CFO Conversations: Ben Edmonds on People, Strategy, and Finance Transformation

Navigating the People-Centric Transformation in Finance

In this episode of the Books to the Boardroom, season three of the CFO Catalyst Podcast, host Sumith is joined by Ben Edmonds, CFO at Alberts in Sydney. The conversation covers Ben's career journey from an early interest in tourism management to becoming a CFO, highlighting the influence of his father and his practical experiences in various financial roles. 

Ben emphasises the transformative nature of the CFO role, the importance of people and leadership in business, and the evolving landscape of accounting. He also discusses the significance of digital transformation, ESG initiatives, and the challenges young CFOs face today. 

Ben provides insights into managing change, maintaining professional development, and balancing technical skills with human interaction. The episode concludes with advice for aspiring finance professionals on building a successful career in accounting.

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Transcript

Ben Edmonds-CFO Audio

Ben Edmonds: [00:00:00] My quote is that all businesses are people businesses, and that applies whether you are, say, my father-in-law who's a tradie, or us maybe primarily these days, a family office to anyone working in a professional accounting firm. I, I think it's all about people being able to connect and communicate with people and getting the most out of people in the best ways possible, which for me is very much about hopefully leading through, inspiring and not getting things done through.

Ben Edmonds: Say the The stick approach. 

Sumith: Welcome back to Books to the Boardroom, season three CFO Catalyst Podcast. Today my special guest is Ben Edmonds. Ben is the CFO at Alberts in Sydney. Ben, great to have you on our podcast. 

Ben Edmonds: Thanks for having me. Sumith. 

Sumith: Ben, I know you sort of start your career in accounting because you've gotta put influence from your father who was a finance controller, so you grew up in that environment.

Sumith: So tell me how your journey shaped with your father's influence. [00:01:00] 

Ben Edmonds: Sure. So I came outta school and, and got into a uni course in tourism management, which I didn't wanna do. And to be honest, at this point in time, I can't even recall why I selected that. I had a chat with, with dad and, and a bit of a look at, at what he did for a living and decided I would give accounting a go.

Ben Edmonds: So he was the financial controller at Matchbox Toys. Which meant back in the late eighties and nineties, we would sometimes spend our weekends at the Matchbox head office in a showroom full of toys that had not been released to the market 

Sumith: opportunity. Right. 

Ben Edmonds: That was my sister and I with a room full of toys whilst dad was upstairs working toys that no one had ever seen before.

Ben Edmonds: It was, yeah, it was pretty cool, but. I guess that that's where the initial idea that start accounting came from. 

Sumith: Right. And so you did academy subjects at the high school or when you were at, at, at the early stage, or you, you only started with uni course. How did that happen? 

Ben Edmonds: So I, I did business studies, I guess did accounting as, as part of that.

Ben Edmonds: But [00:02:00] really I went to TAFE rather than committing to a degree at that point, just so I could get a bit of a taster, did a certificate three, and then immediately went into full-time work. So at 18. I got a full-time job at LG Electronics and then I completed my tape studies part-time, then moved straight into my degree whilst working full-time as well.

Ben Edmonds: Finished that and then rode straight into CPA, so all up with a couple of breaks here and there, including to get married. It took about 10 years and pretty much studied and worked full-time the entire time. 

Sumith: It looks like you have a very linear career and then education as well for me from the accounting perspective, but have you ever been a moment where you.

Sumith: Consider that, you know, a completely different direction to go? 

Ben Edmonds: Honestly, no. I started as a, a junior accounts payable clerk at LG Electronics, probably one of the most junior people in the company, and I think I was the second youngest person out of 300 odd people in the entire company at 18. I [00:03:00] didn't know anything about what I was doing at the time.

Ben Edmonds: I didn't know whether I would like it or whether I would be good at it. I just found in time that I think some of the, the sort of natural qualities that I have in terms of say, attention to detail and just sort of drive to, to get things done, see things through, they were just naturally suited to, to a career in accounting.

