Over the past decade, many companies' treasury teams have evolved from serving primarily as a transactional function to being much more of a strategic partner to the business. This evolution is possible largely because advancements in technology are reducing the amount of manual busy work that treasury staff must complete each day—but technology alone cannot raise the profile of the function.

"Sometimes treasury teams have to go out of our way, and shout from the mountaintops, to be heard and seen as a strategic partner," says Frank Boroch, director of treasury for Hyundai Capital America. "It can be hard to change internal perceptions, and a shift in those mind-sets has to be earned."

Getting a seat at the table in the organization's strategic decision-making requires treasury managers to prove the value their function has to offer. That is exactly what the four initiatives receiving this year's Alexander Hamilton Awards in Treasury Transformation did for their respective leadership teams.

Fernando Cebada, the vice president of corporate treasury for NH Hotel Group, describes the impact of his company's award-winning project this way: "As another outcome of all these changes, corporate treasury today is assuming a new role within the NH organization. The financial environment nowadays is subject to constant evolution, which is creating great opportunities, and we are ready to be there leading the transformation."

Here's how this year's four winners achieved true treasury transformation:

  • Honorable Mention:  The treasury team at NH Hotel Group prepared to support business growth by centralizing and standardizing global treasury processes. They gained unprecedented visibility into corporate cash positions, which enabled them to cut the company's collections cycle in half and to exercise early redemption of a 40 million euro bond.
  • Bronze Award:  Microsoft treasury revamped the processes and technologies around its more than 35,000 intercompany payments, worth more than $50 billion annually. Communication and compromise were key in developing a process with much better visibility into these transactions for everyone involved.
  • Silver Award:  A couple of years ago, Mastercard treasury was still managing several key workflows through Excel-based, or even paper-based, processes. The company deployed a highly customized treasury management system to reduce the chance of errors or oversights, while also freeing up treasury staff to focus on more value-added activities.
  • Gold Award:  At Hyundai Capital America, treasury leaders anticipated that over-reliance on asset-backed borrowing would limit business agility in the future. They prepared to better support the organization's financing needs by undertaking a number of innovative funding strategies. Selling the new capital structure to stakeholders required effort, but ultimately treasury was successful in significantly reducing the proportion of corporate debt that is encumbered.

Congratulations to all four organizations! And thank you to the judges of this year's competition: Jean-Francois Heitz, former deputy CFO and treasurer of Microsoft; Craig Jeffery, managing partner of Strategic Treasurer; Marie Hollein, former president and CEO of Financial Executives International; and Prashant Patri, a principal in Deloitte's Global Treasury Advisory Services practice.

Finally, thank you very much to ION, GTreasury, and Citi for sponsoring this year's Alexander Hamilton Awards program. Stay tuned for additional articles and webcasts throughout the year to recognize the winners in our other categories, as well as the winner of the 2019 Alexander Hamilton Overall Excellence Award.

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Alexander Hamilton Awards