Leveraging Technology to Drive Excellence On and Off the Pitch
FC Bayern, one of the most successful global football clubs, continues to raise the bar on and off the field. With a relentless focus on excellence and innovation, the world-renowned club has extended its usage of SAP SuccessFactors software with AI-enabled solutions to enhance its HR functions and processes.
A clear key to the club’s success are the more than 1,000 employees in Munich, New York, Bangkok, and Shanghai who are as integral to the club as the players on the pitch, meaning each job experience and career path must enable employees to continuously develop themselves professionally to reach their full potential.
Streamlining HR Operations with SAP SuccessFactors
FC Bayern initially adopted SAP SuccessFactors to optimize its talent management, modernize HR processes, and foster a culture of continuous learning and development. Over the years, the club has expanded its utilization of SAP SuccessFactors to manage everything from employee onboarding to performance management.
An Oxford Economics survey, sponsored by SAP, recently uncovered that close relationships between HR and IT are dynamically driving organizational success together. For 55% of the 550 respondents in HR and IT leadership roles, such collaboration improves talent development, optimizes internal processes, and modernizes systems for overall business success.
This finding confirms what thousands of midsize organizations using SAP SuccessFactors solutions already know. Accelerating the shift to digital HR isn’t just a critical advantage; it’s a game changer for business growth, especially as the need for new skills intensifies due to emerging technologies such as AI.
Oxford Economics’ research explains why: “As AI-enabled technologies like chatbots and personalized recommendations become the norm outside the workplace, HR functions will need to strategize to incorporate similar self-service experiences and other AI-driven use cases into their employees’ way of working.”
Driving Growth with a Talent Management Edge
Midsize organizations often seek a human capital management (HCM) solution that supports scalability and can match the pace and extent of their business growth. Yet, they frequently operate with limited HR capacity, hindering their ability to compete in a complicated talent landscape where a shortage of a million experts is expected by 2030.
Expanding midsize organizations particularly struggle to secure or develop talent with the skills required for growth. Oxford Economics reports that 49% of surveyed organizations cite the inability to find the right talent to maintain operations as their greatest near-term risk. Similarly, 41% of HR executives believe their organization’s inability to reskill and upskill workers to adapt to changing needs is a top threat.
With SAP SuccessFactors solutions, midsize organizations can address both concerns. The HCM solutions can help run a cohesive, organization-wide strategy for upgrading outdated technologies and implementing modern, foundational capabilities such as workforce management tools and AI-enabled functionalities.
Here’s a sneak peek into the outsized outcomes SAP SuccessFactors solutions can deliver:
1. Inclusive Job Descriptions and Assisted Candidate Screening
AI is transforming skills-based hiring by creating compelling job descriptions and enabling inclusive applicant selection so organizations can find the best talent quickly and efficiently. We have thoughtfully embedded these capabilities into the SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting solution to provide organizations with tools to help attract and secure candidates with the right skills.
Embedded AI assistance helps talent acquisition teams make better, more equitable hiring decisions while reducing time spent on manual, tedious tasks such as creating job descriptions. Insights into applicant skills – extracted from résumés using AI – allow recruiters to quickly identify and rank top candidates based on their match to a job, removing unconscious bias from the process.
2. Integrated Learning and Talent Management
As the nature of work evolves, so does the approach to HR technology solutions. Integrated learning and talent management systems are pivotal in addressing this dynamic, facilitating a smooth flow of development opportunities for employees.
By leveraging SAP SuccessFactors Talent Management solutions, organizations can tie learning initiatives with talent management processes to help create a cohesive, impactful talent strategy and employee experience. Employees can access learning resources based on their career goals and performance, aligning their development with personal goals and organizational objectives.
Unlock the potential of your people and your organization
3. Intelligent and Personalized Skill Recommendations
The Oxford Economics survey reveals that 30% of HR and IT decision-makers are starting to understand how AI can help meet talent development and retention goals critical to their company’s growth. This includes helping employees stay on track with a personalized view into what they have to, need to, and want to learn.
Adopting a learning management system that includes AI, such as the SAP SuccessFactors Learning solution, gives organizations capabilities that can enhance the learner’s experience. For example, instead of a “search and find” approach to identifying relevant courses and content, an AI-driven system can offer learning options highly relevant to the learner by automatically surfacing personalized recommendations based on the employee’s role, skills, needs, and preferences.
This approach can help save time by pointing learners toward the most relevant and valuable resources, instead of requiring learners to search for them alone. Most importantly, access to self-directed learning and development opportunities fosters a habit of continuous learning and personal growth.
4. New Opportunities for Employees to Grow
Both consumers and employees expect personalized experiences that are easy to navigate and relevant to their needs. Reflecting on this trend, organizations are leveraging solutions – such as the SAP SuccessFactors Opportunity Marketplace solution – to support upskilling and reskilling efforts.
