In today’s workplace, employee experience (EX) is no longer just the responsibility of HR; it’s a collaborative effort that includes people managers, IT, leadership, and even employees themselves.

As EX evolves, understanding who “owns” it is crucial to developing strategies that improve day-to-day HR operations and create a more engaged and satisfied workforce.

The SAP SuccessFactors HR Research team conducted the “What’s n(EX)t for EX” study and shared insights on the evolution of EX as a concept, who the owners are, how it is measured, and how AI might play a role in its future.

In the past, HR was the sole area responsible for employee experience and engagement in most organizations. This has evolved into a new ownership model endorsed by HR leaders, with four additional stakeholder groups that must coordinate their efforts to drive EX effectively: managers, IT, leadership, and employees themselves.

Role of HR in EX: Manage Process and Listen to Employees

From recruitment and onboarding to performance management and benefits, HR has always been seen as the primary owner of EX. But to truly enhance EX and demonstrate measurable results, HR must put particular focus on its responsibility for conducting employee listening. Only by listening to employees — either actively, through surveys and town halls, or passively, through social sentiment and monitoring tickets — can organizations understand the impact of their EX strategy and track towards their strategic goals.

As HR measures, reports, and acts on employee listening results, they should make sure to bring employees along: enable them with better information and encourage them to take a more active role. Otherwise, they might become fatigued by endless surveys that yield no results.

With solutions like the SAP employee experience management solutions by Qualtrics, HR gains access to AI-powered insights and action planning that help identify essential EX factors and enhancing EX factors. Essential factors are the “table-stakes” requirements that heavily impact employee experience and include fair pay, psychological safety, and adequate tools. Organizations should aim for 100% satisfaction in these factors. Enhancing factors are “nice-to-haves,” like flexible work arrangements, career development, and meaning and purpose. Focusing on a select group of enhancing factors can provide a unique value proposition for employees and candidates within an organization.

Role of Managers in EX:  Shape Day-to-Day Experience

Managers play a critical role in shaping the day-to-day experiences of their teams. Our research shows that managerial factors such as clear communication, support, and competence directly impact key essential EX factors like team relationships and psychological safety. Yet, many managers still face challenges in both resourcing and training that keep them from improving EX.

To bridge this gap, the SAP SuccessFactors HCM suite provides personalized insights through manager dashboards that track team sentiment and help organizations identify and develop top managerial talent. By equipping managers with the right resources, organizations create a culture of positive experiences and address the most impactful EX factors.

With SAP SuccessFactors Learning, organizations can offer managers resources for enablement and continuous development, tailored to their individual learning preferences and needs. To help managers empower their teams in upskilling and reskilling, AI-driven recommendations from the talent intelligence hub assist employees in discovering new growth opportunities, preparing them for future roles while helping those managers stay informed about internal mobility possibilities. This supports employees’ development and enables managers to find specific opportunities for their direct reports, creating a dynamic, growth-oriented environment that drives individual and organizational success.

Role of Leadership in EX: Set the Vision

Leadership sets the vision of what employee experience should look like at an organization. Alongside HR, leadership establishes the strategic goals and outcomes that the company expects from its EX strategy. Company leaders should be aware of employee listening results and communicate to the workforce regularly about how their feedback is being considered. In doing so, leadership establishes the importance of EX and encourages trust and transparency.

Role of IT in EX: Manage Technology and Harness the Power of AI

IT is responsible for the tools and technology that make up much of an employee’s working experience. As AI technology advances, it has come to play a more significant role in that experience. AI is helping organizations create a dynamic, inclusive, and future-ready workforce. SAP Business AI in HR helps improve employee and candidate experiences by optimizing interactions and delivering highly personalized experiences and career development plans. By integrating AI-driven HR solutions, organizations can improve essential and enhancing EX factors, from seamless onboarding to customized learning paths.

Improving the Experience of Every Employee: N(EX)t Steps

To truly transform EX, organizations must encourage a holistic approach with cross-functional collaboration, leveraging HR tech solutions that empower all stakeholders — HR, managers, IT, leadership, employees — to take ownership of the employee experience.

Now that you have more clarity on different departments’ roles in improving day-to-day operations, you can leverage this first-ever interactive strategic workbook to learn more about the essential and enhancing EX factors with hands-on exercises and expert insights based on research from the SAP SuccessFactors HR Research team.

Mayara Alves Tabone is a Solution Marketing specialist for SAP SuccessFactors at SAP.

LAS VEGAS — SAP SE (NYSE: SAP) today announced updates to its spend management solutions to help companies collaborate strategically, increase productivity, manage compliance effortlessly and gain business insights.

The announcements were made at SAP Spend Connect Live, the industry’s premier spend management conference, held October 14-16 in Las Vegas.

SAP Embeds Generative AI Across Spend Management and Business Network Solutions

SAP is embedding its generative AI copilot Joule across the SAP Ariba source-to-pay solution portfolio to make it easier for customers to manage routine inquiries, such as status updates, summarization and frequently asked questions. Generative AI will be further infused in SAP Ariba solutions to recommend buying bundles and provide comprehensive supplier summaries.

