Strada was, once again, proud to sponsor SAP SuccessConnect in 2024. It provided the opportunity to meet with many clients and prospects, as well as showcase and promote the Strada brand. Most of all, it was a chance to demonstrate our commitment to innovation and our dedication to driving impactful change in the payroll and professional services industry.
This year, Strada’s own Client Management Leader DACH, Joachim Skura, moderated a SuccessConnect Customer Panel with three of our esteemed clients. Samuel Madrid Paez, Director Program and Global Process Owner, from Philip Morris International, Amy Walsh, Global People Services Manager, from Mölnlycke, and Marcio Candido Borges, Business Applications Specialist HRIS, from RHI Magnesita.
SAP SuccessConnect lessons learned
Each of the panelists discussed their organisation’s implementation of SuccessFactors, the lessons learned, and the benefits achieved. From their various experiences and insights, three primary lessons emerged:
- Integration is critical
- Change management is crucial
- Providing a long view of the investment is key
By examining the context and finer details of these factors as discussed by the panellists, their importance becomes clear. Which reveals a roadmap for businesses looking to make the best use of SuccessFactors.
Integration is critical
Each participant emphasised the importance of seeing your HR software, not as a standalone element, but a part of a larger ecosystem. A few panel members acknowledged that sometimes a shift in thinking is necessary to be able to fully see the value of a unified system.
Some companies might imagine that moving to the cloud is a simple platform change, or that adopting suites of tools is the quickest way to correct HR inefficiencies. But no matter how advanced your tools and technology may be, a poorly integrated system will only increase risks, errors, and manual workload. It can even impact your bottom line.
Taking a unified approach to your systems and processes, consolidating applications, and connecting your system with other data sources and business functions is essential to streamlining and improving performance. Integration also facilitates a quicker and smoother transition and enables companies to grow more efficiently.
While investing in top-tier technology is a good first step, integration is the key to realizing that technology’s full potential.
Change management is crucial
The panellists also acknowledged that adoption rate is often one of the biggest hurdles faced by businesses seeking to implement change. All agreed that change management is fundamental to ensuring that changes are adopted and utilised effectively.
For that reason, it’s important for change managers and team leaders to put themselves in users’ shoes, connecting with colleagues in various business areas to communicate the overall vision and understand their needs better.
The panellists touched on three key change management strategies:
- Establish a unified roadmap. One of the best ways to get users’ onboard is to share a clear and comprehensive vision with them. Open communication provides users with the information they need to adopt changes more comfortably.
- Engage the right people. Putting key stakeholders and team leaders at the forefront, prioritizing partnership and collaboration, is an effective way to assure users’ that their concerns and needs are being considered and addressed.
- Show the long-term benefits. Perhaps most essentially, clearly demonstrating to users how the new tools will improve their work experience can resolve any lingering doubts and uncertainties they may have, fostering a greater willingness to accept changes.
Taking a communicative, supportive, and understanding approach to change management is vital to making your transition as smooth as possible.
SAP SuccessConnect highlighted taking a long view of the investment
Finally, the panellists unanimously agreed on the importance of emphasizing the long-term benefits of an HR transformation.
Given the time, energy and expense involved in a digital transformation, it can be difficult getting people to see the overall vision early on. Convincing others to invest in unknown and untried tools can pose similar challenges. Implementing change in an established environment requires convincing people of the benefits day-by-day.
Building ongoing projects and connecting learning and analytics back to SuccessFactors to demonstrate the strategic potential of integrated data, can effectively illustrate the investment’s long-term value.
Remember that the technology and system architecture you’re implementing today not only offers immediate benefits, but also sets the foundation for your company’s future.
The SuccessConnect Customer Panel discussion covered a lot of ground relating to SAP SuccessFactors, its modules, and its many benefits. The insights relayed above emerged organically from the panellists’ discussion as they shared their personal experiences. For businesses looking to implement SAP SuccessFactors, these insights can serve as helpful guidelines for getting the most out of their digital transformation.