The solution can connect employees with relevant projects, learning opportunities, mentors, and dynamic teams, presenting recommended matches through centralized access. Integrating talent intelligence into these recommendations can enhance their effectiveness by enabling the identification of skills gaps and the analysis of individual preferences and career aspirations. In return, employees can be empowered to grow and develop in ways that benefit them and the organization, helping to create a more engaged and motivated workforce.
Additionally, with the SAP SuccessFactors Succession & Development solution, organizations can optimize employee experiences by properly preparing them for their next role. For instance, employees can feel empowered to own their career development by exploring career options with AI-driven recommendations and intelligent skills gap identification. Also, with AI-assisted goals, employees can quickly create more ambitious development goals aligned with their growth plans.
5. Holistic Skills Management
Competing for and retaining top talent remains a significant challenge for midsize organizations as the skills gap widens. While visibility into current skills and those required for the future can offer a competitive edge, tackling this issue fully requires a more comprehensive approach beyond skills alone.
SAP SuccessFactors HCM can address all sides of this complex challenge by considering individual competencies, aspirations, and preferences. Leveraging talent intelligence, the suite allows organizations to enhance the talent experience with a strategy that can cater to the “whole self” of the employee.
6. Enhanced Productivity and Engagement
Aligning employee goals to business objectives is crucial for enhancing productivity and performance. With AI-assisted goals, employees can craft meaningful and aspirational goals in a fraction of the time it usually takes.
The SAP SuccessFactors Performance & Goals solution enables flexible and continuous performance modeling. Real-time coaching and feedback are included in the flow of work, helping employees feel more supported and engaged while enabling continuous insights and growth.
Building a Workforce Culture of Growth with AI
SAP SuccessFactors solutions can offer a holistic approach to take advantage of the critical role of talent management strategies in driving business growth, as highlighted in the Oxford Economics report. With innovative AI capabilities, the solutions are helping many organizations worldwide win the race for talent and skills and build an agile workforce.
SAP’s commitment to AI innovation is not just about cutting-edge technology. We create HCM solutions that are relevant, reliable, and responsible. Backed by this AI principle, SAP SuccessFactors solutions can offer a competitive edge in the current dynamic talent landscape. Organizations are not only empowered to keep up – they’re also prepared to lead the way with talent management strategies that drive ongoing growth, innovation, and success.
Discover how growth-focused midsize businesses prioritize their HR and IT strategies to help them grow and remain competitive. Read the Oxford Economics study, sponsored by SAP, “Optimizing Talent Management: Best Practices for HR and IT.”
Margit Bauer is director of Product Marketing for SAP SuccessFactors.
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SAP co-founder Dietmar Hopp once said about co-founder Hasso Plattner: “It’s hard to quantify his legacy. All I can say is that without him, SAP would never have been so successful.” At the 2024 Annual General Meeting of Shareholders on May 15, Plattner will step down from the SAP Supervisory Board after 21 years as its chairman.
One need only look at the key milestones in Plattner’s 52-year career at SAP to gain a vivid picture of his legacy. Together with Dietmar Hopp and his fellow co-founders, Plattner created the market for real-time business software, helped steer SAP through more than five decades of fast-moving IT history, and drove SAP’s global expansion – transforming it from a single-product company to the world’s No. 1 provider of enterprise applications.
Over the years, he worked tirelessly to open new horizons for the company and its employees, identifying technological trends and channeling his pioneering spirit into revolutionizing far more than just data management.
1972-1973: The Early Days
Hasso Plattner (sitting) explains the real-time screen application to colleagues from IBM and ICI
Having created Germany’s first real-time software application with a user interface, Hasso Plattner and Dietmar Hopp founded a company they named Systemanalyse Programmentwicklung (“System Analysis Program Development”) on April 1, 1972, together with their IBM colleagues Claus Wellenreuther, Klaus Tschira, and Hans-Werner Hector.
In 1973, the entrepreneurs launched RF, their first financial accounting system. The “R” in the name stood for “real time.” Developed under Plattner’s leadership, RF laid the foundation for a series of software modules in a system that would later be known as SAP R/1.
“Before I worked on RF,” Plattner once said, “I knew nothing about financial accounting; afterwards, I could hold seminars about it for CFOs. And not because I’d read stacks of books or was very smart, but because I’d learned from customers how to build this kind of system. I worked side by side with our customers at their offices every day.”
1976: The Formative Years
Systemanalyse Programmentwicklung was renamed “SAP.” Each of the founders and their employees – numbering about 30 at this point – was a developer, salesperson, and consultant all rolled into one.
Hasso Plattner and Dietmar Hopp were constantly competing to be the best at programming and selling their products. Plattner recalls that it made him really mad once when Hopp sold more than he did. Wherever their tasks and skills converged, they would engage in a private, “take-no-prisoners” contest to outdo each other.
