Client Advice
Need advice about how to recruit your next treasury professional? Then look no further. We have created a selection of videos to help you find that perfect candidate.
A Quick Guide to Virtual Interviewing
With over 20 years of Treasury Recruitment experience, Mike Richards recently shared his secrets to career success and how to land your dream role with the Treasury Management Association of Chicago, TMAC.
Over the past two decades the world of Treasury Recruitment has changed beyond belief - it is not enough anymore to just have the perfect resume to get ahead in your career, you need to build an online personal brand that not only captures the attention of your audience but presents a powerful message to those seeking your treasury expertise.
In his session the audience gained key insights from a global treasury recruiter who has advised corporate treasury professionals on how to advance their treasury careers for decades.
The session included;
- Top tips on how to craft a strong resume
- How to create a standout and powerful LinkedIn profile / personal brand
- A guide to what you should and shouldn’t be doing in this new world of virtual interviewing
Speaker
Mike Richards, CEO & Founder of The Treasury Recruitment Company
https://www.linkedin.com/in/mrtreasury/
Mike@TreasuryRecruitment.com
Established in 2002, The Treasury Recruitment Company are the only truly Global Treasury Recruitment firm in the world. They recruit at all levels within Corporate Treasury from Treasury Analyst to Treasury Director for multinational corporates, consultancies, and a range of financial institutions.
Mike regularly speaks at Treasury Recruitment conferences such as the Windy City Summit – Chicago, the AFP USA Treasurers Conference and the EuroFinance International Treasurers Conference about;
The power of personal branding
How to attract, manage and retain treasury talent
The latest trends happening within the global treasury recruitment market.
In addition, Mike also hosts the popular podcast www.TreasuryCareerCorner.com where he interviews treasury professionals about their careers.
Their company website is www.TreasuryRecruitment.com
Why We Created The CFO Boxset
Hello everyone, its Mike Richards from The Treasury Recruitment Company here. It's been awhile since I last did a video for you guys so I wanted to bring you up to date with a couple of things we've done throughout lockdown and tell you about our latest set of video releases
as well.
All our videos are based around what I call a concept that one of my informal marketing mentors, Marcus Sheridan calls the “They Ask, You Answer” philosophy.
It is based around the idea that as a business, we have to have an obsessive focus on answering your questions, whether you're a Treasury professional or a CFO, we need to give you the answers to the questions that you're asking us every day.
So, to help you we've created a CFO Box Set.
This is an area of the website where I have gathered all the questions I get asked by CFO’s when recruiting a Treasurer for them.
There are articles there and videos that help CFO's at every stage of the recruitment process.
Now you might notice that as they say in those videos the camera adds 10 pounds. Well, they weren't kidding! We had to film the videos in widescreen just to fit in most of my cheeks and my double chins!
But anyway, the benefit for me personally was that once I did all these videos, I decided to lose some weight. 22 pounds, a lot of swimming and now you can see we don't necessarily have to do it in widescreen, we can probably do it in portrait! Anyway, let's move on.
So, all our client videos were originally due for release in March 2020, as you know, very quiet month, treasury recruitment market slowly picking up post-Christmas, bonuses coming through, great timing.
I said, great get all these videos out for our clients then COVID happened, brilliant!
Global pandemic, everything stopped.
18 videos creative for you guys and a temporary hold on all recruitment activity basically for treasury across the world, for all our companies and our clients.
But the issue was, what was then happening to our candidates?
You guys still needed help.
So, we changed direction, pivoted if you were, if you like rather and we created our Candidate Bounce Back Program.
So, over the lockdown for three to six months we had run the program two or three times. We were helping candidates find roles and the Bounce Back Program is still available on the website so you can go there anytime and they're free on there.
There’s advice about goal setting, there's advice on there about how to improve your CV / resume, then also to do your LinkedIn profile.
There's interview advice and all this free advice is to help you as Treasury professionals find your next role.
That's what we want to do. Now the market had started to return, we're in a near post pandemic treasury recruitment world.
Vaccines are on the horizon, hopefully and I can see us slowly getting back to what is a new normal. Much more of a working from home, but a bit more balanced as well. But it's now time to release all this great material for you guys.
