The 2015 Women in Treasury Singapore Forum was held on Thursday 12th March at the legendary Raffles Hotel, Singapore. This annual industry event was once again an outstanding success and was attended by over 120 women and men who travelled from across Asia Pacific to participate. The Women in Treasury Asia Forum is part of our global Women in Treasury initiative and provides an unrivalled platform to bring together senior industry panellists to debate some of the key challenges highlighted by our Women in Treasury Study. Women and men from a wide range of sectors and organisations joined the Forum to hear the panel discussion and share their experiences, challenges, successes and failures as an inspiration and guiding light for other women as they build their careers in treasury.
The event started at noon with a pre-lunch networking reception during which Angela Berry, Publisher of the Treasury Today organisation and Sophie Jackson, Associate Publisher of Treasury Today Asia presented the findings of our 2014 Women in Treasury Study, supported by RBS. This was followed by lunch, during which the panel discussion took place, focusing on four key issues highlighted by the study; nurturing talent, driving equality, work/life balance and how to get ahead.
Our panellists:
Shirley Hiew, Global Cash Lead; Treasurer, Asia Pacific, DuPont
Sonia Clifton-Bligh, Director – Regional Treasury Services Centre Asia Pacific, Johnson & Johnson
Christine Tan, Managing Director, Regional Head of MNCs, Asia Pacific, J.P. Morgan
Deepali Pendse, Managing Director, Head of South East Asia Corporate Sales Global Transaction Services, Bank of America Merrill Lynch
Miral Fahmy of Reuters facilitatied the discussions. A lively question and answer session followed the panel discussion, with challenging questions and interesting views and experiences shared.
The event was both thought-provoking and inspiring and it was great to see so many men as well as women attending.
Shirley Hiew
Global Cash Lead; Treasurer, Asia Pacific: DuPont
Adam Smith Awards Asia 2014 – Woman of the Year Winner
Shirley Hiew’s career started in Singapore as Financial Analyst at ICI, thereafter assuming Finance & IT lead for the Chemical business unit. In 1999, Shirley joined DuPont regional treasury team in Singapore before taking a regional Finance lead role in Shanghai. She now leads the treasury centre in Singapore, with accountability for Global Subsidiary Financing and Global Cash Management. Responsible for consolidating worldwide cash for a multi-billion dollar acquisition, she is leading a new banking architecture project and setting up a new liquidity structure and cash management for a proposed spinoff. Shirley holds a qualification in Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (CIMA).
Sonia Clifton-Bligh
Director – Regional Treasury Services Centre Asia Pacific: Johnson & Johnson
Sonia is responsible for the cash management and investment/lending activities of the Asia Pac affiliates and provides direction for M&A transactions, funding requests, hedging solutions and capital structure. Sonia has been with J&J for 19 years, in Singapore and Australia. She is a graduate of the University of Wollongong in Australia with a degree in Commerce, a Chartered Accountant with a diploma in Applied Finance and Investment and a fellow of the Finance and Treasury Association of Australia.
Christine (Jang) Tan
Managing Director, Regional Head of MNCs, Asia Pacific: J.P. Morgan
Deepali Pendse
Head of Corporate Treasury Sales, Southeast Asia: Bank of America Merrill Lynch
Miral Fahmy
Lead Writer/Editor, Asia Desk: Reuters
Facilitator
