Feel the Force, Find Success

In his role heading up the Middle Office of global oil field services company Baker Hughes, Levente Lázár helped build an entire treasury function from scratch, the firm having just been carved out from GE. Always keen to learn new skills, the project was a labour of love, perfectly placing him for the next phase of his career as the company’s treasury undergoes its complex restructuring programme.  

“I’m really grateful for the experience,” reflects Lázár speaking of his contribution to the ground-up creation of the firm’s treasury department. But taking on new challenges is what drives him, especially when he has a hunch that they will be beneficial. 

Lázár had previously been at GE for some 17 years, culminating in his rise to CFO, GE Power Global Supply Chain Hungary. When Baker Hughes was carved out from GE in 2019, he intuitively took the opportunity to build upon his knowledge and experience, and moved firmly back into treasury. The need to develop processes, establish relationships and deploy the right technology stack to be able to hit the ground running in the new firm offered him just the kind of challenge he has always enjoyed.

Today, Lázár is responsible for activities such as the settlement of treasury instruments, including derivatives, and for financing, using products such as bonds, commercial paper, investments, and intercompany loans. But he kicked off the early days at Baker Hughes by engaging with a full TMS implementation. This saw FIS’ Quantum being deployed alongside a host of other supporting technologies. Learning how to set up a new TMS was, by his own admission, a steep learning curve. 

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