Now I know, as I see a lot of the time I get copied by people, but imitation is a form of flattery, I think.
Now as well as the CFO Box Set there are ten other videos.
We talked about the rise of technology and artificial intelligence in treasury.
We talk about making moves internationally.
We also relate a story about how I was accidentally recommended by one of my rivals, quite an interesting story.
All very easy to access, just go to treasurytv.com or our YouTube channel,
which again is called the same Treasury TV.
Hope you enjoy all of them if you have other areas you want me to cover
or you want advice, then just drop me an email mike@treasuryrecruitment.com.
Happy to answer any of your questions and just here to help.
Thanks very much for your time.
Many thanks.
A CFO's Guide to Recruiting A Treasurer
Hello everyone, its Mike Richards from The Treasury Recruitment Company here.
On today's video I want to talk to you about a concept that Marcus Sheridan, one of my informal marketing mentors if you like, calls “They Ask, You Answer”.
His philosophy is that we as a business have to have an obsessive focus on answering the questions that you as a customer, or in our case as a CFO or a Treasury professional, that you want or need answering.
That's our job to answer your questions, all the things you want to know.
And this is as you know what led me to create several our videos, and in this case what we call the CFO box set.
I've tried to answer all the questions I get asked by a CFO all in one place. The questions I answer in that section include the answers to questions.
So, what do CFO's need to do to recruit a Treasurer?
How should they source candidates and maybe structure an interview process to recruit a Treasurer at the senior level?
What salary level should they be targeting?
And maybe have we got job descriptions for Global Treasurer roles?
Yes, don't worry. We've got thousands because we've recruited lots and lots of Treasurers, that's our job. We've put all this advice and videos in the order that CFO’s also generally use when they need our advice.
So, first tab is there on your screen is about helping you define the Treasurer that you need.
The second tab is about working out where you need to attract the Treasurer from if you like.
On tab three we help you attract and recruit a Treasurer.
Then in addition to that we have a Resources tab which also provides other things like job descriptions and other things.
Now I hope you enjoy the set. If you need further treasury recruitment
advice, go to treasuryrecruitment.com or drop me an email, mike@treasuryrecruitment.com I would love to answer your questions, love to help.
Call me anytime you need our help. Happy to give you some informal advice or formal advice just to try and help you.
Thanks very much for your time.
Here's the link to the full BOXSET;
https://treasuryrecruitment.com/cfos-guide-to-recruiting-a-treasurer/
What Is the Market Like for Interim Treasury Professionals?
Hello, I'm Mike Richards and today I'm bringing to life the latest article
I did about interim treasury.
We get asked, do you recruit interim treasury positions/professionals?
Yes, we do. Obviously a lot more of what we do is permanent recruitment on a global basis, but we've recruited interim treasury professionals across the US, the UK, Europe and further afield actually, down into Asia as well in the past.
But why don't we often have that many interim treasury positions?
I think it's because it's not the biggest part of most Treasury departments.
In a Treasury team if you like they may only have a small Treasury team,
so if there is an interim need it can come and go quite quickly.
Some of our clients use for that interim period might use consultancies,
maybe one of the big accounting firms, one of the big four or five or whatever or independent consultants.
But when clients do come to us, we have got a bank of people that are ready and available. But then I get candidates on the other side of the fence if you like saying to me, Mike I’m going to leave my permanent job, I'm going to become an interim.
I'm going to do some really interesting project work and enhance my career. I say to them. "Are you mad?" And they are like, what?
I say to them, when you last had an interim that came into your team,
did you give them all the sexy exciting stuff to do?
And they're like, no. We gave the interesting work to the permanent staff members. Sometimes there are some good projects that come about
or there might be a maternity leave or something like that.
But often the work given to an interims is the work that the permanent team doesn't want to actually do or embrace, if you like.
You know, they might be assessing controls or creating policies manuals.
Career enhancing? Yes.
Interesting? Not so much.
If you're in the later years in your career and you want to do some interesting project work, feel free to give us a call. It could be a lifestyle choice and everything else.
We do get those assignments. We also interface and speak to a number of consultancies themselves where they need interim resources and they don't have enough time to keep a panel or a bank of interim Treasurers
and we can access those guys. We can help but please don't think it's all shiny and roses out there.
