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Hong Kong: The Sites, Landmarks & Destiny

Posted by WSS on November 26, 2017 | Comments Off

After an awesome week in Hong Kong, during our ride back to the airport the driver said, “when you arrived you saw Hong Kong as a pin on the map” and I added “and now it’s a magnifying glass with a big spotlight!”

What my wife and I found was a fast moving, bright light, vibrant, safe, friendly city with a surrounding region of country trails and rolling mountains. In fact we enjoyed it so much that we walked 9-10 miles each day to see as much as possible!

What brought us to Hong Kong?

Our son Steven is a Drexel University study abroad student at the University of Hong Kong and having a great experience. He was a perfect tour guide pinpointing many great sites, landmarks, restaurants, and less traveled fun places to check out. Also, for 3 days he was selected to spend time shadowing the CEO of the top global publication, the South China Morning Post, (on par with the Washington Post / NY Times) which was an amazing opportunity so between this experience and his classes we had some time to explore.

Our first lesson was how to use the MTR system (aka – subways, trains, metro)… Very quickly we learned about the blue, red, green and orange lines and main attractions like…

Wan Chai (灣仔) one of the busiest commercial areas in Hong Kong and the closest stop to our hotel
Tung Chung (東涌) meaning ‘eastern stream’, formerly a rural and fishing village and now the gateway to Ngong Ping’s Big Buddha, the world’s largest seated outdoor bronze Buddha statue and Po Lin Monastery
Che Kung Temple (車公廟) the stop to visit the Hong Kong Heritage Museum which houses the “Bruce Lee – Kung Fu ‧ Art ‧ Life” exhibit

And of course these lessons allowed us to travel by MTR to the Hong Kong Disneyland Resort which had popular attractions like “it’s a small world,” “Disneyland Railroad” and “Jungle River Cruise” as well as unique ones only found in Hong Kong including “Mystic Manor” and “Iron Man Experience.”

Interestingly the short ride to the resort had a custom Disney metro car with Mickey Mouse windows and a custom interior with blue lined seats, Minnie statues, and hand holders in the shape of Mickey.

Other memorable sites included:

Victoria Peak – The highest mountain on Hong Kong island with amazing views
Chi Lin Nunnery (志蓮淨苑) – Constructed entirely with cypress wood, without the use of any nails and is the world’s largest hand-made wooden building
OZONE – One of the highest rooftop sky bars in the world, located on the 118th floor of The Ritz-Carlton)
The University of Hong Kong (aka HKU / Hong Kong University) – Founded in 1911, it is one of the most prestigious universities in Asia (& globe) with a beautiful campus and a great Alumni Affairs office
Malls – Some of the biggest and most impressive in the world with many top global and local brands
Central–Mid-Levels escalator and walkway system – The longest outdoor covered escalator system in the world surrounded by Hong Kong SoHo
Kowloon Walled City Park – Originally a Chinese military fort and more recently restored into a beautiful park
Tung Choi Street (通菜街) is a well-known street market popularly known as “Ladies’ Market” where you walk through stalls and shops to find deals

Historically it was interesting to think back to when “Made in Hong Kong” was very popular (back in the day!) to the ancient farming and fishing villages — to today where Hong Kong has evolved into a major port and international financial center with more global brands and shopping malls then we have ever seen per square block.

In fact, our hotel, the Grand Hyatt was right next to the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre where the transfer of sovereignty over Hong Kong from the United Kingdom to the People’s Republic of China took place in 1997.

As we walked around Hong Kong you realize it’s always on the move… hustling and bustling… the MTRs are clean (we once saw a glass of water or soda spilled and it was cleaned within minutes). Rarely did we have to wait for the MTR more then 2 or 3 minutes… and the people are friendly and peaceful. The streets and malls are alive and busy into the night.

Interestingly we learned that every Sunday maids from Indonesia and the Philippines gather together and take a government required day off where they play cards, picnic, style hair, and socialize.

Perhaps when it was all said and done we realized how valuable the experience was for us.

To gain perspective about Hong Kong, China, and Asia is very worthwhile. Whether for business or vacation we would highly recommend taking time to get to know Hong Kong.

In fact, like so many places I have visited there will always be a part of us in Hong Kong and as the news takes place and others share their stories my interest will be sky high to learn more and share insights.

Who knows? Perhaps our new friend who we met at the HKU Alumni Affairs Office said it best… Sometimes “who we meet” and “when we meet” is simply “Destiny!” (see symbol on right) and it seemed like finally getting to Hong Kong was our destiny which will live on as a priceless memory for a lifetime.

Appendix – Photo Gallery

Chi Lin Nunnery

Hong Kong Heritage Museum – “Bruce Lee – Kung Fu * Art * Life” exhibit

Hong Kong Disneyland Resort – MTR (Custom Train)

Favorite Restaurant

View from OZONE

Ngong Ping’s Big Buddha

Grand Hyatt Hotel

View from Victoria Peak

Victoria Peak Hiking Trail – Pok Fu Lam Country Park

Hong Kong University

Building a Global, Integrated SuccessFactors HR Services Model with SAP Jam

Posted by WSS on September 21, 2017 | Comments Off

– Grow Your Talent –

Perhaps Bill McDermott, SAP CEO, said it best on a recent investor call that deploying an HR solution is a “more comprehensive decision” than just HR alone (i.e. WorkDay).

