Mary Jo Green, senior vice president and treasurer of Sony Corp. of America, helps shape corporate strategy for the New York City-based entertainment giant. She discussed treasury leaders' changing role with Business Finance editor John Cummings.
John Cummings: You've been with Sony Corp. of America for about five years now?
Mary Jo Green: Five years exactly.
JC: I guess you've seen some major movie releases in that time?
MJG: Absolutely! Spiderman 1 and 2 were the big ones since I've been here.
JC: It must be a very exciting business to be in.
MJG: It is extremely exciting. We are in so many diverse but related businesses. We have electronics, which is the hardware, and we have the content, which is the pictures business. And we have music, through the Sony/BMG joint venture. And then of course we have PlayStation. So it's a lot of fun.
JC: Leading a finance team in a company as diverse and decentralized as Sony Corp. of America must present some unusual opportunities and challenges.
MJG: I don't think we're as decentralized as most people would think from the outside. We have content and hardware. What we've tried to do over the years is to have the business units work with each other to see how they can offer more to the customer. From a treasury perspective, it's definitely not decentralized. As the treasurer of Sony Corp. of America, I deal with all the business units, so I'm constantly visiting them to see how I can assist them and how I can facilitate cross-company collaboration across geographies as well as the different business lines. So quite often we're looking across all the business units to see if what works in one will work in the others.
JC: When a finance leader joins a highly diverse, global organization, how does he or she go about learning its various -- and possibly very unfamiliar -- businesses?
MJG: This business was unfamiliar to me when I arrived. I came from the office equipment and mailing machines business into entertainment and electronics, so it's very different.
The first thing I did was to go out and meet with the business units, and the second thing I did was to start reading the publications that would help me learn. I read Variety; I read Entertainment Weekly. I'm always reading about the film slate -- what's coming up, who's in it. I'm reading a lot of different magazines about electronics, trying to follow up the consumer electronics shows -- what's happening, who's introducing what. On my Bloomberg terminal I have a page where I have listed the names of some of our competitors.
Also, I find that face-to-face conversations really are still the best way to share information, so I travel quite a bit. It has been five years and I'm still learning; every time I visit the businesses, I learn something new.
JC: We're seeing reports that the treasury function at many organizations is wielding increasing influence within finance, and within the company at large. Do you see a trend there?
MJG: Absolutely. I think the scope of the treasury department has increased remarkably over the last several years because we've gone way beyond cash management, foreign exchange and funding requirements. Now we're involved in more strategic issues. So any time a business unit is involved in anything that needs credit enhancement or borrowing, they come to us with the project, which we review with them and make sure it will be beneficial for the organization and is in accordance with our policies and procedures.
I've seen some treasurers that are still in the former treasury [mode], where they're just doing day-to-day cash management. Their companies aren't that international. At other companies where they are more international, or if there are acquisitions taking place, the treasurer does get pulled in because obviously at the end of the day they need the treasurer to determine the best method to pay for it. Also, if you're acquiring a business, someone has to review their treasury systems and cash levels, bank borrowings, etc. There are all sorts of issues, so more and more on the acquisition side, treasurers are getting more involved.
JC: There's a lot going on in treasury at large -- globalization, centralization ...
MJG: Yes. I think we have a sophisticated treasury operation here because what we've done in the last five years is centralize our treasury operations in London. Everything gets funneled into a central location, and we work as a group on our cash flow forecasting to know when we're going to need funding and where it makes sense to borrow. It's been much more efficient in the last few years.
JC: Is the drive toward centralization fairly general among global companies?
MJG: Sony is so large that it really made sense for us to do this because we're in so many countries with so many subsidiaries, and it would be much more costly to have every subsidiary borrowing on its own and doing its own thing. By centralizing, we've saved substantial amounts of money. We have better control over the foreign exchange; we can net positions. And instead of having surplus cash sitting in some countries, we can use that in the countries that need it. Sony has so many different businesses that it definitely makes sense to do it this way.
JC: Do you think treasurers' jobs will look very different in, say, 10 years from now?
MJG: Over the past 10 years we've become much more electronic and more efficient, and we have more safeguards in place. Because of all the electronics, fraud has become a lot easier, so we've put in more protection for that. I can see things becoming even more efficient in the future. The banks are always coming up with new products and more security.