Dietmar Hopp (left) and Hasso Plattner: ambitious and always encouraging each other to achieve top performance (in the anniversary year 2022)
Nevertheless, both men also knew how to harness their ambition and fondness for friendly competition to the benefit of their fledgling business.
1988: Conversion and IPO
SAP GmbH was converted to a stock corporation, SAP AG, and in October 1988 it listed on the stock exchanges in Frankfurt and Stuttgart, providing the company with the funding it needed to expand into even more markets.
The initial public stock offering (IPO) was the beginning of a steep stock rise
1991: SAP R/3
SAP R/3 made the company a global player. Plattner in 1991 at a Hewlett Packard (HP) event.
At SAP’s 25th anniversary celebrations in 1997, Plattner recounted an incident in late January 1991, which he described as “probably the most dramatic situation” in the company’s history: “A year before the final delivery date for R/3, we realized during testing that its performance on our mainframe was completely unsatisfactory and that the test conditions were unacceptable. Six weeks before we had planned to present R/3 at the CeBIT trade fair in Hanover, we had all but given up on the project.
We called an emergency meeting at which everyone remained standing, such was the urgency of the matter at hand. We decided to halt work on the mainframe systems and, in a last-ditch attempt, to switch to the new, more powerful Unix workstations, which we’d previously only used in development.
The presentation of R/3 on Unix was a huge hit. A year and a half later, we began shipping our new client-server software to customers. That was the start of R/3, a business application for network-based computers.”
1992: Heading Stateside
In the early 1990s, when everyone else’s attention was focused on getting SAP R/3 to market quickly, sales of SAP R/2 in Germany were a cause of concern for Dietmar Hopp. As Plattner recalls: “Dietmar and I were standing in his office, and he said to me, ‘It’s not looking good. The only option I can see is for you to pack the system up and take it to America.’” They agreed to continue promoting the SAP R/2 mainframe software in Germany while going all-in on SAP R/3 in the U.S.
At the Sapphire customer conference held in Orlando in September 1992, Plattner announced that SAP would deliver the SAP R/3 system within six weeks to anyone who ordered it there and then. By October, computer manufacturer Convex had signed a contract for the new product, giving SAP its first SAP R/3 customer in the United States. And when, not long after that, oil giant Chevron – one of the country’s largest companies – also opted for R/3, SAP’s new software, originally built with the midmarket in mind, was well on track to becoming a global success story.
The computer manufacturer Convex was the first SAP R/3 customer in the U.S.
1993: A Very Special Partnership
SAP entered into an alliance with the world’s largest software company: Microsoft. Bill Gates, who had flown into Munich to sign the contract in person, told the audience at the press conference announcing the partnership: “We are delighted that SAP, one of the leading providers of standard software, supports Microsoft’s client-server operating system. We believe that many businesses will see this move by SAP as a compelling reason to opt for Windows NT.”
The beginning of a long and fruitful partnership: Microsoft founder Bill Gates and Hasso Plattner
And when, in 2010, Plattner received the Transatlantic Partnership Award, Gates had this to say about his friend and colleague: “I’ve known Hasso for more than three decades. His knowledge, energy, and vision never cease to impress me.”
1997: SAP Celebrates Its 25th Anniversary
SAP turns 25 and celebrates with the Prime Minister of Baden-Württemberg, Erwin Teufel (left) and Federal Chancellor Helmut Kohl (right) in between Hopp, Tschira, and Plattner
Plattner was appointed co-CEO, alongside Dietmar Hopp. In his speech at SAP’s 25th anniversary celebrations, he spoke about what had helped the company prosper: “Product focus is one pillar of SAP’s success. When a product sells well, the employees share in that sense of achievement. That feeling is just as important to them as the pay they take home each month. Our employees identify with the product – that’s why they have always gone the extra mile. No matter how different our views at times were, we always managed to regroup and we never lost sight of the product. For the past 25 years, the founders and employees of SAP remained true to the original product vision and never veered off course.”
1998: SAP Conquers New York
On August 3, 1998, the company debuted on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), the world’s largest exchange. CEO Hasso Plattner described SAP’s Wall Street listing as “a strategic necessity and logical milestone in the history of SAP.”
By having its shares listed on the New York Stock Exchange “Big Board,” SAP gained new prominence in its most important market
That same year, Plattner founded the Hasso Plattner Institute (HPI) for Software System Engineering in Potsdam, near Berlin. “The institute here in Potsdam is my contribution to training internationally competitive junior managers who help shape and advance the digital world,” he said.
Dietmar Hopp and Klaus Tschira transitioned from the Executive Board to the Supervisory Board, and Plattner became co-CEO alongside Henning Kagermann.