It's interesting work or it can be, but can be tough as well, and there are gaps in the employment there. So if you want to do it and want some advice just give us a call.
Hope that helps with the article and everything else. Thanks for your time.
Cheers.
Here’s the links to some useful articles:
https://treasuryrecruitment.com/interim-treasury/
https://treasuryrecruitment.com/dont-resign-yet/
3 Tips About How to Write A Job Description
This video is about job descriptions and how they have changed if you like.
I get this all the time people say look, can you help us with a job description?
No problem. I am a recruiter. It is my job. I try to help clients write effective job descriptions
and, then from that the job adverts, but I have noticed they become closer and closer in terms of content.
So, today's video is about the top three things
I think you need to think about when you are writing
an effective job description and it goes with the articles so have a look there as well.
These are the key things I want to highlight to you. You must remember any
decent job description is essentially a sales document.
When you are writing it, tell people what they are going to do in their job.
But remember you need to sell the job because you need to engage with your audience.
You want someone to read that job description and think that is a place I want
to work. It does not have to be every responsibility they will have. Tell people why they should come and join you.
Explain about some of the day-to-day bits about the job if you like, maybe
at the interview stage. Get them through the job door first.
rather, see if they like you and you like them and engage with your audience.
Remember it is not about you. It is about them. That is what I’ve
said in some of the other videos.
Number two - remember. it is not a shopping list of everything
they would do every week or month; it is an overview of the tasks. Make sure that when people read it they think this is going to enhance my career not become most boring job ever. So, focus on making it interesting.
Now, the third and final point is about closing the gate or limiting your own success if you like.
There is so many times and I mentioned this in the article.
I have seen things like, must have ten years international
expertise, must be a fire eating juggler,
great communicator, the interpersonal skills to rival the greatest stage hypnotist there is!
Yeah, you are not really going to need most of that stuff,
you know. Basically, write a clear, concise, appealing, and engaging job description, keep those words in mind.
If it does help when you are looking at doing your next job description,
whatever the level is from Treasury Analyst to Group Treasurer, go to our Treasury Library.
So www.treasuryrecuitment.com/treasurylibrary
We have job descriptions on there,
we have advice about writing them and you have these blogs
and things like that. If you are still struggling for advice or just want to give us a call,
we are here to help you and thanks very much for your time today.
Here’s the links to some useful articles/resources:
https://treasuryrecruitment.com/effective_job_description/
https://treasuryrecruitment.com/treasury-library/
https://treasuryrecruitment.com/great_job_description/
Three Secrets To Building An Effective Treasury Team
Hello everyone, it's Mike Richards from The Treasury Recruitment Company here this article / video / blog all came actually from a speech I gave a number of years ago in Copenhagen for EuroFinance.
As a Treasury Recruiter I'm usually advising clients about ineffective teams because they have probably lost someone as they've ineffectively managed them.
This was quite a nice change for me to actually discuss and see some successful teams and assess what clients were getting right. It means less work for me. And I was interviewing two of my clients and summarizing their ideas to help form the speech bit.
A bit frustrating. Why are you keeping all these people?
But actually people want to join those teams. And actually I was saying that
when I did recruit for them people tend to stay for a long time, five, ten plus years.
The first thing that they said was, you know with a successful team was he said, look Mike we have a system what we call. I swear he just did this so I could get it out of my mouth complementarity, that's it. What that is is that each of the people in the team, the front, the middle and the back office
they complement each other. Not saying oh you look great today, but actually the skill sets they have it make it a seamless process.
They all work together. Everyone helps each other and makes their jobs a lot easier, and it means that when they pass work between each other it goes through seamlessly. There's less errors , a bit Six Sigma like.
The other part, they talked a lot about was diversity because if you just clone one person and then in three years time recruit a clone of that person again, there's no change. There's no variety if you like.
A good example, you don't keep the same old model of a car and then three, five years later by the same one you buy the improved version don’t you. You just don't want the same thing again and again.
So again when you're hiring ask yourself what's changed over the past three years when you're wanting to recruit.
