CONTENTS | Winter 2017/18 CONTENTS 4 | The Financial Zone


Round up of the main stories in finance in the UK and around the world


6 | The Big Interview Brian McArthur-Muscroſt on the challenges facing the payments industry


10 | Invest in Flexibility


Jose Carvalho on what FDs need to know about millennials


12 | Under Attack Cyber security special by Matt Smith and Robert Rutherford


18 | Trouble Ahead? Communications expert Andy Berry on how to protect your reputation


20 | Whisky Galore


Daniel Evans travels to Scotland to unearth a Loch Lomond secret


24 | Drive for Safety Dr Jim Golby with some timely advice for fleet managers


28 | Target Tax


A personal view from Derek Bates on how to make tax simple


30 | Pensions Special Andrew Vaughan from Barnett Waddingham, IFA Tony Lloyd and Aon’s Andrew Grime


39 | Global Perspective


Lesley Batchelor OBE, Director General of the Institute of Export and International Trade


40 | Future proofing cash flow Why Concur’s Dafydd Llewellyn wishes he could look into a crystal ball


42 | On The Right Road


How Goodwood contributes £245m to the UK economy


48 | The End Zone Saj Manzoor, CFO at McCann London, talks about his working life


dofonline.co.uk


Working out which figures to follow...


umbers are what most FDs and CFOs spend their days poring over so let’s start with a couple of seemingly contradictory ones. According to leading recruitment company Hays, nearly 70% of City firms will be looking to hire more staff in 2018 to


deal with new rules and changing technologies. Yes, Brexit is a concern but the big companies are putting that on the bench as they need to deal with what they see as more immediate issues. As Mark Staniland, managing director of Hays London City, told us:


“Despite market uncertainty, financial organisations are continuing to hire as regulatory changes come into play and digital advancements are creating the need for organisations to constantly adapt and remain up-to-date.” Good news indeed for those, like us, who are interested in the health of the financial sector as the update to the Markets in Financial Instruments Directive (Mifid II) as well as the arrival of the General Data Protection Regulation in May mean workloads will increase. Add to that the daily stories on cyber security breaches – just ask any of Uber’s 57 million passengers about the latest problem – and you can see why recruitment might be on the up. And these developments are feeding through to higher salaries with the


most recent data from the Association of Professional Staffing Companies showing pay increasing by 3.8% in the City in the year to the end of October. Another set of numbers, however, came my way at the National


Enterprise Network conference at NatWest’s London offices in Bishopsgate the other day where the big brains from EY presented a talk on artificial intelligence. Among a huge amount of research, one figure stood out. When it comes to working in some areas of tax code, in three seconds a computer can now do the work which once took a trained and talented EY accountant 15 hours. Actually, it’s less than three seconds and, to make things worse, the computer has ‘greater accuracy’. That piece of information was the one that everyone was talking about in the aſternoon break. If what was once the responsibility of a senior executive over a couple of days can now be done with the press of a button in less time than it takes to pour a cup of coffee, then we really are living in a quickly changing world. What these contrasting figures actually mean will occupy the thoughts and actions of FDs across the UK and around the world in the coming months and, rest assured, we here at Director of Finance magazine will be analysing all the theories and keeping you ahead of the game.


Daniel Evans Editor, Director of Finance


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DIRECTOR OF FINANCE


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