Over the years, the role of the treasurer has evolved from a mainly operational function to something more strategic that involves board-level accountability and the responsibility to help manage enterprise-wide risks. At its most basic, the treasurer must safeguard the assets of a company and manage liquidity to support the operations of the company’s principal business. This task is complicated by the minute-to-minute fluctuations in the financial markets and was never more challenging than during the recent financial crisis. In an online exclusive article for Risk Management, Andrew Woods of SunGard suggests that these circumstances demonstrate the need for treasurers to utilize the latest technology and risk management best practices in order to get a better picture of their organization’s risk profile.
Effective use of technology is the only way a treasurer who manages global exposures can consolidate and analyze information quickly and accurately. Automating the exposure management process eliminates errors, creating opportunities for optimal cost savings and risk reduction. By interacting with enterprise resource planning (ERP) and accounting systems and other exposure data sources, treasurers and risk managers are able to accurately identify, quantify and manage exposures based on complete data, with minimal dependence on IT or finance.
To read the full article, be sure to visit RMmagazine.com.