am lucky to have a local library and am reading The President's Daughter by Bill Clinton and James Patterson.