Transformation Every Day
00:24:47 · JP Haas
[00:24:47] S0: We work with customers across across any SAP lifecycle stage. So before transformations, in transformations, beyond transformations just in the in the ongoing operations stage. And let me tell you why. Because you said earlier, you know, AI operating system for enterprise IT, and that's really what we think and are convinced that we are, which is we are the platform that makes IT much more, you know, digital, AI enabled, and quicker in everything they do. If you zoom one level out further, what is it that we're really doing and and why? We think that there's a there's an amazing opportunity to ensure that the way that the business wants to run and what it needs can be implemented and realized in the software that it runs on in perfect lockstep. Right? So whenever the business needs something to be changed about how it runs and how that's implemented in the system, that today takes a long time to actually realize. That's the ongoing state of my my procurement needs a new feature. It gets passed to IT. They try to implement it. It takes a bit too long. Yeah. And and you... These two things are out of sync. The same thing can be said about a transformation project or a migration project. Now the IT side needs to change something about the technical landscape. You're changing an ECC system to an s four system. How that impacts the business can also lead to these two things being out of sync. Right? IT and business are not in lockstep anymore. But if you you work with Conduct, and if you if you can if you can deliver that operating system for IT that makes sure that everything that can be changed and implemented at pace now, these two things are moving in perfect harmony and at perfect pace.
00:26:49 · Johannes Langguth, JP Haas
[00:26:49] S1: When you look back at your experience that you already have done in your customer interactions, what are considering that the two best stories where your own system surprised you yourself the most with the capabilities it shown and with the moments that you generated with that? [00:27:10] S0: I can think of two amazing... Well, more, but I give you two. Number one, we worked with a customer that identified a bottleneck on the production line. And they didn't understand why a certain order type always took six days to be scheduled and actually be produced, even though they expected it to be only two days. We were able to find out that two different edge conditions were interacting with each other in a way that led to this particular order type always taking six days to be scheduled and not the two days that they wanted. And that was hidden in some kind of custom code line, some edge condition that no one knew actually had an impact on the on the other one. And and so we we were able to figure that out and actually suggest how you could resolve that. And that has, you know, immediate operational impact on the company. The second thing is a company that that was working on on a performance issue in an SAP system system that had been reported by users, and they'd been looking for more than a week into what were the different what were the different causes that that might be that might be be leading to this. And we were able to figure out what exactly was the the cause for that performance issue and, again, suggest the fix. And within within one afternoon, I mean,
00:28:36 · Johannes Langguth
[00:28:36] S1: is literally on the first day of the pilot working together It's what they threw at the at the system in order to test to test its guts. They were able to to to completely resolve that. And and I really like these stories because to to reflect on that, because in the first part where you said like you have some had some interdependencies that nobody knew about and you found out about this. Those things exist a lot and they are nowhere documented. You just have to rely on people who may have known that, okay, I made something five years ago, which could have an effect to that what the other colleague made something eight years ago. But in most of the cases, nobody's aware of anything. And the the knowledge that you are not aware of that is, from my experience, quite common at customers. And this is one of the reasons, for example, why so many transformations get delayed. Because, I have, for example, one customer or I had one when I was at SAP, I remember it quite well. Big German company, they had around 120 ERP systems. And they were completely stuck like like a like a like a rabbit before a foxhole because they said, like, I I really need to start. I want to start. But I have the problem when I cut something over there, yeah, on the right side. If I cut something off because I changed the system, I do something new. I have absolutely no clue if something on the complete other side of my architecture falls down. And this kind of fear was like completely locking any progress in these kinds of of of initiatives that the customers do. And what for me is the good... The the the good news about your existence in that way is that you can can... With this possibilities and capabilities like that, gave more momentum to so many stock initiatives because you are giving transparency. And if I add something of a of a second example, the problem that that we always have in the SAP ecosystem is if you look at the why, what, how dimensions that I quite like because it gives you a 360 degree view on problems. The SAP ecosystem is traditionally very strong in the what because SAP can explain what their software is doing in the standard and can explain it quite well. Concerning the why, it gets a little bit different. But the thing that is more or less the most relevant for many customers in proceeding that way is the why topic. Sorry.
00:30:59 · Johannes Langguth
It's it's the how topic. How do I make these kind of steps? And this is also the factor which blocks and stops too many transformations in that way. How is it reacted? In the standard way because we had no tools yet like Conduct AI. Okay. People talk more about the what because they have to try with the possibilities that they have to get the car rolling again. Why the problem is in the how? And gaining this kind of knowledge and gain this kind of security. Okay, I have now a safe feeling when I go on to my transformation because I have the transparency now. This is will this will lead so many organizations into a position where they can approach this kind of transformation that have been far away from that possibilities until now, definitely.
00:31:45 · JP Haas, Johannes Langguth
[00:31:45] S0: A 100%. And we want to bring confidence where there was anxiety before. And that's the feeling that we that we see often with our users and also up to the CIO level of I now feel in charge and control again of how my company runs. And that's incredibly powerful for them. I do think it's worth also drilling in into again, what what are the reasons for that? We alluded to this earlier that I think and I wanna be very clear on this. I don't think this is the fault of IT, nor of consultants, because I think the the the tough bit about these big transformation projects is number one, the technical complexity, and number two, the coordination issue between business and IT. Number one, technical complexity. You were you were talking about this earlier, Alex. Right? You said, if I change something on one side of the system, I don't know how it impacts some other side of it. Right? And that's because of because of all the interdependencies that exist in these big code bases and system landscapes. And [00:32:57] S1: humans
00:32:57 · Johannes Langguth, JP Haas
[00:32:57] S1: humans [00:32:59] S0: are not made for this. Humans are not made to manually read out what these big code bases and exceptions are doing. There should be technology that helps you to understand technology. That's the first step. And then the second step is even if you even if you can create a technical map of everything, you don't know how that impacts the business end user because, again, you can't read that from from the code and the pure technical objects. And in many ways, that is what these transformations are about. It's figuring out how are these technical objects actually used by the business side of the house in their day to day work. And if you don't have that visibility, which comes down to a communication and coordination issue between these different teams, then it's also very, very hard to make these decisions. Do you agree with that? Or what's what's your take on why why there is so much anxiety in this space?