1999: The mySAP.com Revolution
In May, Plattner announced the mySAP.com strategy, which set the company and its product portfolio on an entirely new path. Using the latest Web technology, mySAP.com connected e-commerce solutions with the company’s existing ERP applications.
To be successful in the increasingly important Internet business, Plattner relied on the mySAP.com strategy
According to Plattner, success on the Internet was key to the company’s survival. At the Sapphire conference in Philadelphia in September 1999, a live demo of mySAP.com — with a prelude by Plattner playing Queen’s “I Want to Break Free” live on electric guitar — was enough to convince customers to adopt SAP’s Web strategy.
And, true to form, Plattner was already thinking about where the technology would go next, predicting that e-commerce and the hosting of applications on SAP servers would be “the future of software sales.”
2003: From Executive Board to Supervisory Board
Plattner stepped down from the Executive Board and was elected chairman of the Supervisory Board.
Speaking at the Annual General Meeting of Shareholders in May, he said: “This rising star of the 90s is now playing in the same league as IBM, Microsoft, and Oracle.”
With Plattner’s withdrawal from the Executive Board, Kagermann (left) becomes the sole CEO
Though no longer its CEO, Plattner continued to channel his passion and his eye for technological trends into driving SAP forward, but now in his new role as chief software advisor on the Supervisory Board. That same year, he helped found the Hasso Plattner Institute of Design (“d.school”) at Stanford University, providing funds to support its work on design thinking, a new approach to finding creative solutions to complex problems.
2006: The In-Memory Database
It was in 2006 that Plattner and students at HPI began work on a revolutionary technology. The result was SAP HANA (High-Performance ANalytic Appliance), an entirely new, column-oriented, in-memory database management system.
“It’s not so easy for a big company to break out and do something radically different,” said Plattner. “The university context gives you the freedom to do it.”
Plattner loves to pass on his knowledge to young people
2011-2013: SAP HANA Drives Growth
Plattner talks about the importance of SAP HANA at the SAPPHIRE NOW conference in Orlando in 2012
Five years later, the first SAP HANA customers began implementing the new database, which generated the kind of demand not seen since the market launch of SAP R/3.
By the end of 2013, the entire SAP Business Suite had moved to SAP HANA. In the three years since its launch, SAP HANA had garnered nearly €1.2 billion in revenues, making it one of the fastest-growing products in the history of enterprise software.
In an interview with German daily Handelsblatt in 2020, Plattner said: “SAP HANA is so superior in practice that there is no alternative. And quite honestly, it saved SAP’s life, because it let us massively accelerate our ERP system without a lot of changes, while physically downsizing it at the same time. That meant a huge cost saving for our customers.”
2015: The Foundation
Plattner reinforced his commitment to promoting education and culture by setting up the Hasso Plattner Foundation.
Among the many causes the foundation has supported over the years are programs to promote healthcare and health education in South Africa. The German city of Potsdam also has much to thank Plattner for: The Hasso Plattner Institute is the largest investment in Potsdam and the one that bears his signature most strongly. The Barberini Museum that he rebuilt completes the inner cityscape of Potsdam and provides a home for his impressive Impressionist collection — the largest outside of France. With the Kunsthaus MINSK, he saved one of the few architectural icons of the GDR era and created a home for his GDR art collection.
Celebrities at the opening of the Barberini Museum in Potsdam in 2017
On being asked why he chooses to get involved with causes and projects of this kind, Plattner explained: “I owe the resources and skills for life to my parents and, above all, to my studies at the public technical university in Karlsruhe. That’s why I want to give something back in the area of education, so that others can also benefit from it.”
2022: Learn from Our Customers
In an interview to mark SAP’s 50th anniversary, Plattner shared some advice: “I recommend a return to the approach we used in the early days of SAP – of sending SAP teams out to the customer. Instead of implementing our standard systems, they should find out how people actually use the tools they get from SAP and other vendors. That will give us our starting point. There are so many interesting companies out there. We can learn from them and with them. We have to step outside SAP and do something with the customers.”
And in a comment directed to SAP employees, he said: “Treat the customers well – once we have them, we have to keep them. That’s one of SAP’s strengths. And never think it’s done. You have to carry on. The job is never done!”
“Treat the customers well” – Plattner’s wish to employees on SAP’s 50th birthday
2024
Plattner will step down from the Supervisory Board on May 15, the last of the SAP co-founders to leave the company.
Explore more of SAP’s more than 50-year history of success that began with five entrepreneurial programmers
WALLDORF and BANGKOK — SAP SE (NYSE: SAP) today announced Charoen Pokphand Foods Public Company Limited (“CP Foods”) has selected multiple SAP solutions to drive further growth and competitive advantage and to ensure the sustainability of its products for the future.
