Tomato Newsletter "News 'n Views" No. 138 - May 2011
Introduction
Once in a while, I have a long list of articles on finance and IT that would be of interest for you. Then again, you have your work cut out for you and may be getting a little weary of more lessons on how to improve on what you're doing. So I revert to issues close to my area of expertise: organizational communication. That's what happened this time. Enjoy reading on how to gain respect from your team, the importance of spelling out priorities and persistent communication to get projects completed quickly.
Overall though - enjoy the variety!
Regula Spottl
In Today's Issue
TOMATO UPDATES
FINANCE AND BANKING
- Optimizing Banking Relationships
- A New Information Discovery and Communication Solution for the Financial Sector
- Risk Management: A Guide and a New Blog
IT
COMMUNICATION/MANAGEMENT
- Gaining more Respect: Consistent Results Lead to Trust
- CFO Must Spell Out Team's Priorities
- Persistent Communication Is Key to Getting Projects Completed Quickly
MISCELLANEOUS
Twitter Response: EBICS als Alternative zu SWIFT?
One of our newsletter readers recently posted in Twitter:
- #SWIFT vs. #EBICS was ist besser.???
- EBICS als Alternative zu SWIFT ?
Martin Schneider, our expert on SWIFT, has direct knowledge and experience with EBICS. Here is his answer:
EBICS is a new German Standard and I do hope that it will spread out to other countries such as France, Switzerland, Austria, Italy etc. For one of our projects, we coordinated the implementation EBICS with their German banks and its Treasury Software. Conclusion: It was an easy plug and play. We had more detailed work on connecting 'our Swiss Bank accounts'.
Switzerland has not (yet) decided for EBICS, so we had to implement a host-to-host at SGKB as discussed in the Sept 2010 and February 2011 newsletters.
EBICS could be an alternative for SWIFT, but if you as corporate need to solve your gaps NOW, either decide for the highway/gateway SWIFT or connect all countries with their latest local standard.
If you as a corporate have mainly bank relations and financial flow connection to Germany and Switzerland and behind the TMS you have various ERP's, then EBICS will be your channel. The market and EBICS did not yet reach Switzerland, France, Italy, Austria, and Eastern Europe.
On the other hand Swift is a solution when your ERP is SAP and one within your corporate world. Then Swift will make sense and you may be happier with Swift. Check again our pictures and slides on our website.
We welcome your questions and comments. Address them to martin.schneider@tomato.ch
Optimizing Banking Relationships
Gtnews recently posted two videos on optimizing banking relationships that stem from panel discussions at Global Corporate Treasurers Forum Europe.
In "Treasurers Need to Be Proactive When Building Relationships with Banks", Ricky Thirion, VP of treasury at Etihad Airways, suggests that treasurers must build relationships with various counterparties. He also elaborates on a panel discussion about compliance. Watch the video! (registration required, free)
In "Managing Your Banking Relationships: How to Take Advantage of the Best
Opportunities," Denise Laussade of Purdue University summarizes issues that were raised in a panel discussion on managing banking relationships. Watch
the video
(registration required, free)
Also remember Martin Schneider's article "How Can Corporates Optimise Their Banking Relationships?" posted on our website.
Bank relations are among the most frequent projects we carry out with each company requires its own best solution.
Other videos from panel discussion at the Global Corporate Treasurers Forum Europe:
- The Trade-off between Global and Local Banking Relationships
- Risk Creates a Buzz at the Global Corporate Treasurers Forum Europe
- Banks versus Non-banks: Competition and Co-operation
- Marrying Treasury and Procurement
A New Information Discovery and Communication Solution for the Financial Sector
Not all social enterprise networks are a worthwhile investment, especially not when the same information can be exploited via Twitter, LinkedIn, or Facebook.
Social enterprise networks that are new data mining/knowledge sharing systems for large companies, which are meant "for employees who work with multiple IT systems and lose productivity because their current tools prevent them to access and manage mission critical data and knowledge efficiently", are a different.
These systems are gaining ground as companies increasingly strive to make data-based decisions rather than decisions based on experience and intuition.
We recently had the privilege of getting an insightful presentation of Entarena's communication platform for corporate finance/treasury that lets employees collect real-time information from existing business systems, initiate on-demand communication and use the information to make better decisions faster. Entarena was founded in 2009 and has its headquarters in Palo Alto, CA and a European office in Stuttgart, Germany.
What we found interesting is that researching this type system on the web is cumbersome, but Entarena's Twitter page is excellent for anyone interested in this new knowledge sharing and data mining system as the company tweets pertinent articles, which then help you understand the potential of such a tool and decide if your company should look more deeply into it.
http://twitter.com/#!/entarena
If you'd like further information, please contact andreas.carl@tomato.ch and we connect you with our contact!
