Partnership Ecosystem Vital for Treasurers

Treasurers rely on a complex ecosystem of banking partners, technology providers, consultancies and peer practitioners for assistance in everything from operational best practices to optimizing capital structure. As the scope of treasurer responsibilities has grown, the value of these business relationships has also grown. The modern treasurer has established a network of trusted, knowledgeable partners, each of whom are instrumental in making the job of running a global treasury organization easier.

In 2018, treasurers will seek assistance from a number of different strategic partners to accomplish their goals. They will work with specialized consultancies for guidance in navigating new regulatory changes to standards such as IFRS 9 and ASC 815. They will be looking for technology providers who can mitigate risks related to growing cybersecurity threats, and to take advantage of new API, blockchain and robotic technology. With interest rates on the rise, treasurers will be working closely with banking partners to develop strategies to more actively hedge interest rate risk.

The challenge for the treasurer is establishing a strong, reliable network of business partners, and optimizing that network in a way that is both practical and cost-efficient. On the technology side, treasurers are looking for partners to not simply have experience working with one another, but to have pre-built, off-the-shelf integration tools. During technology implementations, a major area of cost, effort and frustration results from a lack of off-the-shelf integration capabilities between technology partners and banks, who may share hundreds of global clients. Too often, treasurers maintain incomplete or fragmented partner networks, or work with technology providers who have informal partnerships, or inadequate tools to streamline integration, resulting in some combination of missed opportunity, higher operating costs and/or greater exposure to risk.

It’s the responsibility of the treasurer to make sure their partnership community is comprehensive, and to recognize where gaps exist in the technology partnership ecosystem and work with partners to address those gaps. FIS is a strategic treasury technology and advisory partner to over 1,000 corporates, globally. As a key member of the treasurers’ partnership network, we’re committed to play our part and to integrate with other partners as seamlessly as possible.