When you look at the importance of having a cloud platform including the digital core of “S/4HANA and the nucleus of the 21st Century Enterprise and all line of business (LoB) executives evolving their use of their individual LoB with the center of gravity, the data and the process of the company. You know, that’s game set match for SAP [and SAP SuccessFactors] (1).”

When assessing your organization’s HRIS program, my team and I find that the BEST RUN organizations consider how the HR Service Model, SAP Jam, and company-wide goals align to the business requirements Including: increasing HR operational process efficiency, reducing costs, and aligning HR to strategic revenue imperatives.

A ONE Company Approach
The integrated HR service delivery model works best with one single, holistic, core HR system which addresses:

Deploying one common employee data model
Improving people management and talent development
Reducing the time spent on HR transactional activities
Enabling better reporting for improved decision support

Successful companies develop a strategic HR value map (often with a 3+ year view) which identifies priorities, user cases (scenarios), and enables collaboration and communications.

Quantifying the Challenge
The numbers speak louder than words including a Dale Carnegie Training survey which outlines the drivers of employee engagement and highlights why it is critically important. This study was based on national representation of 1500 employees which found (2):

11 Billion (USD) is lost annually to employee turnover
Companies with engaged employees outperform those without engaged employees by up to 202%
71% of all employees are not engaged

While these numbers may vary proportionally in your organization the trends are alarming and every business leader and HR executive and manager is aware of their importance. Providing the combination of HR and SAP Jam provides the ideal platform to engage employees and stakeholders.

Leaders, employees and contractors, managers, centers of excellence, and experts all have a common responsibility to work together and help achieve company goals, objectives, strategies, and execute tactically in support of a ONE company approach.

Too often there are silos, disparate unorganized information, barriers to cross-team engagement (internal & external to the organization), which impedes progress, creates roadblocks, and increases the risk of failure or inefficient processes — all of which impact the bottom– or top-line of the business.

When the best and brightest in our organizations work together with common goals, excellent communication and collaboration, more often successful outcomes are achieved along with continuous improvement.

Building the HR Service Model with SAP Jam
The business model is clear. Using SAP SuccessFactors for User Experiences, Reporting Systems, Talent Management, Core HR, and Technology increases the odds for enterprise-wide success (see Print Screen 1) and enables an organization’s ability to manage and grow its talent.

Print Screen 1: Building a Global, Integrated SuccessFactors HR Services Model with SAP Jam

Moving all the employee master data onto a single global system, to reduce complexity and deliver better data for analysis, provides a greater ROI (return on investment) and reduces the TCO (total cost of ownership) of the overall HRIS Global System.

While many customers deploy the entire HR suite and others implement a few modules (i.e. Learning, Performance & Goals) at a time… the BEST RUN companies leverage HR and SAP Jam Collaboration together:

Deploying enterprise-wide Learning & Development Academies or Universities
Ensuring HR communications and collaboration are in place to improve engagement with employees, contractors, and new hires (as well as internal/external stakeholders)
Replacing old or ineffective HR intranets / portals with SAP Cloud Platform &/or SAP Jam
Leveraging SAP Jam to reduce the risks and costs of implementations, adoption, and change management

The decision to deploy SAP Jam Collaboration with HR is very different than using disparate non-HRand non-business process related collaboration platforms such as Yammer, SharePoint, Jive, Chatter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Slack, Connections and HR boutique throw-in collaboration and discussion boards.

SAP SuccessFactors (along with SAP SuccessFactors Foundation – formerly BizX) and SAP Jam provide a powerful, unified basis to grow talent and address strategic HR management. Together they provide a core set of capabilities centered around one global system of record, fine-tuned to meet local, enterprise, and business unit requirements.

HR leaders and HRIS management should always consider the bigger picture of a comprehensive enterprise HRIS Global System, along with consistent processes and employee data, in setting in place the most effective tools and resources which empower the workforce.

The Importance to HR Leaders
HR leaders have a growing responsibility of great importance = To optimize employees engagement, skills, work experiences and to stay ahead of technology developments which provide value to company-wide and individual KPIs, goals, objectives, and achievements (3).

Given the many changes which will happen from today to the year 2030 in the marketplace (i.e. Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence, Internet of Things, Blockchain, Big Data, and Analytics) the choice is simple: stay up with the times or risk being left behind which can impact jobs and company success or failure.

The decisions made today will impact the next year and the next decade plus.

The times we live in are exciting and important. Those early adopters who pay attention to the strategic direction of their company’s leaders, along with marketplace conditions which impact employees and customers, will be in the best position to stay ahead.