Record, report and act on your sustainability goals with SAP software
Catering to more than 4 billion people globally, CP Foods is embarking on its next stage of digital transformation with the RISE with SAP, SAP Sustainability Footprint Management, and SAP Sustainability Control Tower solutions. In addition, the SAP EHS Management, environment management application will be implemented to future-proof its business and to gain strategic insight into the sustainability impact of its products, processes and infrastructure globally. The company is a leading integrated agro-industrial and food business that is one of the world’s largest producers of feed, shrimp, poultry and pork. It has operations in 17 countries and exports to more than 50 countries.
Global Net-Zero Ambitions
In line with CP Foods’ goal of becoming the “Sustainable Kitchen of the World,” CP Foods is the first food processing company in the world with near- and long-term forests, lands and agriculture (FLAG) sustainability targets validated by the Science-Based Targets Initiative (SBTi). CP Foods is looking to realize the company’s Net Zero goals of reducing 42% of Scope 1 and 2 emissions and 30.3% of Scope 3 emissions by 2030 – and 90% of Scope 1 and 2 emissions and 72% of Scope 3 emissions by 2050. To achieve these goals, the company is implementing SAP Sustainability solutions to record, report and act on real-time sustainability data, driving carbon accounting at both corporate and product levels.
“Net Zero is the only solution to climate change,” CP Foods CEO Prasit Boondoungpraser said. “It is important to us to understand and reduce our impact on the planet, so we create food that is not only safe and nutritious for people but also green and clean for the earth. Feeding our livestock, farming our food and transporting it to people’s plates incurs emissions we have to be able to record and report. With RISE with SAP and SAP Sustainability solutions, we will have insight into actual emissions automated in real time rather than relying on manual averages, allowing us to make quick, informed and sustainable business decisions for our operations and for the planet.”
SAP plans to provide a technology foundation that will support CP Foods in complying with forthcoming carbon regulations in various markets, including the EU Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (EU C-BAM) and U.S. SEC climate risk disclosures.
Key to reducing total emissions, CP Foods will focus on supply chain emissions, with its emissions mostly falling under Scope 3. CP Foods will work with the Customer Success organization at SAP, leverage YASH Technologies’ sustainability expertise and build on Amazon Web Services (AWS) to implement SAP Sustainability solutions. Doing so will allow it to record and report on its Scope 1 and 2 emissions in Thailand and select Scope 3 (3.1 and 3.4) for its feed business in Thailand covering both FLAG and non-FLAG emissions. The next phase of implementation will extend in scope to cover operations around the world.
Cloud Sustainability
Paul Marriott, president of SAP Asia Pacific & Japan, said: “Sustainability is a huge opportunity for businesses across Asia. Using RISE with SAP and our sustainability solutions, CP Foods is getting ahead of forthcoming emissions regulation and future-proofing its business by using data to make more sustainable decisions. It can use those insights to drive more operational efficiencies, optimize supply chains, and differentiate its business against competitors.”
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In a significant development for the defense sector, SAP National Security Services, Inc. (SAP NS2) has obtained the Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) provisional authorization (PA) for SAP S/4HANA Cloud, Private Edition. This authorization enables SAP NS2 to deploy SAP S/4HANA and other cloud applications within their secure U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) cloud environment, […]
The global leader in enterprise software has announced the contract extension of SAP CEO Christian Klein for an additional three years, until the end of 2028. The decision, made by the company’s Supervisory Board, not only prolongs Klein’s tenure but also strengthens his position as the chairman of the Executive Board, a role he previously […]
To help address the challenge of unproductive meetings, the Future of Work team at SAP and SAP AppHaus created the “Meeting Workout” board game. It brings a playful approach to making meetings more efficient. Interested teams can choose between a virtual template or a downloadable, do-it-yourself version.
For the majority of employees, work comprises enjoyable projects and duties but also routines and tasks that can be tiring or difficult. To make the work experience as positive and efficient as possible, experts and companies around the globe seek to continuously improve the realities of their workforce. This is also true for SAP.
Meetings, All Kinds of Meetings
An important facet of today’s work reality is meetings. They are where all sorts of work decisions are prepared and made, where briefings take place, where teams build up their team identity, exchange thoughts, solve challenges, share updates, align across geographical time zones, and much more. In many cases and for many roles, meetings consume a considerable part of overall working hours. So it comes as no surprise that, in their most recent project, the Future of Work team at SAP and SAP AppHaus colleagues joined forces to develop an easy approach for teams to improve their meeting routines.
“As featured by Forbes in May 2023, an average employee spends 31 hours per month in unproductive meetings. This is a challenge we want to address with the Meeting Workout game,” says Andreas Hauser, SVP and head of SAP AppHaus Network. “By innovatively blending play with productivity, we can transform these hours into opportunities for meaningful engagement and collaborative innovation, paving the way for a future where every meeting is a step towards building stronger, more dynamic teams.”
Photo courtesy of Hyun Lee.