Joule will help SAP Fieldglass solutions customers perform time-consuming hiring tasks and service requests with speed and accuracy. Joule can recommend best-fit templates to generate job postings and statements of work (SOWs) with prefilled information such as start date and the number of skilled workers needed.

Joule embedded across SAP Business Network will facilitate tasks in logistics and asset management. Generative AI will analyze, categorize and transform unstructured invoice rejection errors into structured, actionable insights to reduce the cost of resolving exceptions. Generative AI capabilities within the SAP Business Network Discovery solution will help match suppliers with new business opportunities.

Joule is currently available within SAP Ariba solutions and will debut in SAP Fieldglass solutions and SAP Business Network in the fourth quarter 2024. Joule will manage 80% of the most frequently performed tasks in the portfolio of intelligent spend management and business network solutions from SAP starting in the fourth quarter 2024 with a phased approach.

New SAP Ariba Intake Management Solution Delivers Simplicity in Procurement

SAP introduces the SAP Ariba Intake Management solution to help transform how businesses handle employee requests and process orchestration, starting with procurement.

With SAP Ariba Intake Management, employees have one place to go for procurement inquiries and visibility on status. The solution collects employee requests, orchestrates processes across heterogenous landscapes and applications, including all necessary stakeholders, and provides visibility on status while shielding employees from process complexity yet keeping them informed. This simpler, more intuitive user experience is designed to help drive adoption and improve compliance.

SAP plans to make SAP Ariba Intake Management available in the first quarter 2025.

New SAP Business Network, Promote Subscription to Help Suppliers Grow their Businesses

SAP Business Network in the first quarter 2025 will launch a new promote subscription with value-added features to help suppliers differentiate themselves, attract new buyers and grow their businesses. With millions of companies conducting nearly $6 trillion in commerce annually on the SAP Business Network, promote presents a sizable opportunity for suppliers to accelerate growth.

SAP Unveils Analytics Add-On for External Workforce Management

The new analytics add-on with AI capabilities for SAP Fieldglass solutions helps procurement, vendor management and HR professionals to quickly implement more agile multi-channel talent strategies. This add-on enables business users to benchmark and predict external talent scenarios.

The analytics add-on for SAP Fieldglass solutions lets users:

• Review performance against over 50 external workforce key performance indicators.
• Access global market intelligence including rates, talent supply and demand, and time-to-hire trends.
• Track sustainability initiatives such as spend with diverse suppliers and worker health and safety, while observing cost overruns, worker fatigue, and on- and offboarding compliance.

“With SAP Business AI as the foundation of our intelligent products, customers can improve productivity and gain insights from their spend data no matter where it sits,” said Manoj Swaminathan, President and Chief Product Officer, Intelligent Spend and Business Network, SAP. “Whether it is managing cost, mitigating risk or supporting scope three emission reduction, SAP empowers companies with the right solutions for agile and effective spend management and supply chain functions.”

Visit the SAP News Center. Follow SAP at @SAPNews.

Media Contact:
Kelly Sheldon Murray, +1 (978) 708-6821, kelly.murray@sap.com, ET
SAP Press Room; press@sap.com

This document contains forward-looking statements, which are predictions, projections, or other statements about future events. These statements are based on current expectations, forecasts, and assumptions that are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results and outcomes to materially differ.  Additional information regarding these risks and uncertainties may be found in our filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including but not limited to the risk factors section of SAP’s 2023 Annual Report on Form 20-F.
© 2024 SAP SE. All rights reserved.
SAP and other SAP products and services mentioned herein as well as their respective logos are trademarks or registered trademarks of SAP SE in Germany and other countries. Please see https://www.sap.com/copyright for additional trademark information and notices.

SAP Spend Connect Live is the industry’s premier spend management event — a reputation that is well earned. And this year will be no exception.

Once again, we are prepared to showcase groundbreaking innovations that will revolutionize the landscape of spend management. As I continue to engage with our customers, their enthusiasm for our latest offerings helps validate our commitment to delivering solutions that streamline processes and empower businesses to achieve their full potential.  

At SAP our focus is on automating tedious, time-consuming tasks, allowing you to concentrate on the strategic decisions that drive your organization forward. SAP continues to invest heavily in innovations across the spend management and business network portfolio, including new artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities and seamless integrations, enabling users to navigate uncertainty, seize optimization opportunities, and simplify processes. Our goal is to give you the freedom to shape your business’s future without the distraction of day-to-day operational noise. 

Betting Big on Your Success with SAP 

During my keynote, I outlined our product strategy for the coming year, emphasizing three key pillars: Data, Intelligence, and Suite. These focus areas are a direct response to the valuable input we’ve received from customers. I am confident that our continuing investments in these areas will provide them with the insights needed to make informed, strategic decisions that propel their organization to new heights.  

Our newest capabilities across our intelligent spend management solutions enable customers to gain visibility across all of their processes, eliminating fragmented touchpoints that hinder progress.