When entrepreneurial visionaries like “Elon Musk Thinks AI Will Beat Humans at Everything by 2030,” it at least sends a signal that we must position our organizations and people to be ready for change and transition to new jobs, skills, and expectations which will affect us one way or another going forward.

Those who consider the BIG picture and make comprehensive HR decisions will be in the best position to (a) grow in their own jobs and careers, (b) help employees and stakeholders, and (c) provide the most value and impact to their organization.

—

Useful Links / References

(1) Seeking Alpha: SAP’s CEO Bill McDermott on Q2 2017 Results – Earnings Call Transcript
(2) Dale Carnegie Training – Engaged Employees Infographic
(3) Economist – Equipping people to stay ahead of technological change
SAP Jam Collaboration for HR: Revolutionize work, simplify your business
SAP SuccessFactors – Forrester, Gartner, IDC – 33 reports
SAP SuccessFactors Employee Central
SAP SuccessFactors
Forrester Consulting: The Total Economic Impact of SAP Jam Collaboration

About the Author

Richard D. Blumberg is a SAP Jam Practice leader who works with both SAP and SAP Services. He is the President of World Sales Solutions, LLC (WSS) (www.WorldSalesSolutions.com) providing 29+ years of thought leadership on a variety of “View from the Top” strategies including: Enterprise Social Business, Go-to-Market Strategies, Business Development, Talent Development, and Community Building. He and his team are recognized SAP Jam global experts for implementations, innovation, and adoption.

Blogs

From Now to the Year 2030 – SAP Jam Collaboration Will Play an Important Role With SAP Leonardo and the Digital Revolution

Posted by WSS on July 13, 2017 | Comments Off

What is the role of collaboration in the digital age?

The recent SAP Executive Summit 2017 in Italy, the home of Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci, shared insights on the “4th industrial revolution” to remind us that we can learn from each new wave of progress and change.

Bill McDermott, SAP, CEO, referenced in his keynote at Sapphire NOW the “fourth industrial revolution and an incredible opportunity for companies to re-imagine themselves in this digital age.”

And now with the overwhelming success of Leonardo Live in Frankfurt Germany there is an opportunity to further understand digital innovation and leading-edge solutions with customers, partners, and experts from around the globe.

As we consider the historic and future trends related to the cloud and digital transformation, one of the leading common denominator grows in importance: collaboration.

The Industrial Revolution – A Look Back & Forward

Upon hearing and reviewing these presentations, keynotes, and events, I decided to research the previous industrial revolutions and consider the role of collaboration in respect to connecting people, processes, and technology.

The first industrial revolution saw the growth of steam power, coal, iron, railroads and textiles
The second one involved mass production advancements in industry, technology, energy, electricity, petroleum, steel, agriculture, manufacturing and transportation
The third realized information technology, new energy, and renewable electricity
Now the fourth is the digital revolution

Collaboration played an important part in each of these industrial revolutions. And now we look forward to the digital age before us and the next big wave of opportunity: SAP Leonardo.

For SAP Leonardo solutions to work at their optimum level there will be many business and IT considerations including a key universal theme = collaboration. Whether addressing all or one of the following: Internet of Things (IOT), Machine Learning, Blockchain, Analytics, Big Data, SAP Cloud Platform, Digital Supply Chain, Leonardo Bridge, and Design Thinking — they all work best when people team together.

Collaboration – A View from the Top

Perhaps Hasso Plattner, SAP co-founder and Chairman of the Supervisory Board said it best, “Simplicity, Speed, Collaboration, Security Drive – The Intelligent Future.” During Sapphire NOW he shared a key message about “tapping into the collective intelligence of workers” (Proof point: watch the first 20 seconds of this video, see the orange arrow below where he identified SAP Jam).

SAP Jam Collaboration Plays a Central Role

SAP will continue to invest in SAP Jam as a central component of the digital modular suit. As the value map and roadmap continue to evolve, SAP Jam will play a unique role to enable SAP Leonardo and Digital Transformation. SAP’s Modular Suite highlights the importance of collaboration, SAP Jam Collaboration.

Collaboration has a Purpose & Unique Place in the Digital Age

It all makes perfect sense. Digital Transformation for business and IT requires collaboration to harness the intellect of the entire workforce. Where there is collaboration, individual and group intelligence can be realized to accelerate revenues, growth, value, learning, productivity, and success.

Jobs and successful outcomes, between now, 2030 and beyond, depend on collaboration to address and stay ahead of the rapidly changing marketplace.

Where there is innovation…
When a team redefines a business challenge or opportunity. As SAP and third-party apps and data are used to turn ideas into action. Where rollouts go from pilot programs to scale across the enterprise.

From disparate silos to holistic central hubs of knowledge.

To turn a vision into reality. For the early adopters, business colleagues and lines of business, both internal and external to the organization, who are empowered to transform the business.

For community building.
To gain the competitive advantage.
To accelerate initiatives and create win-wins.

The best bet, both now and as we go to 2030 and beyond, is SAP, SAP Leonardo and for collaboration: SAP Jam.

