April 1, 2022
SUMMARY: Innovation is at the heart of SI Group, helping us provide our customers with the cutting-edge additive solutions that they need. Yet innovation within any business must be accompanied by a robust and carefully planned financial strategy. Without proper asset management and a long-term plan, any future business growth could be in jeopardy before it has even begun.
To this end, we caught up with Rustom Jilla, SI Group’s Chief Financial Officer (CFO), to explore how careful planning, robust execution and teamwork are key to driving growth and innovation.
Your professional background involves working for a wide range of companies across several different countries. Could you tell us more about your expertise and how it helps inform your decisions?
Certainly. Living and working in several continents broadens perspectives and provides different experiences. For instance, living in Germany helped deepen my appreciation of the roles that Works Councils play in Europe. A Works Council is an internal group of employees who are a part of the business entity that represent the interests of the employees and advocate for the employees at their site on a variety of topics. There is also nothing like living in different cultures to bring home the value of diversity. Likewise, the learnings from the actions that worked and the ones that did not across different industries are invaluable. All of these experiences are very useful when supporting profitable growth in a global company like SI Group.
What are you hoping to achieve in your role?
I would like to foster teamwork, be a catalyst for strategic change and prioritize SI Group’s resource allocation.
To leverage my experience and skills, collaborating closely with my fellow Executive Leadership Team (ELT) members and the other members of Team SI to help us become a bigger and a better company. And always through teamwork, to foster a “work together, win together” spirit across SI Group.
A CFO wears many hats—a key one is being a catalyst for change. Another is being a strategist, helping to identify, evaluate and prioritize opportunities for investment.
At any company, CFOs play a key role in prioritizing and allocating resources. So, my first focus upon joining was to understand the ELT’s priorities. Since then, the finance leadership team has put together a streamlined financial operating plan. This sets out objectives, milestones, timelines, and responsibilities so that our global Finance team supports the delivery of our business priorities.
How do you hope to fulfil customer needs in your role?
Another priority in my role will be looking at making SI Group’s systems, applications, and products more efficient, so we can more effectively deliver what our customers need. The team at SI Group has done a great job at identifying what needs to be done; my job now is to use my experience to prioritize specific tasks so we can execute the company’s plans. At the end of the day, a commitment to satisfying our customers’ needs is not simply important—it is critical, so it is necessary to have the best tools to deliver for them.
It also goes back to aligning investments with SI Group’s strategy. As CFO, I will be assessing plans to spend money on growth, foundational projects, key ESG investments, team development, and more. All of this eventually goes back to profitably fulfilling customer needs. And, as SI Group makes and executes smart investment decisions, our stakeholders win.
Finally, it is important to create genuine, collaborative “win-win” partnerships with customers. We always act with integrity, and with a long-term perspective. This way if we hit unforeseen bumps in the road – for example, supply chain issues or something similar, the trust we have built up helps immeasurably in sustaining the relationship.
You’ve mentioned teamwork throughout, where does this come in for you?
A “work together, win together” attitude is something I am really trying to foster across SI Group. Something I’ve learnt in both business and sports again and again is that it’s the team that wins, not individuals. You can see when you watch sports that most teams have very capable people, but it’s the degree of teamwork and “the will to win” that creates the winners. I’ve seen countless examples of business success arising from positive teamwork and want to strengthen that here at SI Group, both within and between departments. That’s what sets apart winning and losing teams - passion and teamwork. And my personal goal is to help SI Group win at becoming The global additives powerhouse.
In the town halls I have had with the Finance team, I’ve emphasized that at the end of the day we are ‘Team SI’ above everything else. Of course, we are proud to be 'Team Finance', but our mission is to help 'Team SI' win and we will achieve this through teamwork and unwavering attention to all our customers – both internal and external.
What excites you most about working for SI Group?
SI Group is at a pivotal point in its existence. There are big challenges of course – like the rising raw material and energy costs that our entire industry faces. However, there are also solid growth opportunities. By executing together as a unified team, we can deliver quality products for our customers and provide enriching experiences for our employees.
I’m excited by the opportunity to help build a culture of “people and performance” throughout the business as we meet all challenges and, together, we reach out vision of becoming The global additives powerhouse.
Learn more about Rustom and the rest of our Executive Leadership Team by visiting https://siigroup.com/About/Company/Leadership
Rustom Jilla is the Chief Financial Officer (CFO) at SI Group