Boardroom basics

Posted on July 23, 2016 by Sally

No one wants to make a hash of briefing the company’s directors. Sally Percy asks experienced treasurers how they get it right

A treasurer’s place is in the boardroom. Not all of the time, of course, but some of the time at least.

That is one of the principal findings of The Contemporary Treasurer 2016, the ACT’s latest research into the evolving influence of treasury on corporate financial strategy and business growth.

Nearly 200 treasurers across the UK, continental Europe, Asia-Pacific, the Middle East and North America were interviewed for the study, which found that treasurers globally are contributing far more strategic advice to their organisations than they did five years ago.

It is not just business strategy that treasurers report on, however. Their board reports tend to encompass a broad range of subjects, from capital and liquidity management and risk management through to corporate governance, treasury operations and controls, and pensions management.

So just what does presenting treasury matters to the board entail? And is it really the horrifying prospect that it might seem?

Continue Reading… (PDF)

Back to basics

Posted on June 18, 2016 by Sally

Published in Project

Project management is just a matter of finding out what works and doing it over and over again. Or is it? Sally Percy investigates

“Repetition is the mother of learning, the father of action, which makes it the architect of accomplishment.” This observation by the late US motivational speaker Zig Ziglar applies as much to project management as it does to art, music, sport, writing and many other activities.

The theory is that, if you repeat the same task or sequence of tasks over and over again, eventually you will excel at them. “Look at professional athletes,” says Adrian Dooley, lead author of the Praxis Framework, a free, online project management resource, and a book (£49.95) published by APM. “In their training, they practise the basics over and over again. They make these basics instinctive. In a game situation, they then improvise around those basic skills.

“If they didn’t spend so much time doing the ‘boring stuff’ and getting it right, they would never have a platform from which to launch their creativity.”

For example, footballer David Beckham revealed in 2013 that his mastery of the free kick was the result of “tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands” of practice free kicks in the local park when he was growing up. If only it were that simple…

In the world of project management, repetition does not relate to the process of landing a ball in a goal from a distance of 30 yards (although some project managers might argue that, actually, metaphorically it does). Instead, it relates to the process of getting the basics right – repeatedly.

Continue Reading… (PDF)

Vacancies left unfilled as skills shortage bites

Posted on January 29, 2016 by Sally

Published in The Telegraph

Construction and financial services among sectors worst hit as employers struggle to find suitable candidates for around 25pc of vacancies

In 2015, nearly a quarter of all job openings were left vacant because employers could not find people with the necessary skills or knowledge to fill them. This is a 130pc rise since 2011, according to the newly released 2015 Employer Skills Survey (ESS) from the UK Commission for Employment and Skills (UKCES).

The UK’s modest economic recovery between 2011 and 2015 can partly explain the increase in skills shortages; businesses have ramped up their hiring to meet customer demand. It does not tell the whole story, however. “Education has not always been aligned with demand in the marketplace,” says Douglas McCormick, a UKCES commissioner.

“We have real shortages of skilled labour in construction and also in professional services. That’s because in prior years there hasn’t been enough investment in the people coming through.”

As the survey highlights, skills shortages in the construction sector are a real concern, since the sector contributes nearly £90bn to the UK economy, employs more than a million people and undertakes strategically important housing and infrastructure projects. Worryingly, employers struggled to fill one in three construction vacancies in 2015.

Who holds the key to closing the skills gap?

Posted on January 21, 2016 by Sally

Published by EY

Five actions to accelerate gender parity

Can it be possible that women lost 30 years of progress toward equal economic and political participation with men in just 12 months?

Unfortunately, according to the World Economic Forum, that is precisely what happened in 2015.

In 2014, the WEF predicted that it would be 80 years before gender parity could be achieved, according to the economic, educational, health-based and political indicators at the time. Just a year later, in 2015, that forecast changed to 117 years.

So how can we achieve gender parity when “business as usual” is failing to close the gap both within individual organizations and across nations? At EY, we decided to drive change at the local level by bringing together committed leaders from corporates, entrepreneurship and government.

In 2015, EY established the Women³. The Power of Three, a forum for female and male leaders from corporate, entrepreneurial and government organizations across major markets in EMEIA. After examining a number of different challenges to women in professional roles, the forum focused the last 12 months on how we could better leverage the skills of women throughout the three stages of their career (entrants, express and experienced) to close the global skills gap and support economic growth.

Through 10 regional roundtables with over 150 leaders, plus surveys of more than 1,000 organizations, Women³. The Power of Three developed a set of recommended actions calling on governments, corporates and entrepreneurs to work collectively to address five recommended actions for better harnessing female talent.

Out of these, the group prioritized five specific actions that we believe will hasten change.

Making an impact

Posted on October 5, 2015 by Sally

Published in The Treasurer

Treasurer-turned–Telefónica UK CEO Ronan Dunne reveals the secrets of his extraordinarily successful career

When Telefónica UK CEO Ronan Dunne held his first town hall meeting back in 2007, he told his assembled staff: “I see my job to be chief cheerleader and chief storyteller on behalf of the organisation and to make each one of you the success you deserve to be.”

t is this fierce commitment to helping others to fulfil their potential that has underpinned Dunne’s own spectacular career to date. A clearly inspirational leader, who has managed to hold down the top job in one of the UK’s best-known companies for eight years, he makes it his business to match people to potential. “I have a personal view that all of us can be good at many things,” he says. “Every one of us can be amazing at something. So what we have to do is make sure that we create the opportunity for as many people as possible to discover what they can be amazing at.”

He continues: “That’s why I ended up being a CEO. I could have been good as a finance director, but actually others saw that I had the potential to be a CEO. And I realised that I wanted to see if I could be amazing, potentially as a CEO. Because the responsibility that a CEO has affords the opportunity to be even more influential and more impactful than even the best CFO.”

Continue Reading… (PDF)

Factors to consider when relocating your business

Posted on October 5, 2015 by Sally

Published in The Telegraph

Local infrastructure can make or break a business, but moving poses enormous challenges and unexpected costs

“When a man is tired of London, he is tired of poky offices, exorbitant rents and crippling business rates.” That is what Samuel Johnson might have said had he been a 21st-century business owner rather than an 18th-century writer.

But with future improvements in infrastructure – particularly the High Speed 2 rail line between London and Birmingham, and Crossrail in the capital and the South East – the way people move around the country is set to change. Meanwhile, the construction of the planned new nuclear power station, Hinkley Point C, is poised to become the epicentre of a whole new economic ecosystem in Somerset.