—
Useful Links / References

About the Author

—

Blogs

14 Ways to JumpStart #SAPJam Collaboration, Communities or Groups

Posted by WSS on November 16, 2016 | Comments Off

How a Group Admin or Leader Ensures Adoption!

Important strategic initiatives, business outcomes and processes, collaboration, content, communications, and/or community building takes “time and effort” to translate onto SAP Jam.

The recent study, “Forrester Total Economic Impact™ of SAP Jam Collaboration for Learning, Onboarding and Employee Development” showcases the impact to cost savings, productivity, operational efficiencies, and overall strategic objectives. Several customers that my team and I work with participated in this study and continue to realize the value highlighted. Together we see on a first hand, daily basis …that it works!

And yet, sometimes a SAP Jam group admin, business owner, or leader needs to consider ways to drive (or “spark”) sustainable growth and momentum for their respective audience. They need to step back, assess, and plan out the priorities. The last thing any of us want to see is that 3 to 9 months after go-live that the group has “zero” activity.

As a result, my team and I, based on hundreds of work experiences and success stories pinpointed a “Top 14” list to help organizations JumpStart their SAP Jam initiatives.

Which of the following are applicable to you and your current or emerging SAP Jam initiative?

Business is complex. And from complexity we want simplicity. It takes a certain skill set to turn the complex into simple. There are business challenges and technical requirements. SAP Jam can be stand alone or integrate with other SAP, SuccessFactors, or 3rd party applications and data. All of these requirements take cross-discipline expertise.

Every quarter their are new SAP Jam releases. New features and capabilities. My team and I welcome the challenge on a daily basis with the multitude of business and IT considerations (& approaches) to help our customers achieve successful SAP Jam implementations and adoption.

At the end of each day, we appreciate the many important and diverse groups we work with to address their challenges and find solutions. It takes both the “science and art” forms to achieve success. No matter how many implementations take place and questions are answered there is always more to address, learn about, and discover.

Consider a 1000 piece puzzle. We work together to put the pieces together.

The Many Attributes of SAP Jam
SAP Jam is compared to other platforms which is fine.

The part that’s comforting is that SAP, SuccessFactors, and the SAP Jam product team are market leaders.

SAP Jam and the attributes it represents rank very high in Analyst reports including:

Integration – SAP SuccessFactors integration is built in by way of SuccessFactors foundations (previously BizX) (i.e. SuccessFactors Learning / LMS, SAP HCP, SAP CRM, Hybris Cloud 4 Customer, Fiori, S/4HANA, SAP ECC (SD), Document Repositories such as OpenText, Box, etc.) with an excellent Developer and Open API environment (OData). SAP Jam works well with SharePoint, Microsoft Office 365 SharePoint (Web Parts), Outlook Plug-in and YouTube. Public documentation is excellent.
Social Learning – SAP Jam for Social Learning (Jam + LMS) reduces the cost of training
Roadmap – SAP Jam is part of the overall SAP roadmap so the enhancements and value continue to grow in leaps and bounds throughout the SAP portfolio. The SAP Jam roadmap is based on customer feedback and provides continuous innovations on a regular basis.
Admin Controls – Strong Permission Levels… Moderation Levels… Language capabilities built into the platform for the users… Users can be removed (made inactive quickly…)…
Groups – Enterprise collaboration goes beyond feed conversations. Both structured and unstructured collaboration is available along with sub-groups and auto groups.
Feed Aggregator – SAP Jam provides a feed aggregator, SAP Jam Activity Hub, that can be used. to follow and chat in Yammer, Connections and Jam which allows for one view without having to log-in to multiple applications..
Mobile App – SAP Jam Mobile App, which is used for Apple (iOS – iPhone or iPad) or Android, is ready out of the box! No extra programing required.
OpenSocial Gadgets – Feeds and data can be embedded such as RSS Feeds, Stock Tickers, Countdowns, Facebook, Twitter… Survey Monkey which go into widgets.
Work Patterns – Admins can leverage templates available, out of the box, to enable repeatable best practice and business processes when creating a group. With work pattern builder, templates can be changed and enhanced easily for custom specific needs.
ADDITIONAL CONSIDERATIONS…
> SAP has “1” enterprise collaboration platform only which it invests heavily in.
> All the information is in one place (uploaded, linked, or embedded), one enterprise collaboration platform, one “central hub.”
> Offline access allows users to select content from SAP Jam to and from a local file system via Jam File Sync Client

Summary: SAP Jam is the Best Bet!
Given the investments and attributes of SAP Jam and with a long-time career in the high tech, entrepreneurial, cross-industry, and SAP Ecosystem space, my team and I bet on SAP to make the continuous investments in collaborative enterprise business software as an essential part of the portfolio to support customers.

The value of SAP Jam is both a today and tomorrow decision. Today for what it can deliver and tomorrow for the investments to the roadmap which is based on a 40+ year history of SAP success.

