Latest Published articles |
Since relocating to the United States from Australia five years ago, CFO Laeek Afzal has acclimatised to the local market dynamics, but admits some differences were harder to get used to than others.
“The experience has really stretched me, across all areas of being an effective CFO, from the personal side, the technical side and the strategic side,” says the Nevada-based CFO of manufacturer ENTEK, a private-equity backed global producer of battery separators, extruders and parts. Like many Aussie expats, Afzal’s initial move was “strategically opportunistic” rather than planned. As he’s settled in, doors have opened, enabling him to leverage the experiences he’d gained having consulted on various M&A and capital market transactions and other strategic business projects with multinational firms PwC in Australia and the United Arab Emirates and QNB Group in Qatar, and in-house with the global corporate finance and strategy team at international steel supplier, BlueScope. Opportunity knocks The spark for the US move came when Afzal was tasked with assessing the financial feasibility of a site expansion for BlueScope’s Ohio-based business North Star BlueScope, following the work he’d done on the full buyout of the jointly owned steel making business in 2015. “I was essentially leading that project from Melbourne, flying back and forth to Toledo, Ohio about twice a month,” Afzal recalls. Six months in, he took up an offer of a secondment to join North Star BlueScope as financial controller, relocating in 2019 to Ohio with his wife and three young children (they have since welcomed a fourth). Not long after that, he was promoted to VP of Finance – the equivalent of CFO – a role he held for more than two years. “It was the biggest, highest profile business within BlueScope at the time. I knew I’d learn different skills, and our kids were pretty young, so we thought it was a good time to try it,” he recalls. “I worked with some amazingly talented leaders across the business at BlueScope and learnt a lot of important skills that helped with the transition to the CFO role.” In May last year, Afzal embraced a new opportunity, relocating the family to the other side of the country just south of Las Vegas to take up his current role with ENTEK. He saw it as a chance to have a taste of working with a high-growth, private equity backed business, and to flex his skills in a global role with a remit to lead the financial strategy for the business across the US, UK, Japan and Indonesia. The role ENTEK plays in decarbonisation was another attraction, its big growth plans in the servicing the electric vehicle market in the US offering Afzal a very different lens from his prior experience with larger publicly listed businesses. For the full story, head to CFO Magazine. Comments are closed.
|
