Trésorier/Treasurer magazine - N°98 - July/Aug/Sep 2017 - 12

FOCUS

How to attract and then retain talented
young people to careers as treasurers?

LE MAGAZINE DU TRESORIER / TREASURER MAGAZINE

-

N°98

- JULY /

AUG / SEP 2017

A CHALLENGE
FOR THE FUTURE
TREASURERS

12

Treasury, the discipline with no
training courses
We find that the profession of treasurer
has never really been properly or fully
covered by business or financial management courses in universities. If it is
covered, it is as add-ons to Masters Degrees, or as a sprinkling of courses that
only partially cover the subject. This
is not a complaint, but a fact that we
need to accept. Over the last few years,
courses have started to be offered in
some countries and treasurer associations are playing the role of training
providers to more young people. So, in
fact, we already have specialist training
opportunities, even though they may
still be few and far between. In the final
analysis, treasury and risk management
can be learnt only at the coalface. This
automatically means that students,
trainees and budding future treasurers
might well not know much about this
fascinating world of corporate treasury.
As treasurer associations, it is our duty

to provide specialist training courses
to disseminate our knowledge and the
mysteries of our trade.
But a Head of Treasury Department
now faces two challenges: 1) attracting
talented people (and training them,
obviously), 2) then retaining them over
the medium term. This will be no easy
challenge, I fear.

So how could we attract
talented people?
Talented persons do not come to you on
their own initiative. To attract them you
have to try to recruit them directly from
the universities. And here it is perhaps
up to the Associations to do the work
that the poor, short-staffed treasurer
is unable to do. Surely this is just the
sort of role for which Associations were
intended? I certainly think so.
We have to demystify the role of treasurer, but also we have to sell it properly
to attract the best people to it. We can
go to student fairs and exhibitions,

taking treasurers with us, to promote
our great profession. Sometimes
treasurer are asked to give specialist
talks as part university courses or a
lecture. By promoting the work of EACT1
and its members, we contribute to
raising the profile of the profession and
increasing its attractiveness. Offering
free subscriptions to young students or
recent graduates looking for their first
job could give them a chance to find
out about our special and mysterious
world, surely? We should always make
a point of inviting students in their final
Masters year to our conferences, to tell
them about what we do.

We have to demystify the role of
treasurer, but also we have to sell it
properly to attract the best people
to it.

1 - European Association of Corporate Treasuers
Trésorier/Treasurer magazine - N°98 - July/Aug/Sep 2017

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