At the end of the day, my team and I enjoy working with a diverse, smart, progressive group of senior executives, leaders, business owners, instructors, group admins, and stakeholders who want to work on a platform, which delivers the most value and impact, to help them and their fellow internal and external colleagues do their jobs and realize the type of outcomes highlighted in the Forrester Study.

The ideas associated with enterprise collaboration have been around for hundreds of years. However, the realization in the cloud with digital transformation are available NOW in full force with SAP Jam.

About the Author

Blogs

Featured Link: SAP Jam Collaboration Help Portal

This video highlights the value of turning the complex into a more simple productivity resource.

Understanding the Lift in SAP Jam Implementations & Adoption

Posted by WSS on August 20, 2016 | Comments Off

Ensuring Success Beyond the Go-Live to Continue the Momentum

As a practitioner of hundreds of SAP Jam and related communities, platforms, collaboration, and transformation initiatives my team and I see many great efforts to support an organization’s strategy, goals, and objectives. Often we are asked to share insights on how to ensure success after the go-live.

Recently, when reading the NY Times best seller, “The Wright Brothers” by David McCullough, I was inspired by the story of the “courageous brothers who taught the world how to fly.”

A central part of their success was a formula[1] that they worked out and tested for flight:

Lift = k * V^2 * A * cl

The factors for successful flight address the size and shape of the wing, the velocity of the air flowing over the wing and the density of the surrounding air to address:

L = Lift
k = Smeaton coefficient (addresses the relationship between pressure and velocity for objects moving in air. Drag refers to the resistance that the wing generates as it flows through the air.)
V = Velocity (the higher the velocity the greater the lift)
A = Wing area (the larger the size of the wing the more lift will be created)
cl = Lift coefficient (addresses the angles a wing assumes in respect to the flow of air)

In the same way SAP Jam initiatives need to take flight and lift organizational goals and objectives towards impactful outcomes. These factors can be equated to the following:

L = Increasing revenues, growth, value, profits, learning, innovation by bridging organizational silos with cross-teams working together through common business processes and work patterns
k = The drag or opposing force that organizations, groups, and employees face when in motion
V = Speed to market, acceleration to achieve goals and objectives. Velocity is important when things are going well as well as when there are obstacles to overcome.
A = The greater the “area” and access to knowledge and expertise than the greater impact to an employee’s productivity, quality, value and reach to engage internal & external customers
cl = The trajectory of an organization based on 4 key factors: revenues, operational efficiencies, cost cutting, and/or recognizing major disruptions in the marketplace

When delivering SAP Jam[2] implementations and adoption initiatives some groups dynamically fly towards their goals and objectives while others are more static (or disparate) in their approach.

>>>The question persists – how to effectively start a SAP Jam group (or enterprise initiative) and sustain value beyond the initial launch? How to ensure it gets off the ground and continues the momentum?

While the factors to ensure “engagement” include “executive sponsorship” and excellent “business ownership” along with “business process accountability” and validating “governance” as well as developing “champions” to expand consistent usability is important, 4 foundational factors must be considered by way of the formula “E = A x C3”

Engagement = Access x (Content x Communications x Collaboration)

These factors are considered as follows:

Access = The right internal & external audience of owners, stakeholders, and end users have access to SAP Jam including setting privacy settings as needed
Content = Finding the right information at the right time on an ongoing basis to save time, money and scale to the right audience. Maintaining a 100 day plan for seeded content updates.
Communications = Sharing updates about SAP Jam and the respective initiative to the audience based on a 30/60/90 day and beyond plan
Collaboration = Posting discussions, questions, ideas, comments, and decision-making tools such as polls to encourage two-way dialogue

As mentioned in the blog, “SAP Jam: Using all the Piano’s Keys and Pedals” often groups play a few of the keys but the more advanced aspects of SAP Jam take time, trial and adjustment, and a combination of business and IT work experiences. The how-to’s of turning SAP Jam on or picking up the basics in the User Guides are helpful but most administrators, power users, content & community managers, and their users seek more by way of SAP Jam tips and insights.

Like the Wright brothers obsession to fly, SAP Jam takes dedication.

It takes both the “science and art” forms to achieve success. No matter how many implementations take place and questions are answered there is always more to address, learn about, and discover. With new product releases, which happen approximately every 2 months, there are new capabilities, innovations, and investments to take advantage of on a regular basis in the cloud.

So whether it’s your very important SAP Jam group (or enterprise rollout / initiative) or the Wright Brothers taking flight, the key is to consider the right factors for achieving lift (i.e. during implementation “and” beyond go-live including adoption).

When the right formula is applied with the right combined skills and best practice work experiences are put in place than success can be achieved both in the short and longer-term.