Ben Edmonds: So once I saw some success at work, man, I was getting progressed through the ranks and simultaneously was studying and, and getting good marks and, and really was able to apply. Instantly what I had learnt in, in a practical sense at work. I mean, just kind of snowballed there. There was never any moment where I doubted the path that I was on in and what I was doing.

Ben Edmonds: It just became more motivating. 

Sumith: So now you're a CFO of a large private owned company, and how do you see that now you're A CFO and there's a career opportunities as well. So as an accountant, so how we have seen that the change or the transformation for the CFO career? Because you [00:04:00] probably would've worked on the number of CFOs and now you're A CFO.

Sumith: So how do you see that the includes coming from the CCEs and now you are the benchmark for your successes. So how do you see the transformation, what you learned, and then what exactly what has to, to your Unity upload to the upcoming finance corporations? 

Ben Edmonds: It's interesting because if I go back to my first CFO over 20 years ago.

Ben Edmonds: I think culturally it was in a very different company to the one I work in now. And I think even just as a society, things were a little bit different back then. I liked my CFO, but you know, there'd be times where I'd pass him in the hall and I might say, good morning, and he would just keep washing.

Ben Edmonds: Perhaps that was more acceptable at the time, or maybe it was just more of, of a reflection of the corporate culture rather than what was even considered the sort of norm or acceptable. But it, it does feel like. Now, and certainly where I work now, but also the people in my network and who I interact with.

Ben Edmonds: It's much more, I guess, kind of open in terms of communication, in terms [00:05:00] of hierarchy, there's no barriers. Certainly where we work now from the CEO to perhaps the most junior role in the company or in the open plan as a lot of businesses now are 20 years ago, that that wasn't really the case. And there's just a nice open flow of, of communication.

Ben Edmonds: So I mean, that that's, that's one. Change. And so I guess in that regard, I, I feel like I, I probably didn't learn a whole lot from that experience. I also worked at a few companies after where we didn't have a CFO. In fact, the role I have now, it's a, a progression of the previous role I had where I was the head of finance and we hadn't had a CFO for about 600 years.

Ben Edmonds: Certainly had a lot of exposure to CFOs in other businesses and, and I've mentors and things, but hadn't sort of worked under a CFO for quite a while. So I probably take more inspiration from other leaders around the business. For example, my, my CEO now, in terms of his demeanor, how he carries himself, his level of professionalism, which I, I just think is of [00:06:00] the highest order.

Ben Edmonds: One key thing that I've, I've definitely tried to emulate, and I did get this from the last CFO, had circa kind of six, seven years ago, was just that demeanor piece. I mean, we. We are balancing so many things, both in terms of our professional lives and our personal lives, and just perhaps even just a range of other considerations and, you know, someone that can kind of manage that and that kind of level of, of stress.

Ben Edmonds: And we, we always liken it to the, the sort of duck on the water where the legs underneath, they going a million miles now, but on top it's just calm, cruising along. It's kind of how I, I like to carry myself. It's certainly how my CEO. My current CEO Carrie himself and how my former CFO displayed in terms of demeanor.

Sumith: Yeah, that's an interesting point you mentioned then regarding the transformation, like I was also exposed to that hierarchy high departments when I started and now we have a different short run. You everyone's equal and like what you said, it's an open plan and everyone's pretty much in a flat structure [00:07:00] and we had to learn the in a different way, but now we had to houses transform into the way that is.

Sumith: Required in the market right now. So it's, we are the sort of condu in between that in hierarchy and then the paper people centric of finance or the, the business operation. So how challenging was it at the beginning for you to sort of build that kind of a rapport, rapport with your colleagues? I don't think it 

Ben Edmonds: was challenging.

Ben Edmonds: I think it was natural. I, I feel like the world around me just started aligning with how I naturally am and wanted to be. I would never wanna be the person who walks down the hallway and doesn't acknowledge someone. If, if they say hello to me and I'm the kind of person that will walk around the office, usually I say goodnight to everyone that's still there before I leave and making sure that I haven't sort of miss someone who might be sitting around the corner, for example, I very much value people and relationships and I guess earlier in my career it was more about debits and credits and, and obviously what I do now, I.