The other part of the team, the final part if you like, was the non human element of the team, and that's where we talked about having an IT system could be a real game-changer because an IT system, you know or treasury management system if you like, works 24/7 fees and electricity, churns out numbers and delivers everything.
But one of the things he mentioned and that all of them mentioned actually, was that there were hidden dangers when you get a new member of staff, a human member of staff, you reference check them, background check them, speak to previous bosses.
But do you do the same for your IT TMS?
Do you background reference check with loads of different customers maybe?
Did it deliver on its promise in the RFP/RFI and everything else?
Are they cyber secure?
Big thing. Basically make sure that when you are referencing, check the semi-human or the non human employees as much as you would with the real human employees.
That's enough read the rest of the article. Hope it helps. Thanks for your time.
To find out more, read our articles here:
https://treasuryrecruitment.com/team-building-secrets/
https://treasuryrecruitment.com/grow-your-treasury-team/
4 Tips to Attract Treasury Candidates - Why Join You? A Welcoming Interview NOT an interrogation!
This video accompanies the article about attracting candidates.
I just wanted to try to highlight if you like, some of the key points within the article the kickoff from about halfway through it about job descriptions in particular because before someone has even joined you if you like or when you're trying to get them through the door,
you need to attract someone you need to attract those candidates because if you don't attract the candidates.
You want to join you you've lost in what you might call a daily war to attract talent.
There are a number of areas within the article that I go into in more detail,
but there are probably four that I will perhaps just focus on now.
Number one grabbing their attention. This comes from the job description. If you want to grab the attention, you need to maybe sell your growth plans for the company, why might they want to come and join you? Where will, they fit in with those and become part of their growth plans.
Second thing when they’re coming to join you - the first round of interviews when
someone first walks in put yourself in their shoes. They're going to be nervous. It could probably be maybe a junior candidate even if they're not sit them down ask them. If they want a coffee do anything you can at that first round interview to make it a welcoming environment particularly for junior candidates this might be one of the first interviews or second interview they’ve ever done in their life.
And then remember that interview is not an interrogation. Yes, you want to understand them but you also have to sell your company to them. You have to sell the opportunity. You're giving them if you just put them in the spotlight their walk out thinking. Why would I join them are some questions try to understand them but be gentle. Second round interview. That's the other thing you need to - they've got to be the coming in again. They've got to know you a little bit better. That's a good thing why at that stage don't you maybe involve your other team members get them to feel like this candidate, They could be part of the team before they're even part of the team.
It's going to mean that they want to join you and is going to encourage them to feel like it's a place they want to join, but then described in the article more about the final stages of the process, and that could be about the job offer has to get that right some hygiene facts in there.
I suggest you give it a thorough read it will definitely help you or as always.
If you do need more treasury recruitment advice,
you know, where we are. Give us a call. Thanks for your time.
Here’s the links to some useful articles:
https://treasuryrecruitment.com/attracting-candidates/
https://treasuryrecruitment.com/its-about-candidates/
How I Was Accidentally Recommended as a Treasury Recruiter by One of My Rivals
I was recently, as I said in the other article, and I couldn't get it all in
because Russ my evil videographer wouldn't let me do the full story, but I was recently accidentally recommended as a Treasury Recruiter by one of my rivals.
First ever time, its great!
Basically what happened was, I was sitting in the office and one of the guys in the office says “Mike. I've got a phone call here, it's Derek, he's a CFO of a FTSE 250 and he's been accidentally recommended to you by one of your rivals”
I thought this is the weirdest thing -I thought I’d been drinking, I hadn't for a change!
Basically he'd been on the phone to his usual Executive Search Recruiter who dealt with his senior positions and at the end of the conversation as the guy is taking the briefing and taking the call.
He said “Derek who else will you be speaking to?, because he said you have probably already spoken to Mike at The Treasury Recruitment Company, the specialist recruiter of Treasurers”.
Obviously Derek said, “yes he had”, which was lovely.
He hadn't!
He was straight onto Google.
Who is this Mike fella?
Who is The Treasury Recruitment Company?
After the call he went straight onto Google, did the search, called us straight away. And he said, you've been accidentally recommended by one of your rivals.
I'm the Finance Director of FTSE250 looking for a new Treasurer.