—

Footnotes:
[1] National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), “Lift Equation of the Early 1900” – http://wright.nasa.gov/airplane/liftold.html
[2] Important Note: SAP Jam is a unique market leading platform and solution. It seamlessly integrates social business capabilities into existing (& planned) business process. SAP has made SAP Jam an integral part of the SAP portfolio of products and solutions addressing:

All lines of business centric vs. CRM as the primary
One SAP Jam vision vs. multiple roadmaps which have overlaps
SAP’s proven 40-year history of business software, processes, and market leadership
Collaborative ecosystem (Out of the Box – i.e. OpenText, Box, SharePoint, etc.)
Application integration (i.e. OData, REST APIs) by utilizing the SAP Jam Developer Center
Integrated platform as a foundational principal vs. a standalone which increases costs
Internal & external SAP Jam group capabilities & templates which easily set-up
Structured collaboration to support problem solving, issue resolution, and decision making
Screen and video capture
Mobile App alignment with SAP Jam Page Designer provides out of the box mobile capabilities

—

About the Author
Richard D. Blumberg, President, World Sales Solutions, LLC (WSS) (www.WorldSalesSolutions.com) provides 25+ years of thought leadership on a variety of “View from the Top” strategies including: Enterprise Social Business, Go-to-Market Strategies, Business Development, Talent Development, and Community Building. He and his team are recognized SAP Jam global experts for implementations and adoption.

WSS is a SAP Service Partner for SAP Jam and long-time supporter of the SAP Community Network and the SAP Ecosystem.

Prior Blogs:
– SAP Jam: Using all the Piano’s Keys and Pedals
– View from the Top: Bill McDermott shares his success secrets at a #fireside chat!
– The Path to SAP Jam ROI Success
– SAP Jam Work Patterns: The Big $ or € &/or ¥ Game Changer for a New Product Launch!
– SAP Jam: The ROI Impacting Sales Productivity
– Split Second Selling with SAP Jam – 7 Use Cases!
– The Customer Go-to-Market Imperative – Transforming Silos to Social Business and Community Building

SAP Jam: Using all the Piano’s Keys and Pedals

Posted by WSS on August 11, 2016 | Comments Off

The Importance of SAP Jam Implementation & Adoption Expertise

The rewards of using SAP Jam are awesome! Getting to the point where business and IT value is realized takes time, logic, dedication, and expertise. Successful SAP Jam implementations and adoption requires many considerations, some of which are often overlooked.

It reminds me of the day when my family got a piano from my in-laws house for our son. While other children and friends would bang on the keys he wanted to play meaningful songs at an early age. There were adult friends and teachers who remembered playing a bit growing up (or knew a few songs) but could only offer a few ideas around how to play the piano beyond the basics.

Only when we got an expert piano teacher (on the second try) who had the style and skills which were complimentary to his interests did we see his enjoyment and piano playing skills soar forward.

For my team and I working with leading customers and business units around the globe we see that no two SAP Jam implementations are alike. Like a snow flake each one has its own unique work patterns based on their customers, industry, lines of business and culture.

As a result we must be agile and dig deep on each engagement to address a wide range of skills, requirements, work experiences which range from HR, Learning, Onboarding …to Sales, Marketing, Services, Commerce and Customer Engagement …to Communications, IT, Procurement, Operations, Communities of Practice, and User Experiences …to working within a wide range of SAP and 3^rd Party Apps and related Management Information System (MIS) environments …to the ability to write, provide visual consistency, and program management …as well as help turn complexity into …simplicity.

There are a number of best practice guidelines to consider:

Consideration #1 – Getting Started!

Understanding the business requirements
Enabling overall usability
Translating the business process to SAP Jam
Ensuring relevance by way of content / communications
Utilizing dynamic widgets vs. static text and images
Assessing Change Management
Ensuring participation

Consideration #2 – ROI & Value

Pinpoint the SAP Jam Return On Investment (ROI) and business drivers important to your organization centered around “Time” “Money” and “People” scalability to ensure measurable (“quantifiable” and “qualifiable”) gains.

Consideration #3 – Differentiators

SAP Jam is a unique market leading solution. It seamlessly integrates social business capabilities into existing (& planned) business process whereas as other 3^rdparty platforms are focused on the tools. SAP has made SAP Jam an integral part of all SAP solutions addressing:

All lines of business centric vs. CRM as the primary
One SAP Jam vision vs. multiple roadmaps which have overlaps
SAP’s proven 40-year history of business software, processes, and market leadership
Collaborative ecosystem (Out of the Box – i.e. OpenText, Box, SharePoint, etc.)
Application integration (i.e. OData, REST APIs) by utilizing the SAP Jam Developer Center
Integrated platform as a foundational principal vs. a standalone which increases costs
Internal & external SAP Jam group capabilities which easily set-up
Structured collaboration to support problem solving, issue resolution, and decision making
Screen and video capture
Mobile App alignment with SAP Jam Page Designer provides out of the box mobile capabilities

Consideration #4 – Roles & Responsibilities

When addressing an SAP Jam initiative the executive sponsor, business owner(s), and project leader must consider 3 key roles including:

Administrator(s) (or Power Users)
Content Manager(s) (& Contributors)
End Users

While one SAP Jam tactical action can be straight forward. Each action has a consequence on another aspect of the project or initiative.

For those of us who watch (or remember) Star Trek and Spok’s 3D chess game, each move has an impact to another chess piece which may be on the board you are working on or another. It takes a lot of SAP Jam experience to address these moves which have important relationships to other business processes.