Ben Edmonds: I still need [00:08:00] to understand that, but it's very much turned into, obviously it's a leadership role now. It's about people and it's about getting things done through people. And to me the best way to do that is through building rapport. 

Sumith: That's, that's wonderful because the misconception in the market is like when you say accountant or the C four, they think we only work with numbers, but especially when you are where the C pulls at.

Sumith: So you have a people management more than anything else. So I think you have a payments code as well. You mentioned to me and, and we were talking before recording, I think it's a great one to sort of tell. 

Ben Edmonds: Yeah, sure. So when I first started at Alberts, were mainly a music visits. So we had recording studios, we were still signing artists.

Ben Edmonds: We had a staff of 20 or 25. It was a fully fledged music business. And we had a guy, a senior guy within the team who used to say, you know, the music business, it's a people business. And for me, my, my quote is that all businesses are people businesses, and that applies whether you are, say, my father-in-law who's a tradie, or us maybe primarily [00:09:00] these days, a family office to anyone working in a professional accounting firm.

Ben Edmonds: I, I think it's all about people being able to connect in, communicate with people, getting the most out of people in the best ways possible, which for me is very much about hopefully leading through, inspiring and not getting things done through. Say the the stick approach. 

Sumith: So it's a for, for CFOs, like we need to have certain amount of technicality as well.

Sumith: For you to be A CFO running the finance strategy for a company at the same time you had to balance it with the human element or the relationship building, working with the team, the other soft skills as well. So what's your approach to balance these two then? Do you do anything specifically to sort of make sure that you are somehow balance these two elements?

Ben Edmonds: I've found that that's quite a challenging thing for you because certainly the more you move away from debits and credits and, and reconciliations and as, as the years literally go by where you're not. On the tools, you do start to forget what you knew. For me, [00:10:00] I need to maintain a certain level of, of knowledge of those things, but I also need to be able to let those things go.

Ben Edmonds: So it's trying to find the right balance. And certainly the key for me, and this has been certainly more of a, an important factor in recent times, is just having the best people around me. Finding the best people in the first instance, and then retaining. Those people and building trust in the fact that they're down there in the weeds on the debits and credits on the recs.

Ben Edmonds: I trust the information that's coming up to me so I don't have to get down there, but getting enough exposure to that, that I'm not receiving, you know, reports and things, my mind isn't instantly clicking into this is how these. Numbers came about or in terms of interpreting them? I think still understanding the fundamentals of how they came to be is is quite important.

Ben Edmonds: So it's about trying to get enough exposure, but also not so much that you're back down on the tools that you can sort of let people focus on, on what you've hired them to do and that there's that trust that they're giving you the right data. 

Sumith: That's true. And [00:11:00] you're a member of CP I'm sure you will probably do some continuous professional development as a part of the membership obligation.

Sumith: How important is it for, you know, for us more voluntarily than just because it is a requirement for, for us to 

Ben Edmonds: maintain the membership? Again, it's, it's been hard to find the time to do those things. I also think we perhaps do them. In ways that may not be as obvious as, as they were a few years ago. You know, you might go to a bunch of courses and seminars, or you might go and do maybe a, a formal qualification somewhere.

Ben Edmonds: I, I think my exposure just to people and I, perhaps some of this stuff isn't necessarily recognized by CP in terms of CPD, but just the networking piece, just being out and about, talking to people, learning from other people, trying to pair that with things that do kind of tick the CPD box of probably how I stay up to date, but it, it is hard.

Ben Edmonds: To find time to do those cpdr I've found, and, and the more I sort of progress with my career, the harder I'm finding that. 

Sumith: I completely agree. The part that you said, like we [00:12:00] learn a lot from those informal conversations that we have then the structured courses or webinars or any other format, but unfortunately that's no way to measure that or recognize that in the program.