As Mickey North Rizza, group vice-president of Enterprise Software at IDC, recently shared, “SAP continues to dominate the procurement applications space as measured by market share because customers want a seamless user experience with which to conduct the full spectrum of their spend management/procurement activity. When layering in the breadth of SAP’s industry experience, the expansive business network, and direct sourcing capabilities, SAP has clearly earned its place.” 

I couldn’t agree more.  Our commitment to maintaining our position as the industry standard in spend management is unwavering, and we will continue to set the benchmark for providing a smooth, efficient user interface while delivering unparalleled visibility into every aspect of spend.

Now, let’s dive into this year’s announcements.  

Generative AI Transforms the Source-to-Pay Process 

SAP is dedicated to delivering best-in-class solutions infused with AI, empowering you to prioritize strategic initiatives over mundane tasks. We understand and hear the concerns surrounding data security when implementing AI, which is why we have made no compromises in ensuring our AI capabilities set the standard for compliance. From third-party advisory boards to adhering to the UNESCO 10 Guiding Principles for Ethical AI and singing the EU AI Pact, we enable customers to harness the power of AI without sacrificing control over their data.  

SAP’s generative AI copilot Joule will be seamlessly integrated across SAP Ariba, SAP Business Network, and SAP Fieldglass starting in Q4 of 2024. Joule will enable users to manage their most important tasks quickly and accurately across all areas of our spend management portfolio.  

In SAP Ariba, users will be able to use generative AI-infused capabilities to create RFPs and request help with routine inquiries and surface risks. These capabilities will also provide buying recommendations along with comprehensive supplier summaries from different data sources. In addition, sustainability scorecard from SAP Ariba ensures that customers can make informed decisions that align with their organizations’ environmental, social, and governance (ESG) objectives.  

With Joule, SAP Fieldglass users can take advantage of template recommendations to generate job postings and SOWs with pre-filled information, saving precious time. Users can now request assistance and insights in natural language, and immediately receive responses from Joule directly from the SAP Help Portal. It is now possible to ask Joule how to create a job posting and receiving accurate, step-by-step instructions complete with links and resources.  

SAP Business Network will use Joule to help with logistics and asset management tasks. Joule provides SAP Business Network users a natural language interface and navigation for scenarios such as status requests and queries, supporting freight orders, freight bookings, invoice disputes, equipment, notifications, and work orders. It will also provide insights into rejected invoices to reduce manual intervention for errors. Suppliers can dive into potential business opportunities based on keyword matching that selects best-fit profiles for RFIs. 

Streamlining Procurement with SAP Ariba Intake Management  

Most companies have a complex landscape of disparate and siloed solutions for handling procurement needs such as purchase requests, contract processing, or helping onboard a new services provider. Typically, employees don’t know which platform, portal, or system will handle their request because it isn’t a task they perform regularly. Hours of time may be wasted trying to figure out how to make the request in the first place and track down subsequent status updates. 

But no more: SAP Ariba Intake Management, a brand-new solution built on SAP Business Technology Platform, will automate procurement request creation and provide process orchestration, including routing and support across diverse procurement landscapes and complex workflows. By connecting different systems into one central location for procurement inquiries and status updates, employees can adhere to your organization’s policies and comply with necessary regulations without the need for time consuming manual corrections. SAP Ariba Intake Management will offer one pane of glass for status updates and requests, making procurement orchestration simpler and more intuitive. Scheduled to be available in Q1 of 2025, the solution will offer out-of-the-box integration with other SAP solutions and a robust set of connectors for third-party integration.  

Empowering Suppliers with SAP Business Network, Promote Subscription  

We announced a new promote subscription for the SAP Business Network, designed to deliver immediate value to suppliers, helping them to find new business, improve match potential, and build relationships with buyers using the network catalog. Through the promote subscription, suppliers will receive recommendations to improve discoverability, advanced search results, supplier profile verification, and network catalog APIs. With the help of generative AI tools, suppliers can now load their full suite of offerings into the network catalog faster and with enhanced product descriptions and summaries. The new promote subscription will also help suppliers identify sales opportunities based on regional search data and use advanced insights to track business growth on the network.  

Elevating External Workforce Management with SAP Fieldglass Analytics Add-On 

SAP Fieldglass delivers a new, enhanced analytics capability with next-level insights into your external workforce. The analytics add-on with AI capabilities will help businesses meet sustainability and human rights goals, acquire talent quickly, and implement multi-channel talent acquisition strategies. Users can benchmark and predict external talent scenarios, review performance against KPIs, track trends against industry averages, and monitor sustainability and compliance initiatives.  

As we continue to listen to our customers and invest in our spend management and business network solution offerings, our commitment to setting the standard for spend management software remains steadfast. We are committed to providing innovative solutions that help our customers collaborate strategically with their business partners, enhance productivity, and improve compliance.  

To learn more about these new innovations, read “Innovations in Spend Management from SAP Help Customers Improve Productivity, Gain Insights and Boost Growth.”

If you couldn’t attend SAP Spend Connect Live in Las Vegas, sign up here for the virtual experience on October 24 to access live and on-demand content from across content tracks. Join us as we continue to shape the future of spend management together. 

Manoj Swaminathan is president and chief product officer for Intelligent Spend and Business Network at SAP.