A successful SAP Jam implementation addresses 5 phases:

Preparation
Realization
Verification
Launch
Post Go-Live

It takes vision, leadership, teamwork, compelling business outcomes, and passion to build any successful community which meets either face-to-face or virtually. SAP Jam requires the same consideration to achieve successful implementations and adoption.

Whether its learning how to play the piano or SAP Jam, it takes multi-dimensional expertise to ensure that all the “keys and pedals” are optimized.

SAP Jam has many self-evident, out of the box templates and capabilities that are excellent, but to gain the full advantage it takes the right skills, work experiences, and expertise to achieve the highest level of success.

— About the Author

Richard D. Blumberg, President, World Sales Solutions, LLC (WSS) (www.WorldSalesSolutions.com) provides 25+ years of thought leadership on a variety of “View from the Top” strategies including: Enterprise Social Business, Go-to-Market Strategies, Business Development, Talent Development, and Community Building. He and his team are recognized SAP Jam global experts for implementations and adoption.
WSS is a SAP Service Partner for SAP Jam and long-time supporter of the SAP Community Network and the SAP Ecosystem.

Prior Blogs:
– View from the Top: Bill McDermott shares his success secrets at a #fireside chat!
– The Path to SAP Jam ROI Success
– SAP Jam Work Patterns: The Big $ or € &/or ¥ Game Changer for a New Product Launch!
– SAP Jam: The ROI Impacting Sales Productivity
– Split Second Selling with SAP Jam – 7 Use Cases!
– The Customer Go-to-Market Imperative – Transforming Silos to Social Business and Community Building

Originally posted on the SAP Community Network – full blog >>

Alumni Career Services: Fired, Displaced, Downsized, Restless – How Can I Win My Next Job?

Posted by WSS on May 17, 2015 | Comments Off

Happy to provide career and job insights to those who are interested in “climbing the steps towards success!” Here’s a recent session I gave to fellow Drexel alumni based on my own journey and sharing insights with alumni and students over the years… Whether you’re selling a product, service or solution “or” yourself for your next job…many of the skills are the same! The methods used are proven…they work for those who leverage their skills, education, and work experiences into valued, growth areas and have persistent follow-up.

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Drexel Alumni Career Services Webinar:
“Fired, Displaced, Downsized, Restless – How Can I Win My Next Job?”

An Online Career Services Workshop
Rich Blumberg ’84, President, World Sales Solutions, LLC

Featured Assets: Slides | Planning Template

This recent session focused on the strategy and tactics of moving forward with a job and career search during challenging times. Given the fact that there are an “abundance” of opportunities in the marketplace and that you have a great education from Drexel, what specific steps can you take to identify and win your next job? Whether your 100% in need of a job or have one but require a change, this presentation will share time tested, proven approaches to be happier with the process, make money, and achieve the outcomes that you deserve.

Topics included:

A blue print for success
- Putting your predicament into context
- The power to begin
- The art & science of survival
- Positioning for triumph
- Identifying the economic decision maker
- The information advantage
- Steps you can take during the summer months
Closing the deal

Building Partner Networks with SAP Jam

Posted by WSS on November 15, 2014 | Comments Off

This article is reproduced from the Oct-Nov-Dec 2014 issue of SAPinsider (SAPinsiderOnline.com). Read the entire special report on social collaboration. View this attachment (4th page) or visit SAPinsiderOnline.com.

Building Partner Networks with SAP Jam
by Rich Blumberg

Launching new products such as automobiles is both exciting and challenging, especially when you consider the complexity of connecting a manufacturer with its dealer network. Launch success depends on full visibility; timely training and certification; as well as clear sales, marketing, and go-to-market execution (see Figure 1). World Sales Solutions (WSS) understands the manufacturer-to-dealer complexity as this services organization is regularly called on to assist manufacturing and service companies in making these necessary connections.

WSS relies on the SAP Jam developer program to provide its customers with a social collaboration platform that bridges the gap between manufacturers and dealers with a central hub that:

Brings together a company’s marketing, sales, service, and cross-team staff with external parties such as advertising agencies and key suppliers
Provides formal learning and certification using SuccessFactors Learning Management System (LMS) or SAP Learning Solution
Delivers informal learning (via SAP Jam) such as sales best practices among dealers or quick access to experts
Onboards new partners and employees expediently to ensure the shortest time to revenue by optimizing SAP Jam
Supports strategizing and decision making among the entire network for product innovation, including integration with SAP Customer Relationship Management (SAP CRM), SAP Cloud for Customer, or third-party innovation management systems
Enables coordination among the entire network for product or new service launches, including large-scale activities requiring visibility into events, tasks, and deliverables

The SAP Jam Developer Program:
Extend Existing Investments and Drive New Revenue

Customize

Develop work patterns (custom processes)
Add pre-built third-party apps

Integrate

Bring SAP and third-party app data into SAP Jam with OData
Collaborate with documents from content management systems
Embed SAP Jam in your business apps

Extend

Build collaborative customer apps on SAP HANA Cloud Platform
Add capabilities with OpenSocial
Incorporate third-party capabilities (gamification, for example)

SAP Jam helps align companies with their partner networks to drive efficiencies that save time and money based on the volume and scalability of their network, boosting return on investment (ROI). To use auto manufacturing as an example, each dealer has the opportunity to access SAP Jam to engage with its local sales and service staff for receiving training, learning best practices, finding experts, keeping up with regulations, managing rollout of sales and marketing plans, and sharing feedback from customers.