Sumith: But, but, but we learn a lot from the other people. We learn a lot from talking to them. We learn a lot from working with them. So, yeah. Anyway, so that's a conversation that we will have to have with the CPA Australia at some point and see how we can get better, something that they can recognize as part of CPD.

Ben Edmonds: I honestly think it's important for them to do what they're doing in terms of maybe not making it too broad, because I think at that point people might start to take advantage of the whole situation and, and I mean, ultimately you want people to make sure. They're maintaining their technical knowledge and upholding that professional standard that the CPA and for the CPA to do that they do, like us doing the study and the tests in the first instance, they, they have to make it relatively hard, otherwise everyone would do it.

Ben Edmonds: And if they lower the standard [00:13:00] too far, you ultimately just lower that perception of what you know, being. CPA means inside. 

Sumith: Great point. And we have to be mindful that the position is transforming anyway, like the CFO's role or the public accountants role when you're running a firm yourself or whatever.

Sumith: So it's changing as well. So there's a bigger part that still I don't think in the equation. So we only still looking at the technicality, but I think since I'm on both side of the pains. I can see that there's a bigger part on the other side as well that's very important for you to be successful as a CPA.

Sumith: Well, I, I would take a segue here, Ben, just to get your percept about the topics in the CFO market. They're the buzzword these days pretty much, right? So digital transformation for finance, I think it is something that we all try to embrace because it's going to give us the benefit of, because finances is always under-resourced, so you have to somehow optimize how you work.

Sumith: To create the requirements of the right business needs. So what are your thoughts about the partners transformation and [00:14:00] how do you apply those concepts and the methods in your business? 

Ben Edmonds: I mean, it's something that we. I'm probably trying to do a bit more of at Albert Alberts, but I guess there, there's sort of two sides of of the coin, which are perhaps fairly obvious is the opportunity for using tech and AI to improve efficiencies, to improve accuracy, which hopefully elevates accountants to the point of data interpretation analysis, coming up with meaningful and and useful insights as opposed to just straight.

Ben Edmonds: Data entry, the cyber of the role that you know when you start out is, is probably not that, not all interesting. And I was reflecting in preparation for, for this podcast on when I first started at lg, we had a role in the team that was purely to process inbound logistics, invoices. And the person doing this literally received a stack of invoices about 30 or 40 centimeters high every day or week.

Ben Edmonds: I, I can't recall, but hard copy. [00:15:00] They would punch them into the system. I think there was five different codes that they could possibly use. It's all they did every day. And I think there are potentially benefits of having a role like that in terms of starting on the ground floor, perhaps building up some, some resilience in terms of having a job that is perhaps not that that fascinating, but you think about the possibilities now with, with tech and, and ai and I suspect maybe even years ago that role had already been consumed by, by such things.

Ben Edmonds: And that person might now be doing something a lot more interesting and inspiring, which maybe leads them to, to stick with their career. So there's the the whole efficiency, accuracy thing. And then the other side is just the people. And I think you're right that there is this perception that tech will take over.

Ben Edmonds: There won't be jobs for accountants and the accounting professional suffer. I feel like people are already starting to make that call themselves in anticipation. And I'm sure we both. I have read about there being a shortage of accountants. I heard from some recruiter contacts [00:16:00] recently that enrollments are about a half of what they were five years ago in terms of accounting qualifications.

Ben Edmonds: So perhaps because of the, the perception of maybe not a, a long-term career prospect in accounting, but also I think the profession suffers from other issues in terms of maybe not being the most exciting as well. Which I mean, that has been the same since you and I started and also pay. I, I think on a relative basis, other professions might be paying better, but it does seem to be translating into lower numbers of accountants and that, that makes me sad because this has been a fantastic career choice for me.

Ben Edmonds: I, I love what I do. As I said before, I've, I've never deviated from this path. I've had exposure to so many different businesses and, and different situations from. Inside these businesses, I've been able to do some travel around the world. I've met some fascinating people. It's just been amazing, and it would be sad for people to miss out on things like that because of maybe a, a sort of wrong perception of what [00:17:00] it is.

