Supporting the World's Largest Agriculture & Food Production Company to Achieve $1B in business benefit value with SAP
Delivering Organizational Change for a Global SAP Transformation across 43 countries.
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Introduction
Our client, the world's largest agriculture and food production company, embarked on a global, multi-year journey to transform their business using SAP. With operations spanning over 70 countries, 160,000 employees, and revenues exceeding $120 billion, the company sought to:
Build next-generation capabilities
Energize the organization and evolve company culture
Generate significant financial value and simplify how they work and grow
The Scenario
As a long-time SAP customer, the company embarked on a multi-year journey to transition all processes and data to a single platform. This involved implementing both on-premise SAP instances and SAP Cloud Platform products and services, including S/4HANA, Fiori, iOS Apps, Ariba, and SuccessFactors.
The Change Challenge
To drive efficiencies and enhance standardization in organizational change management (OCM), the company aimed to reduce the number of consulting providers. By focusing on select partners, they sought better quality and control. They needed a partner capable of scaling services flexibly with fluctuating demand while optimizing resource use, maintaining high standards, ensuring rapid scalability, and keeping costs manageable.
Scale & Complexity
The company has approximately 65 businesses within North America, Latin America, Europe, Middle East & Africa, and Asia Pacific regions. These businesses belong to five enterprises, categorized into multiple groups, each with several businesses. Additionally, various supporting functions are provided by global or regional shared services.
A Diversified Portfolio of SAP and Transformation Initiatives
At the time of engagement, the company's portfolio included 43 SAP deployments over four years, alongside four enterprise business transformation projects and two global IT signature projects.
One Global OCM Standard with Flexibility & Responsiveness
They sought a provider to deliver organizational change management services across all regions, improve change management service quality, utilize standardized global processes, and accelerate system adoption—shortening time to value and ROI.
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A Golden Thread
We provided a key theme, narrative, and message framework that served as the foundation for all project communications, ensuring consistency and engagement. Our team also became the company's primary partner for change communications.
A Hub & Spoke Model for Organizational Change Management
We served as a seamless extension of the company's hub-and-spoke model, with a global lead in North America and regional leads in Asia Pacific, Europe, Middle East & Africa, and Latin America. This ensured consistent processes, industrialized change management, and enabled early adoption while reducing costs by eliminating duplication.
The Accelerators
An Elite Team with Deep SAP & Industry Expertise
Senior Practitioners: Our team consisted of seasoned professionals with extensive experience in organizational change management, SAP projects, manufacturing, food, and agriculture industries.
Local Bilingual Support: We provided local support in native languages to ensure effective communication and engagement.
Early Engagement: Initiating OCM activities 20-24 weeks before deployment helped create a successful change environment.
Data-Driven Approach
Objective Insights: We used data-driven methods to support executive discussions and improve change management outcomes.
Change Impact Aggregation: Aggregating change impacts informed planning and helped track adoption metrics globally and locally.
Guided Focus: Data insights directed OCM focus where it was most needed.
Tools That Scale
Our standardized tools and processes were designed to scale, ensuring consistent application across various deployments and regions.
Celebrating Our Impact and Innovation
Our OCM team and the company's counterparts were awarded the company's Breakthrough Award for an exemplary SAP deployment completed in just four months. This honor recognized innovation and high performance aligned with the company's values.
Award Nomination
Recognized for excellence in change management and innovative solutions.
Our Commitment
Dedicated to driving impactful change across global enterprises.
Start Role Mapping Early
Role mapping, though not initially part of the SAP training strategy, proved vital for go-live success. Starting this activity early enhanced adoption and ownership among employees.
Higher Frequency of Assessment
Frequent change impact assessments significantly reduced open impacts at go-live, dropping from 100 to an average of 5. This proactive approach minimized disruptions and facilitated smoother transitions.
Super User for Life
Post-go-live, Super Users became invaluable assets. They supported managing directors and reduced support costs. Implementing a clear strategy for Super Users increased benefits realization and sustained performance improvements.
Positioned for the Future
The company is well-positioned for further transformation and innovation, realizing goals of being big, fast, and innovative. They are unlocking new growth, fostering commercial excellence, embedding agility, and leveraging analytics.
Do you operate globally, including North America?
Yes. Issoria serves clients worldwide, including North America, Europe, Asia, and Latin America. Our global virtual bench of change consultants ensures local expertise wherever you need it. Approximately 60% of Issoria clients are US corporates.