The Imperative for Efficient Meetings
According to a recent Microsoft report, inefficient meetings have been identified as the top disruptor to productivity, with an excessive number of meetings following close behind. As SAP Chief Future of Work Officer Christian Schmeichel states: “The way we are working is changing rapidly, and both the rise of hybrid work and new technologies have increased the number of meetings for many of us. Hence, it’s an imperative to foster meetings that best utilize our time, spark energy, and drive outcomes. The Meeting Workout game can help with an engaging workshop format that can not only improve meeting effectiveness but can enable teams to set new standards for workplace collaboration on their journey into the future of work.”
Playing for a Better Meeting Experience
From the initial idea to create a game for teams to improve their meeting routines, it took the New Work Practices team and SAP AppHaus a few weeks to design, test, and produce the Meeting Workout game. However, what might look like a fun project was very similar to any other design and innovation project.
“In our planning meetings and test sessions we really tried to put ourselves in the shoes of all kinds of teams in different organizations and setups,” recall project members Beate Riefer, UX designer at SAP AppHaus, and Filip Weidenbach, HR project expert in New Work Practices. “Through a very generic phrasing of the cards and in simple steps, the game should be applicable in the most diverse, if not all, environments. It’s not as easy as it might seem – and it’s the reason why we established breaks in our meetings to keep the energy and concentration levels up. Here’s an important recommendation for all teams playing the Meeting Workout game: have plenty of sticky notes and a variety of snacks available!”
50 Meeting Workout Games Available
The Meeting Workout game can be a perfect opportunity to help actively inspire and support teams in restructuring their current meeting formats. Users can choose between the virtual version available on Mural, a do-it-yourself, paper-based version for a physical workshop, and a tangible board game version.
The Future of Work team at SAP is gifting 50 board game versions on a first-come, first-serve basis. People or teams that would like to test and use the board game can contact SAPFutureOfWork@sap.com, thereby acknowledging that their postal address and contact information will be used only for the delivery of the game shipment, in accordance with the SAP Privacy Statement.
Waltraud Grimm is communications lead for SAP Future of Work. Imke Vierjahn is communications lead for SAP AppHaus.
Top photo courtesy of Hyun Lee
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SAP’s commitment to customers is steadfast in making SAP Business Technology Platform (SAP BTP) the best platform to extend and personalize SAP applications, integrate and connect landscapes, maximize the value of data, and drive business innovation through artificial intelligence (AI).
Discover which version of SAP BTP meets your needs
To that end, I am thrilled to announce that TrustRadius, a leading independent peer research and review platform, has once again recognized SAP BTP, along with multiple solutions that run on our platform, as winners of the 2024 Top Rated awards.
As a reflection of direct customer feedback, the TrustRadius Top Rated awards offer an authentic measure of a product’s quality and customer satisfaction and highlight those products that have demonstrated excellence in fulfilling clients’ needs and expectations.
Best of Awards
SAP customers’ willingness to share their hands-on experience and opinions of SAP BTP is testament to our platform’s services, robustness, and ongoing innovation.
We are honored that the following solutions have been recognized with Top Rated awards:
“SAP Business Technology Platform’s comprehensive suite of solutions has been recognized with a TrustRadius Top Rated award,” said Allyson Havener, senior vice president of Marketing and Community at TrustRadius. “SAP is committed to delivering innovative technologies that empower businesses to drive digital transformation, and achieve their goals. We congratulate SAP on this achievement, showcasing their continued leadership and excellence in providing cutting-edge enterprise solutions.”
Our Focus on Customer Success
At SAP, customer success and satisfaction are the ultimate measures of our own success. We strive to deliver industry-leading solutions, functionality, and user experience that exceeds customer expectations and unlocks business potential. This is especially important as customers accelerate their digital innovation across business operations while maintaining the agility to adapt to fluctuating market demands. SAP BTP provides this for our customers.
“SAP Business Technology Platform is the right tool to manage sites, applications, users, and everything you can imagine in the cloud and non-cloud world, from my point of view BTP is very well focused and has everything that a tool has to have.”
On behalf of the entire SAP BTP team, we sincerely thank TrustRadius for acknowledging SAP BTP in its 2024 Top Rated awards and our dedicated SAP BTP customers for their unwavering support.
JG Chirapurath is chief marketing and solutions officer for SAP Business Technology Platform.
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As the global economy continues to evolve, supply chains have grown more interconnected, complex, and prone to vulnerabilities. This evolution, paired with increasingly stringent regulations that require businesses to report on sustainability practices, has necessitated that procurement teams deliver enhanced transparency into increasingly dynamic supply chain operations.
Yet, this has become a challenge for chief procurement officers (CPOs) who often lack information on the supplier base. In fact, a recent study from Procurement Leaders and SAP found that suppliers are often reluctant to disclose privileged information, leading to miscalculated procurement decisions.