Sumith: I couldn't agree more, Ben, because even when I first started account, of course, it was boring at that time. Even I chose that one because of my passion. But now the accounting is very different. It's like a passport now. It's a traceable skillset. And you can operate from anywhere, for any country or any profession, right?

Sumith: And you can even elevate yourself to A CEO or other disciplines as well. So I think we have the key, as the accountants to transform me to anything today what I do is for purely mastering and is like, I don't touch the accounting anymore, right? But I enjoy, I, and I really have the benefit of have that solid foundation for my camp to do what I do today.

Ben Edmonds: There are not many other career parts that I can think of that. Give you that broad exposure to any business, how the business operates, the touch points across sales, marketing, logistics, exec administration, like you name it. If you're in the finance team, and if you know like me, you've done literally every single role and probably performed every task that an accountant can possibly perform [00:18:00] over 20 odd years.

Ben Edmonds: You touch on everything and you, you kind of get spat out the other side with this well-rounded understanding of just how do businesses work. 

Sumith: That's right. It's basically, it's a, like what I said, like a passport. I think this is the best time to be an accountant. That's my kind of thought, because when me was starting, it was art.

Sumith: It's a. Very tough discipline, like you had to go through the hurdle of the exams and then of course, tough workload, like what you said. You know, sometimes you get a fight of documents to process through, but you don't have any of those things. Now you can be more human, can be more impactful and you can sort of happy.

Sumith: What you're doing and the, the recognition that you get is even higher than what, what we had before. Because I think the business, like us, we work with lots of people in the art in our industry like music industry and ESG. This is another big part in now is the conversation in the CFO world. And for the large or the corporate business, it's mandatory now, but I think it's, it doesn't need to be mandatory for people to think about that and [00:19:00] sort of incorporate them in the business because it's a wonderful thing to do beyond the financials.

Sumith: And how do you embrace the ESG in your business? Where it should go or where it is right now? 

Ben Edmonds: Yeah. I mean, this is something that we've absolutely done a lot of work on and have probably more than embraced it. It is a core component of our strategy. So far, I go back in time. So I've been with Abbots for just over 10 years and, and have worked from the management accountant level up to, to CFO in that time.

Ben Edmonds: So again, even just at Abbots, I've, I've had a sort of real broad range of, of experiences and, and have seen a lot, but I. Almost kind of halfway into that, we made a decision to really switch the business to be focused on having a positive impact. As part of that as well, we came up with four themes that we really wanted to focus on, which were, um, a quality sustainability, healthy mines, and vibrant culture.

Ben Edmonds: We have a, I guess, a core vehicle that, that we've been utilizing to invest [00:20:00] in line with those teams, which has been a, an early stage venture capital. We, we call it a fund, but it's all self-funded by, by the Alberts. So at the moment we have, I think, 22 early stage investments. So pre-seed seat and series A with every single one.

Ben Edmonds: Having one of those, or sometimes multiple of those impact themes at their core. We also have a, a philanthropic foundation called the Tony Foundation, which does use music to create positive change through its granting, but we also pivoted the investment portfolio, so it's a private ancillary fund. We pivoted the investment portfolio that sits behind it so we can have a, a more holistic approach to, to impact for the foundations.

Ben Edmonds: We now invest along the, the lines of our responsible investing framework, which has positive and negative screens. Effectively. It's a sort of positive impact investment portfolio that's also attached to the impact that the granting out of the foundation has, and that's been quite a positive thing for us to, to see a shift in that.

Ben Edmonds: We also do other things in terms of [00:21:00] advocacy. So we have a, a music education program and get music education as a priority back into schools, particularly primary schools. That's, it even has its own website. It's point, it's definitely a, one of the key things that we're focused on. It's a wonderful thing.

Ben Edmonds: My son is a, a 9-year-old drummer, so I see that from a personal perspective as well. And I see the lack of support he gets at school in terms of his music education and, and what we're trying to do in that regard. It's, it's a really positive thing. And then obviously all the benefits to come with.

