Hard Skills and Soft Skills in Treasury: Striking the Right Balance

Treasury Leadership: Balancing Hard Skills and Soft Skills

In today’s fast-paced and complex work environment, it’s crucial to strike a balance between hard skills and soft skills. The role of treasury within organizations is becoming increasingly strategic, driven by global economic volatility, advancements in technology, regulatory changes, and the need for enhanced risk management. Developing soft skills, on the other hand, relates to how you work and interact with others. Communication, empathy, adaptability, and teamwork are key to leading successfully in today’s world.

Treasury leaders are expected to go beyond traditional roles of managing liquidity and financial risks. We are increasingly involved in strategic decisions, providing insights that impact the entire organization, from capital structure decisions to mergers and acquisitions and even strategic investments. As specialists in our area of expertise, our roles are critical as advisors to the C-suite.

Staying up to date with technology and being early adopters is key. The adoption of advanced technologies like artificial intelligence, machine learning, blockchain, and robotic process automation will continue to reshape treasury functions. Treasury leaders need to be at the forefront of advocating for and overseeing the implementation of these technologies to enhance efficiency, improve accuracy, and provide better predictive analytics for decision-making.

In a global financial world, treasurers need to focus on comprehensive risk management strategies. This involves not just financial risks but also operational, geopolitical, and cyber risks. The future treasury leader is expected to have a comprehensive risk management framework that is agile and adaptable to changing conditions. For efficient collaboration, treasury leaders must enhance the integration of treasury functions with other parts of the business. It is critical to work closely with IT, HR, legal, tax, and other departments to ensure that financial strategies are fully integrated across the organization. As regulations become more complex globally, treasury leaders must stay ahead of the curve to ensure compliance. This includes understanding and preparing for the implications of changes in tax laws, banking regulations, and financial reporting standards.

As treasury leaders, we must be able to self-assess our strengths and weaknesses and be willing to receive feedback to develop soft skills, which will allow our teams and ourselves to create impact. Proposing tools like 360-degree feedback can offer insights into how others perceive your hard and soft skills, helping us evolve.

Getting out of our comfort zone is another key to success. Commit yourself to lifelong learning to enhance both types of skills. For hard skills, consider certifications, courses, and webinars related to our field. For soft skills, workshops, mentorship, and coaching can be invaluable. Throughout my career, I have learnt that adapting your communication style is crucial. I continuously strive to improve my communication skills, adapting to new generations and different cultures and focusing on improving digital communication tools. Making efforts to understand non-verbal cues and thinking every day about how to be clear and concise is even more important when working in a second language and/or multicultural and multilingual teams. Being an active listener is key to success in all these areas.

I remember old management in treasury telling me not to be too soft if I wanted to manage teams. Today, I understand those managers had zero skills in emotional intelligence and empathy. Through the years, experience has taught me that cultivating emotional intelligence skills is a cornerstone of effective leadership, enabling me to understand and manage my emotions and those of others. I truly believe it improves team dynamics, conflict resolution, and decision-making. Developing a genuine interest in the challenges and aspirations of our teams fosters trust, loyalty, and open communication.

Every leader will have to manage and solve problems. Therefore, developing problem-solving skills that combine technical knowledge with creative thinking and collaboration is key. This often involves using both hard and soft skills.

The treasury leader of today and the future must encourage teamwork and demonstrate a balanced approach in our actions while showing proficiency in our technical duties and strong interpersonal skills. We treasurers must understand the strengths and weaknesses of our team members and delegate tasks accordingly. This not only ensures the best use of hard skills but also develops soft skills within the team, such as responsibility and leadership.

Regularly seek feedback on your leadership style and the balance between your hard and soft skills. Reflect on this feedback and make continuous adjustments. Balancing hard skills and soft skills in leadership doesn’t imply equal proficiency in all areas. Instead, it means recognizing the value of both, continually improving, and using them effectively to lead your team towards success.

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