Against this backdrop, how can procurement professionals elevate their role and transform the depth of insights the function can offer? I believe this starts with three key actions.
1. Go Beyond Reporting
Environmental, social, and governance (ESG) initiatives have become a priority for procurement teams in recent years. Unfortunately, buyers often fail to receive accurate or complete sustainability information from sellers, according to the Procurement Leaders study. This lack of transparency can increase the potential for regulatory violations, especially as climate-focused laws like the European Green Deal come to fruition.
While reporting should remain a key tactic, it is not sufficient to deliver on sustainability goals. Organizations must invest in software that fits within the organization’s scope, generates more touchpoints with sellers, and provides visibility into suppliers’ social and environmental impacts.
Move faster and spend better with e-procurement solutions from SAP
Software can help organizations increase regulatory compliance, reduce costs, and develop healthy relationships with sellers. Of course, there are limitations as suppliers can be reluctant to share information – like financial statements or internal regulatory policies.
However, software that is augmented with predictive analytics can deliver metrics and insights into supplier emissions and energy usage that enable organizations to evaluate suppliers against their sustainability objectives.
2. Take the Lead Through a Bold but Methodical AI Strategy
As procurement teams take on more responsibility in increasing transparency across the supply chain, they should be courageous but vigilant in efforts to uncover supplier insights. Consequently, many CPOs have opted for strategies involving AI.
AI can provide procurement teams with intelligent business data that can lead to more informed purchase decisions. Additionally, according to the Oxford College of Procurement & Supply, AI can reduce time spent on buying processes by up to 60% and reach cost savings of up to 40%.
Adopting AI throughout the source-to-pay process has obvious benefits, although many companies lack the internal skills needed to leverage the power of this technology. Organizations should take a holistic and careful approach, ensuring that internal and external stakeholders are “bought-in” and empowered through cohesive training and change management programs.
Similarly, CPOs should take steps to maintain rigorous data privacy policies to build trust with suppliers. Procurement teams should only implement AI technologies that are relevant, responsible, and reliable, ensuring that the implementation of AI follows guiding principles and protects the privacy of all users.
3. Select a Trusted Technology Partner
Leading procurement teams are realizing the importance of cultivating trusted and mutually beneficial relationships with suppliers, particularly those offering resources vital to business continuity. Identifying a technology partner who understands the needs of different industries and the power of developing connections can empower procurement teams to optimize decision-making.
This is where SAP is in a unique position to help. We not only have unmatched access to business data, but we’ve processed data responsibly and reliably for decades through our ERP systems, SAP Ariba solutions, and now SAP Business Network. This makes it possible to help organizations counteract supplier reluctance, as SAP Ariba solutions work with millions of trading partners to help develop connections and provide greater visibility.
In addition, SAP Ariba solutions can provide guided recommendations for buyers, supporting internal compliance even if the user is unaware of regulations. This can enable deeper knowledge of spend management, helping to reduce redundancies and complexities and provide employees with more time to solve harder problems.
Procurement’s visibility into the supply chain is paramount for informed decision-making and mitigating risk. By moving beyond reporting, investing in AI methodically, and partnering with a trusted solution provider, procurement will not only achieve greater supply chain visibility but also lay the foundation for increased innovation and competitive advantage in today’s global economy.
Now is the time to rethink your procurement technology strategy.
Baber Farooq is senior vice president and head of Market Strategy for SAP Ariba.
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New Value Generation partnership initiative focused on delivering greater client productivity and innovation with new generative AI capabilities and industry-specific cloud solutions
WALLDORF and ARMONK— IBM (NYSE: IBM) and SAP SE (NYSE: SAP) today announced their vision for the next era of their collaboration, which includes new generative AI capabilities and industry-specific cloud solutions that can help clients unlock business value.
“IBM and SAP’s shared approach to generative AI, built on an open ecosystem, trust and purpose-built models, will help empower clients to optimize business outcomes,” said John Granger, Senior Vice President, IBM Consulting. “Our new Value Generation partnership initiative will enable clients to accelerate the path to innovation, competitive advantage and become a next generation enterprise through generative AI.”
“It makes perfect sense to expand our partnership with IBM to help more customers accelerate their cloud journey leveraging RISE with SAP and realize the transformative benefits of generative AI for business in the cloud,” said Scott Russell, Chief Revenue Officer & Executive Board Member, Customer Success of SAP SE. “This expanded partnership will help more of our joint customers reach new heights by innovating through the cloud, data and business AI to grow and transform their businesses.”