Can we meet?
The answer was, “Yes”. We went and met.
It was a quite a strange call. But after, I met Derek and had a very fruitful meeting with him, I really enjoyed it. We only had about five minutes of the meeting to go.
He talked for about 35-40 minutes and said “Mike I have only got five minutes, can you tell me why I would choose you over my current search recruiter?”
And he said, “Why are you any better?” I said to him, Derek we're not! Because basically we are on a par with your Executive Search Recruiter.
We will do a very similar search and similar to them we've got a proven track record of recruiting Executives at this level.
But in four to six weeks time, which your Executive Recruiter will then come with his, because it is his first Treasurer position, as he has never recruited one before, he will give you a list of four to eight candidates who wanted their next job.
I said, Derek. I've already got that list for you.
I've got it for you today.
He said great!. So the difference is, in four to six weeks, maybe even shorter than that. I'll have a list of candidates who want a job with you and your company.
He said, "Mike, that's a great line".
I said, "I know I've been practicing it for 20 years!"
And exactly that happened, in actual fact it was also quite strange as at the end of the process Derek said later on, he said Mike you have presented eight people to me. I want to meet all eight. I said Derek no one meets all eight!
He said Mike I've never recruited a Treasurer before, I want to see what a good one looks like. We did that, successfully placed it.
Really enjoyed it. Sorry I went on a bit long today, and this is an additional story, but I thought it was worth telling and just about why again the specialist focus, the knowledge, the time it saves, the track record.
Many thanks for your time.
Here’s the links to some useful articles:
https://treasuryrecruitment.com/why-choose-trc/
https://treasuryrecruitment.com/real-treasury-specialists/
A Track Record of Treasury Recruitment
Today I wanted to talk to you about why you might select The Treasury Recruitment Company,
and I don't want to just to be sell sell sell!
I just wanted to perhaps use this video and the article that accompanies it to compare us and what we do against other people.
I often get asked by clients and candidates to explain who we are and what we do and what we offer and how we're slightly different if you like, because we just do treasury.
So I thought in the article we should try explain who we are, what we do and most of all why we are different. We are 100% experts in treasury recruitment because that's all we do. We act with confidentiality as you'll see, lots of our searches are confidential due to client sensitivities.
I described that again, that's very frustrating to us because it means our website if you like is
not as full of jobs as other websites should I say because all of our jobs you'll see are real, rather than some of the pretend jobs that we see listed by some of our rivals. We're counsellors if you like as well, we give advice to our clients and candidates even when we don't win an assignment.
At the end of the day we've been doing this for 20 plus years and we wouldn’t have got that far today without always giving that kind of advice. Other areas we talked about include track record. We believe that the past is a good predictor of the future, if these people know what to do and they've done it in the past then we can do again and again.
We are specialists not generalists, we cover all levels from Treasury Analyst to Group Treasurer.
We are recognized in our niche, I speak at conferences, we do the Treasury Career Corner podcast each week, we network with our treasury guys and you know that any role that comes to us isn't going to be the first treasury position we've done this year because that's all we do. References, track record, do people trust us, have we placed other Treasurers?
That's an indication to the future. The other one, and in the other video I talk to you about it in a few weeks time, about cost. Are we the cheapest? We're not, you know, if someone is the cheapest recruiter, we try to be competitive and sometimes we lose out but we're not always going to be the cheapest if that's going to drive the reason and cost. Then we might not always be the right choice to people.
International capability, when we recruit and we are recruiting currently for one of our Swiss roles, we look globally for people. We don't just look in Switzerland, we look across the UK, Europe, right the way across, as long as you got the right to work there, you know, we'll do it. Now at this point I wanted to talk a bit more, but unfortunately Russ my videographer won't let me. I talked here about
being accidentally recommended by one of my rivals.
I'll record a separate video for anyone wants to hear that quick story.
It's a pretty good one. Just follow the link if you're interested. But that's enough from me. I'll shut up now. Thanks for listening to me.
See you next week and many thanks.
Here’s the links to some useful articles:
https://treasuryrecruitment.com/will-the-real-specialist-please-stand-up/
https://treasuryrecruitment.com/who-we-are/