Ben Edmonds: Children having a music education and how that applies to other parts life. The next frontier, I guess for us as a business is embedding our impact mandate and, and themes, also our focus on dei, our focus in terms of. Backing pioneers. And also, yeah, taking a, a sort of leadership and, and advocacy approach for all this.

Ben Edmonds: So hopefully we're inspiring others, but we would like to take those things and apply them to every other, I guess, asset and operation across the business. So we have a sort of core investment portfolio. [00:22:00] We have commercial property, we have rural property, we've got a music copyrights that we retained, making sure that holistically we're, we're having impact in all of those various areas.

Sumith: Sounds like a great plan. My love, the, the initiatives you are already taken on this subject and yeah, that's very impactful to, you know, course for the word at the end of the day. So we only can't think about today, right? So we don't think about the future and you know, the people who are coming. So wonderful.

Sumith: And also now since we discussed about this skill shortage as well, at some point we don't have enough accounting professionals that we can find locally. And I think one of the, the options is to outsource or offshore it. I do similar business as well. So what's your exposure to running ing operation or outsource team or offshore team and what are the sort of complexities if you have already done it?

Ben Edmonds: We had a really close look at this recently because we were about to do a, a junior high and not for any cost saving reasons, but just because we were finding that [00:23:00] there's still a lot of volume around in terms of people applying for junior accounting and finance roles. The quality seems like it's perhaps not at a level as five or 10 years ago.

Ben Edmonds: So we had spoken with those in the network who've outsourced their, their finance function, particularly to the Philippines. That's quite a popular outsource location at this point. And just to try and perhaps increase the quality of candidate we were getting through. We did quite a bit of DD on a, on a firm based out of the Philippines.

Ben Edmonds: We ended up doing a slight restructure of, of the team and, and didn't pursue that model, but. Did see through the DD process that there's a lot to think about. And I think it is, it's a bit of a leap if you haven't done anything like that before. And for us to execute on that, I think it absolutely would've, would've been a leap and certainly outside the norm in terms of what we've ever done.

Ben Edmonds: But I, I still, I totally understand. And if we were gonna hire at that level again, we'd probably take the same approach. Why you would do that in the search for, for quality, which comes back to [00:24:00] what we're saying before about. The lower number of people enrolling in accounting qualifications and just that shortage of accountants, even though it does feel like the career prospects still remain.

Sumith: Yeah, so I love what you said, the the reasons for outsource is not, not for the cost benefit, right, which is a parity condition anyway. I think we need to do that, but more wider purpose for the continuity, for the quality, or to sort of free up our time of the team members time and do those kind of more strategic reasons.

Sumith: And I always say. To my prospects and the clients sometimes don't outsource just to get the cost benefit. That's probably not the best thing that you can get out. Plus, don't do it when you are in a crisis. 

Ben Edmonds: I think any change, right, any significant change, you need the, the sort of bandwidth to be able to manage that, that process.

Ben Edmonds: This certainly would've been a significant change for us. We'd like to think that if we execute on it, that we just have the bandwidth that in terms of, yeah, managing that person because it would've been. Like a higher, that person would've been basically an Albert's staff member [00:25:00] just based in the Philippines.

Ben Edmonds: Completely different to how we've ever done that before. And we are a, we're a hybrid working model. We, we work three days in and two days to work from home. So to have someone who is a hundred percent work from home in the Philippines, very different for us. And also from a, a cultural perspective, um, we very much value.

Ben Edmonds: Face-to-face interactions, and we all come together on a Wednesday. That's our all staff day, but the whole team ends up seeing each other quite a bit across the course of the week, working in three days. So to have someone that, it would've been a, a big, big shift for us. 

Sumith: And looking ahead, what do you think the biggest challenges for up young and upcoming ca fours in Australia?

Ben Edmonds: I think for me it's probably that shift to selecting and utilizing the right technology, which could be replacing, selecting and perhaps not utilizing is the right word, but selecting and, and having the right people. It just feels like there's a proliferation of tech [00:26:00] out there at the moment, and it can be quite hard to, to know what is the right thing to utilize, what's the right sort of fit for purpose tech for what you're trying to do.

