Critical questions treasury leaders need to ask themselves and their teams.
With a variety of challenges squeezing profits and increasing competition for commercial customers, financial institutions (FIs) are re-evaluating the role of treasury management.
- Is it a back-office function primarily in support of commercial (i.e., loan) relationships?
- Or, is it a self-sustaining sales and service organization that generates clients, deposits, revenue and value for the FI?
By far, most FIs today still view customer service as treasury management’s primary responsibility; well over half of the senior treasury leaders interviewed by Capital Performance Group reported customer service as treasury’s number one objective.
However, they also believe that the greatest risk for FIs of any size is to ignore the new realities facing treasury and take a “status quo” approach.
To size up the value of your treasury management opportunity, ask these questions:
- What is the primary purpose of treasury management for our FI?
- What is our approach to technology and Fintechs?
- What is our value proposition?
- How are we differentiating ourselves from other financial institutions and from Fintechs?
- How is our client experience better than the competition?
- Where are we doing to attract, develop and retain the next generation of treasury management talent?
The answers may surprise you—especially if there’s a sizable disparity among internal stakeholders. While there is no single formula for treasury management success, the best approach is one with a clear vision, adequate resources and the full support of the entire organization.
Up next in our treasury management series: How customer experience and technology innovation are changing treasury management.
This content is accurate at the time of publication and may not be updated.
