The Key to HCM Excellence: Creating an Irresistible Employee Experience

When HRIS systems went into the cloud over a decade ago, expectations were high: Surely, these new Cloud HCM systems would transform the employee experience, support real-time people data, and enable the coveted HR "seat at the table" because HR people would be freed up from administration.

For large companies, implementing cloud-based HCM systems is a multiyear, complex, cross-functional and costly project, and results often fall far short of expectations.

Understanding Excellence with HCM

So, we set out to study what drives excellence with Cloud HCM systems on a multi-year, in-depth research program. We worked with hundreds of HR, HR Technology, and business leaders, implementation consultants, and the three largest Cloud HCM providers: Workday, Oracle, and SAP SuccessFactors. Built on the journeys of the world's largest and most successful companies - Adobe, AirAsia India, Allianz, Boeing, BT, GE, JPMC, McDonald's, Microsoft, Target, and Tata Chemicals, for example - we identified what works.

Today, we launch the third part of this three part series, identifying what success with SAP SuccessFactors HCM is all about.

SAP SuccessFactors: Beyond the Status Quo

With close to 75 million users, SAP SuccessFactors HCM (called Human Experience Management, or HXM. indicating the priority on experience) is the most widely used Cloud HCM platform in the world. It's also (arguably) the most complete solution across the entire company ecosystem, and we see them go beyond the status quo..

• Beyond Office Workers: The HXM was built with the mobile, "deskless" workforce in mind, with a For example, a fully integrated chatbot and an engaging mobile experience
• Beyond HR and SAP: The "Intelligent Enterprise" (data from other applications across the entire SAP suite) and SAP's wide partner ecosystem help build bridges outside the HR function and beyond the capabilities of SAP SuccessFactors.
• Beyond Linear Careers: In 2022, SAP SuccessFactors launched their most significant release, with the Opportunity Marketplace at the center, connecting people with career opportunities.
• Beyond Skills: The "Whole-Self Model" includes a self-assessment to allow employees to indicate personalities, likes, and dislikes to further personalize the experience.
• Beyond Hierarchy: A new dynamic teams capability enables teams to assemble, work together, and disband quickly for an agile organizational and operating model.

Six Lessons of Successful SAP SuccessFactors Implementations

SAP SuccessFactors's massive global reach and relentless focus on creating an outstanding experience shows in industries and companies we worked with for this research:

• Technology (Microsoft, headquartered in the United States)
• Insurance (Allianz, headquartered in Germany)
• Telecommunications (BT, headquartered in the United Kingdom)
• Pharmaceuticals (Bayer, headquartered in Germany)
• Manufacturing (Bekaert, headquartered in Belgium)
• Consumer products (Nestlé, headquartered in Switzerland)

We identified what matters most in HCM Excellence: While flawless execution, and great change management are table stakes, what really differentiates is a focus on six key dimensions:

• creating an irresistible employee experience
• fostering people analytics and talent intelligence
• facilitating HR transformation
• focusing on business outcomes
• enabling leadership and governance
• simlifying the entire technology ecosystem

For SAP SuccessFactors, these dimensions can be applied across six key lessons for Cloud HCM success.

Examples of Excellence

Microsoft puts employees front and center, focuses on a growth mindset, and listens to employees daily to allow them to thrive. To fully understand the variations and needs across its global businesses and 220,000 employees, the implementation team for SAP SuccessFactors HCM engaged more than 2,000 employees worldwide during the four-year implementation process.

The team aimed to create an intelligent enterprise based on actionable analytics, all the while reinventing the global job taxonomy to accommodate evolving lines of business such as AI, blockchain, and quantum computing. To do so, the HR technology team integrated existing information from SAP SuccessFactors and LinkedIn. The final skills taxonomy will be managed and refined within SAP SuccessFactors, which will relay opportunities and ultimately create an internal talent marketplace for project staffing, mentoring, learning, and job openings.

“Our goal is to unify the experience for our employees regardless of their country or region. e consistent processes and rich data to unify and leverage consistent processes and rich data to unify and improve.”

Nathalie D’Hers, Corporate Vice President (CVP) of Digital EX, Microsoft

Allianz worked hard to simplify processes across its 400 business units and various geographies to create an irresistible experience. The team developed a web portal and chatbot to guide employees to relevant materials for each country and role.

The HR team used SAP SuccessFactors to simplify data analysis and reporting at an enterprise level. This included eeports of key facts and figures across all of its business entities, which were used to generate new insights into its employees worldwide, allowing the HR team to generate important insights into the workforce. They then redefined static roles as dynamic roles, helping eliminate manual workflows for 20,000 internal moves each year.

"We learned to deeply understand the evolving experience expectations during this multiyear, multicountry implementation, well aware that the experiences may evolve over time.”

Conclusion

Companies spend a lot of time, effort, and focus on HCM systems, but these investments can fail to deliver on expectations. Often, they are seen as failures for taking too long or exceeding the forecasted cost. Accomplishing significant, transformational outcomes—outstanding people data, a more strategic HR team, an irresistible EX—are falling well behind. The most successful companies think strategically and go well beyond using HCM implementation for technology deployment purposes only.

So how do you reach this highest level of HCM maturity?

We outline specific, actionable steps to get started and operationalize HCM excellence in our definitive guide (available to our research members). The fundamental first step of this journey is a mindset shift.

Your HCM is not just a system; it’s a vehicle to power your entire business transformation for the future, solve the toughest challenges, and most importantly create an irresistible experience for your employees.

After all, that’s what our work in HR is all about: helping all employees to do and be their best.

Where to Go Next

• Download complementary resources to learn more about HCM excellence.
• Contact us to become a JBC Member for access to the full Definitive Guide to HCM Excellence including examples from Workday, Oracle, and SAP SuccessFactors, with in-depth case studies from Adobe, Allianz AirAsia India, Boeing, GE, Joanne, McDonald's, Microsoft, Tata Chemicals, and Target, along with other action-oriented, practical research, diagnostics, learning programs, community, and much more.
• Learn foundational concepts with the Josh Bersin Academy: The HR Tech Workshop.