Risk Management: A Guide and a New Blog
Gtnews just published a 2011 Buyer's Guide to Risk Management Systems. The guide looks at the "new normal" environment treasurers operate in. It includes in-depth features on the top three risks facing treasurers today: liquidity, foreign exchange (FX) and counterparty risk.
Download the 24-page pdf document! (registration required, free)
In the first of her new monthly regulation blog at gtnews, Selwyn Blair-Ford, contributing editor and head of regulatory policy at FRSGlobal, discusses the importance of diversification in today's risk-based regulatory world. (Full story... registration required, free)
^ Top
IT Execution Plan for Social Business Strategy
Your company may be one of many that don't see the point of getting into social technology, at least not yet. However, good advice from professionals shouldn't be ignored.
The Forrester blog Do You Need an IT Execution Plan for Social Business Strategy? is such an article that CIOs should read. Nigel Fenwick suggests that CIOs need to evaluate the company's present "social maturity and position IT to successfully support a social business strategy." He supports the text with good graphs.
He advises that "making the right choice now may define the rest of your career as a business leader."
Resultate der Studie "Swiss IT 2011"
Computerworld.ch hat die Resultate der Studie "Swiss IT 2011" evaluiert und Details der Studie publiziert. Veröffentliche Themen:
- IT-Bedarfsanalyse für Hardware, Software und IT-Services
- Die Angst vor dem Anwender
- Wie IT-kompetent ist das Management?
- Was die Anwender von den Anbietern halten
- Fakten, Analysen und Prognosen
- Was die Anwenderunternehmen bewegt
- Informationsmanagement: Optimieren durch Automatisieren
Die Computerworld-Spezialausgabe können Sie auch als Einzelheft zum Preis von 9.80 Franken (exkl. Versandspesen) online auf Computerworld.ch bestellen.
Wir haben die Themen täglich "ge-tweet-et". Sie können also individuelle Themen auf http://twitter.com/#!/tomatokloten verfolgen.
Gaining more Respect: Consistent Results Lead to Trust
Integrity helps to build trust, but that's not all. Results, especially consistent results over time, contribute significantly to the trust leaders create.
In his book The Speed of Trust, Stephen Covey, the author of 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, is offering advice on the relationship between competence and trust.
In the CFO.com article "All CFOs want r-e-s-p-e-c-t. But what are they doing to earn it?" Bud Kulesza, dean emeritus of the IMA Leadership Academy and former CFO at ITT Automotive, suggests that "consistent excellence by the
CFO and his or her staff helps builds the trust that brings respect and, in turn, allows finance to serve organizational needs better and faster." He relates this concept with examples from his career as CFO. (Full story...)
Covey's book is not just for CFOs; it applies to anyone in a leadership position. Check an excellent summary with headings and bullet points!
CFO Must Spell out Team's Priorities
There's a difference between priority (importance) and urgency (timing). If staff doesn't understand this clearly, they are likely to do first what was discussed last. That's because their boss didn't provide direction on where tasks fits into the priority list.
In the CFO.com article "Making Priorities a Priority: Don't leave your finance team guessing as to what they need to focus on first", Bud Kulesza argues that it is important for CFOs to "provide guidance and rank the importance of every item the team is expected to work on." He further explains how to begin the process.
This doesn't just pertain to CFOs; it applies to anyone in a leadership position.
Persistent Communication Is Key to Getting Projects Completed Quickly
Managers who heap the same messages on teams again and again get projects completed quickly. That's what research by Harvard Business School Professor Tsedal B. Neeley revealed.
In the article It's Not Nagging: Why Persistent, Redundant Communication Works Neeley argues in addition that
- Project managers who don't have direct authority will work harder at communication to enlist support from team members.
- Project managers with power tend to delay communication. They typically send an e-mail and assume that is enough to pressure employees to do the job.
- It's less the message than the frequency of the message that counts in getting the job done.
- Managers without power get employees to move more quickly and with less need to clean up later.
Which Comes First: Success or the Pursuit of Happiness?
It seems to follow naturally: If you work hard, you'll be successful and if you're more successful, you'll be happier. All you need is finding that great job or a promotion. Shawn Achor, corporate strategy consultant and a former Harvard psychology professor, argues that intelligence predicts some success, but most if it is not due to intelligence.
In The Happiness Advantage: The Seven Principles of Positive Psychology that Fuel Success and Performance at Work, happiness fuels success, not the other way around. He shows how we can capitalize on the Happiness Advantage to
improve our performance and maximize our potential.
From the Desk of Regula Spottl, Greensboro, North Carolina
Remember that I said I really want an iPad? Well, I got one for Mother's Day. Dream come true! It will take a lot of learning to optimally profit from the gadget and I'm taking baby steps. So exciting though!
It won't replace my laptop for sure but opens new opportunities. If you know of any apps that I need to get, let me know! rspottl@triad.rr.com.