IBM Consulting and SAP aim to accelerate transformation enabled by RISE with SAP by supporting clients in the following key areas:
Next-Generation AIBusiness Processes: Together, the companies are exploring opportunities to build new generative AI capabilities for RISE with SAP and infuse AI into SAP business processes across industry-specific cloud solutions and line of business applications. Initially, IBM plans to extend AI capabilities across SAP’s portfolio of cloud solutions and applications, all of which are underpinned by SAP Business Technology Platform (SAP BTP). This includes RISE with SAP, the GROW with SAP solution, financial solutions for the office of the CFO, supply chain management solutions, solutions for human capital management, SAP Customer Experience solutions and intelligent spend management solutions. IBM also plans to leverage SAP Signavio and SAP Business AI solutions to help define next-generation business processes through a proof-of-concept adoption program.
Next-Generation Industry Innovation: IBM and SAP plan to build intelligent industry use cases, enabled by data-driven insights, into end-to-end business processes to fuel next-generation industry innovation. These use cases will initially focus on the industrial manufacturing, consumer packaged goods (CPG), retail, defense, automotive and utilities industries. This includes IBM’s recent work with SAP to develop new AI solutions for the CPG and retail industries. As part of this initiative, IBM has begun the development of an extensive portfolio of over 100 AI solutions across industry, line-of-business and product delivery. In addition, IBM plans to develop prescriptive industry value maps that define next-generation business processes and opportunities for impact with AI. Clients will be able to access all of these new AI solutions through the global IBM Innovation Studios and SAP Experience Center sites.
Next-Generation Platform Architecture and Customer Adoption Approach: Next-generation enterprises require next-generation platform architectures and a modernized approach to customer adoption. Through the Value Generation partnership initiative, IBM intends to provide next-generation reference architectures that enable a clean core approach. To do this, IBM plans to leverage SAP BTP, SAP Signavio and LeanIX solutions. These new reference architectures will help define standards across data, process, systems and device integration, process orchestration and automation. IBM consultants supporting clients on SAP projects can also leverage IBM Consulting Advantage, IBM’s AI services platform, and its portfolio of proprietary methods, assets and Assistants to bring more repeatability and consistency to client delivery. With IBM Consulting Advantage, IBM consultants can transform the way they deliver SAP solutions to boost productivity and mitigate risk by leveraging generative AI to help complete tasks like generation of user stories, test scripts, training and change management content and code creation.
Next-Generation Ecosystem Expansion: IBM and SAP plan to partner around their respective employee network groups and “next-gen” communities, such as the business women’s networks at IBM and SAP, the SAP University Alliances program and the Veterans to Work program of SAP and Veterans at IBM to increase the SAP solutions experience in the consulting workforce and develop the next generation of talent. The companies also plan to explore new ways to collaborate on social impact programs, such as training at- risk youth in the IT sector and accelerating the integration of social businesses into global supply chains.
watsonx Planned Availability on the Generative AI Hub: IBM Granite Model Series are expected to be accessible for use across SAP’s portfolio of cloud solutions and applications – which is underpinned by the generative AI hub in SAP AI Core. The generative AI hub facilitates relevant, reliable and responsible business AI and provides instant access to a broad range of large language models (LLMs). This expands on IBM and SAP’s collaboration around embedding IBM Watson AI technology into SAP solutions. To further highlight watsonx.ai Granite capabilities, IBM Consulting plans to build extensions using the model on the generative AI hub for select customers.
This initiative will build on the companies’ over 50-year collaboration based on deep technology, industry and domain expertise and demonstrates the two organizations’ joint commitment to continue to evolve to put clients first and meet market demand.
IBM Consulting accelerates business transformation for our clients through hybrid cloud and AI technologies, leveraging our open ecosystem of partners. With deep industry and business expertise spanning strategy, experience design, technology, and operations, we have become the trusted partner to the world’s most innovative and valuable companies, helping modernize and secure their most complex systems. Our 160,000 consultants embrace an open way of working and apply our proven, collaborative engagement model, IBM Garage, to scale ideas into outcomes. As the only major global systems integrator inside a technology company, we don’t just advise – we invent and build what’s next together with our clients. Find out more at IBM.com/consulting.
IBM is a leading provider of global hybrid cloud and AI, and consulting expertise. We help clients in more than 175 countries capitalize on insights from their data, streamline business processes, reduce costs and gain the competitive edge in their industries. More than 4,000 government and corporate entities in critical infrastructure areas such as financial services, telecommunications and healthcare rely on IBM’s hybrid cloud platform and Red Hat OpenShift to effect their digital transformations quickly, efficiently and securely. IBM’s breakthrough innovations in AI, quantum computing, industry-specific cloud solutions and consulting deliver open and flexible options to our clients. All of this is backed by IBM’s commitment to trust, transparency, responsibility, inclusivity and service.
As a global leader in enterprise applications and business AI, SAP (NYSE:SAP) stands at the nexus of business and technology. For over 50 years, organizations have trusted SAP to bring out their best by uniting business-critical operations spanning finance, procurement, HR, supply chain, and customer experience. For more information, visit www.sap.com.
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