Treasury leaders: paths to success – interview with Gerrit Willem Gramser, Group Treasurer at AkzoNobel

January 8, 2025

We sat down with Gerrit Willem Gramser, Group Treasurer at AkzoNobel – a leading global paints and coatings company.

As Group Treasurer at AkzoNobel, Gerrit Willem Gramser, GW in short, manages a global team of 35 people. Over the last 30 years, he has built a successful career for himself in finance and treasury, working for some of the most well-known companies in the Netherlands.

Before joining AkzoNobel in 2009, he worked at Philips in treasury, HR’s compensation and benefits team and in the corporate post-merger integration team.

Can you tell us about your current role?

As Group Treasurer of AkzoNobel, I am responsible for the company’s treasury and insurance activities. We have a centralised treasury setup which is now entirely functionalised. We have team members in multiple locations – Shanghai (Asia), Sao Paulo (the Americas), Amsterdam (EMEA and global) – but work as one team. Our setup is highly automated, and we like to keep things simple and straightforward.

The role reports to the Chief Financial Officer (CFO) and sits in the finance leadership team, as treasury is an integral part of the finance function.

My scope is in line with what you would expect and includes capital structuring, financial risk management, cash management, treasury technology, M&A funding and insurance.

Tell us about your journey working in treasury. Were there any key moments that shaped your path?

I have always had an interest in shaping the world of finance.

So, after my master’s in business economics at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, I was drawn towards finance, banking and treasury which tend to be more future-oriented than accounting which looks more into the past.

In my first job at Rabobank, I got the opportunity to work on one of their (then) new and niche products – interest rate derivatives – as a Sales Trader. I loved the dynamics of banking and financial markets and learned a lot. But soon I felt the pull to further expand my knowledge and so decided to make a move into the corporate world, joining Philips. There, I was introduced to the corporate side of finance, funding and bond issuance.

A few years later, an interesting proposition within Philips came by, which was to help HR redefining their long-term incentive plans. A super nice role that allowed me to create new policies and build cross-functional processes. It also exposed me to board room dynamics, since whatever the position, everyone has a view on their personal compensation.

The success of this somewhat unconventional move also opened the door to another new project within Philips, the formation of a central post-merger integration team.

I got involved in over 40 M&A deals and ten integrations and it was truly an invaluable experience.

In 2009, I was approached to join AkzoNobel as they had recently acquired ICI and formed a new team to run the integrations and treasury transformation. Together with the team, we worked on this massive transformation project for a good part of three years. The programme included implementing new technology, state-of-the-art processes, building a payment factory and in-house bank and ended up earning external recognition and multiple awards.

In 2016, I stepped up to the role of Group Treasurer. Soon after, I was met with the biggest challenge of my career as PPG made a hostile takeover bid on AkzoNobel. Capital structure became pinnacle and forefront of all discussions, which elevated my role. We had to split the company – AkzoNobel keeping the paints and coatings business and the chemicals business (now Nouryon) being sold off, which was a massive exercise.

After the separation, as a new board was created and a new CFO appointed, also finance embarked on a transformation journey. Ultimately, we were able to pull everything off successfully, creating a highly automated and efficient finance function.

What do you value most about working in treasury?

There are so many things I like about treasury.

I get to be at the forefront of finance, to bring external dynamics and provide forward looking perspectives to my company.

The day is never boring; there are always new challenges, and we get to play a role in defining creative responses and solutions with strategic relevance.

The people around me are my biggest motivators. I enjoy working with my team in treasury, and finance at large. Mentoring and guiding them is very fulfilling. It also energises me to interact with various people throughout my day – different teams in the business, senior management and the board, bankers and consultants.

What has been the most challenging period in your treasury career and how did you deal with it?

The biggest highlight and challenge of my career was during the period of the hostile takeover bid by PPG of AkzoNobel. There was immense external pressure as so many things were happening at the same time. People kept leaving and there was a constant revolving door and teams and processes had to be cloned and split up. It was very intense.

I chose to stay and treat this as a learning experience.

I kept my focus and stayed close to my team members to get through the difficult period together. In the end, it taught me so much and I would not be as experienced a Group Treasurer as I am now.

Why did you want to become a Head of Treasury?

I wasn’t actually sure that I wanted to become a Head of Treasury. I never really planned my career. What I did was follow my nose and do things that excited me.

As I am pretty entrepreneurial, I prefer doing new things rather than things that have already been established and hence frequently shaped my roles to what I would like.

All my experiences ended up merging in a good way for me to become a successful Head of Treasury.

How has the role of treasury evolved since you first started? How do you see it changing in the future?

In my years in treasury, the function has definitely become more strategic and embedded in finance. In the past, we were more an advisor while others called the shots. Now, we get more ownership to act and make things happen.

In the future, I believe treasury will be integrated further with the rest of finance. As technology improves, there will be more automation of end-to-end processes.

Finance will be a seamless function with value creation at the touchpoints with other (external) processes, which is for treasury the interaction with the financial markets and banks.

If you could go back to the beginning of your career, is there anything you would do differently?

I very much like what I do now, so I don’t have many regrets. At some point in my career though, I did think that I would eventually like to take on a CFO role. However, that would have meant a little more planning on my part.

What I would advise for someone interested to move from treasury onto the CFO path, or even to become Group Treasurer one day, is that both depth and breadth are important.

Speak to other finance professionals, take action and raise your hand to rotate through different finance functions.

Just explore as many areas as possible of the profession that you can.

What key skills do you think treasury leaders need to be successful?

Technical expertise – know your stuff! Develop depth and breadth in finance.

Brain power – be curious to learn and expand yourself. Get better at adapting, reflecting and analysing to come forward with plans. Foster the ability to switch perspectives quickly, from high-level strategic to low-level journal entries, all at the same time!

Leadership capabilities – you can only be as successful as your team. Be engaging with and fuel cooperation amongst them.

Find the right balance between being technical and also being a people person.

Learn to manage stakeholders and align yourself with the right people who will propel you forward and not backward. Build a close connect with your CFO and finance leadership team and have each other’s backs so that you can keep your strategic edge and stay effective (especially when it comes to external negotiations).