Ben Edmonds: Then also questions around whether some of the earlier stage tech will even be around itself in a period of time, because it just feels like it's all happening so fast. We certainly have ended up with sort of different apps and systems and things where we're trying to rationalize that at the moment because we, we just have so much, it's kind of hard to keep track of what we have and, and what does what.

Ben Edmonds: But yeah, I think that's one of the big challenges using tech, selecting the right tech, and again, coming back to what I said for. I hope that doesn't mean that where we, and we currently have a team of six, including me in finance, where we had six, that we only need three. I'd like to think we still have six, but you know, those people are spending their time on more sort of value adding tasks rather than just straight data entry 

Sumith: and then in final thought for [00:27:00] the CFOs or something, your experience that you have and you think you better tell them.

Sumith: Okay, so do this now. So then you are ready for the future? 

Ben Edmonds: I mean, I, I have, as I said to you earlier, before we started, I have lots of advice for the young people and people trying to get into finance. I mean, if I think about my own journey, starting at the bottom, working hard, doing the time as well, and just putting my head down and getting into it, it's, it's kind of, you know, led me to where I'm now.

Ben Edmonds: I, I think it, it does feel like. People wanna kind of jump to halfway or, or jump straight to the top, that they don't wanna sort of take the the necessary step-by-step approach. I just think it's so important in terms of learning the foundations. And again, as I said earlier, for me now looking at a set of numbers, I can see and understand exactly where they have come from, because I've done every step in the process to get to that point.

Ben Edmonds: So that's important. As I mentioned before, just general advice for looking to get in into finance or businesses or people, businesses, but make [00:28:00] sure you can communicate. Accountants are perhaps inherently introverted. Step outside of your shell. Show people your personality, who you are. Don't be afraid to be yourself and and connect with people.

Ben Edmonds: I think it's just so important to connect and to do that, I think you really do need to just show people your personality. Another one I always say, which I'm sure people are sick of hearing, that are in my world, is it's easy to do the easy things. And for me, that's when you're starting at your first job, the most fundamental stuff.

Ben Edmonds: Turn up on time, be professional, be willing to take on tasks, even if they're not the most fascinating things, the, the pile of invoices that we talked about. You know, take notes, write down actions, and make sure you complete them. Really important. I find that a lot of people don't even do those, those fundamentalism.

Ben Edmonds: Those are the things that I see as easy things. So it's easy to do easy things. Couple of others manage up not down as well. That whole concept of understanding, and particularly as perhaps you're sort of moving up through the ranks and [00:29:00] perhaps you are a manager yourself, but always looking both sides, understanding who's above you, how they like to work, what they value, what they want, how they wanna be communicated with, and adapt to the different styles around you.

Ben Edmonds: I'll give you one more one that I, I've always relied on. And that is that perception can sometimes be as important as, as reality. I think people need to, to manage how they're being perceived in the business. I think as young accountants, you can be doing a fantastic job in, in the kind of back corner of the office as well, plugging away, but it's very easy for, for managers to maybe not see exactly what you're doing.

Ben Edmonds: And I, I think at that point, certainly what you're doing can be taken for granted. So. Sometimes you need to in the right way. Just make sure that people can see what you're doing. Shine a light on yourself, make sure that that you're not forgotten. And I, I don't think this is a red mark on managers. I think it's just sometimes how it is when everyone's busy that they, they can't see what you're [00:30:00] doing and then hence, we we're not appreciate it.

Ben Edmonds: So put your hand up every now and then shine a light on yourself and make sure that the perception matches the reality. If you're doing an amazing job. 

Sumith: Great advice. Great advice. And Ben, thank you for being on the books of the Boardroom CFO Catalyst Podcast. 

Ben Edmonds: No, I think they're really great to meet you and yeah, I enjoyed the discussion.

Ben Edmonds: Thanks. 

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