“As a partner, the SAP Jam developer program presents market-first options for solving complex business problems such as enabling more successful automotive product launches,” says Richard Blumberg, President and CEO of WSS. “We can now create new work patterns or bring business data directly into SAP Jam from our customers’ existing SAP or third-party systems to support customer-specific processes. This has helped us position unique social collaboration services to our customers with a strong ROI.”

The Path to SAP Jam ROI Success

Posted by WSS on September 8, 2014 | Comments Off

Understanding the Financial Value

Introducing the WSS ROI Calculator for SAP Jam

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Many SAP Jam initiatives require a solid business justification before senior management will commit time, money, and resources. The business case can address one or more of the following:

Revenues – Aligning strategic and tactical sales, profits, and margins with account plans
Customers – Engaging customers to provide value-add, collaboration, and communications
Employees – Providing an environment to maximize productivity, performance, learning, onboarding, and cross-team collaboration
Partners – Leveraging the channel to extend revenues, delivery, learning, and customer reach
Operations – Identifying and quantifying process improvements and simplification
Financial – Reducing costs and/or showing a realistic Return on Investment (ROI)

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The assessment of SAP Jam begins with the value and importance of SAP and SuccessFactors. SAP is the market leader for business software with over 253,000 customers. SAP Jam has over 15 million subscribers. One only needs to look at the SAP Solution Explorer value maps, with a breadth of products and solutions, to realize that the current and upcoming investments (& alignment) with SAP Jam are part of the overall strategy to fuel organizational simplification, cloud and “digital transformation.”

Five ROI Essentials

Quantify – Understanding a project’s economic impact and business drivers can turn uncertain support into an endorsement to move forward.
Stakeholders – Connecting ROI to a project can build confidence amongst key colleagues, cross-team members and influencers that a project is worthwhile.
Benefits – Socializing a SAP Jam project can lead to finding additional benefits that were initially not recognized.
Prioritization – Ensuring accountability. Once the decision is made to invest in a SAP Jam project the ROI can help management and stakeholders prioritize their time as participants.
Change – Recognizing that an important business initiative needs help (i.e. by way of change management) and that SAP Jam can enable important outcomes.

Understanding the Financial Value

Measuring financial value can be complex. Breaking it down into known components helps simplify:

Time – Accelerating productivity and reducing wasted time
Money – Aligning value around salaries (and cost savings) as well as supporting revenue initiatives
Volume – The quantity of people including employees, customers, partners, and other stakeholders

Providing a base level framework around these values provides a business model and perspective.

How do we know it works?

In addition to World Sales Solutions (WSS) best practices and hundreds of SAP Jam and related community work experiences, consider an industry analyst’s perspective:
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“According to an IDC White Paper sponsored by Adobe, “Bridging the Information Worker Productivity Gap: New Challenges and Opportunities for IT,” September 2012, reporting on a global survey of information workers and IT professionals, information workers waste a significant amount of time each week dealing with a variety of challenges related to working with documents. This wasted time costs the average organization $19,732 per information worker per year, amounting to a loss of 21.3% in the organization’s total productivity.”

Now assess the impact to your organization!

Based on a breath of data points, customer feedback, and findings, World Sales Solutions has built the first WSS ROI Calculator for SAP Jam(www.wssroi.com). This tool provides an internal/external “customer-centric” framework (see diagram on right) for measuring the economic impact of Time, Money, and Volume when addressing:

Finding the right information
Searching for but not finding information
Realizing information is in disparate locations vs. a central hub
Receiving unfiltered information (including spam)
Finding the wrong information
Reworking unfound or wrong information
And many other “Business Driver” considerations

How do these examples affect your business goals & objectives? Consider the impact of each!

There are many paths!

In summary, there are many paths to realizing value from SAP Jam projects and initiatives. Using a combination of “ROI” and identifying “business drivers” (see WSS ROI Calculator for examples) these strategies and tactics can be centralized and guided by executive sponsors, business owners, and content (or community) managers along with end user contributions and collaboration.
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Organizations that implement and adopt SAP Jam can gain higher productivity, performance, and a competitive advantage.
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The use of SAP Jam allows organizations to invest in core competencies, achieve a solid ROI, and addresses important business drivers which form the foundation for success.

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About the Author
Richard D. Blumberg, President, World Sales Solutions, LLC, (WSS) (www.WorldSalesSolutions.com) provides 25+ years of thought leadership on a variety of “View from the Top” strategies including: Enterprise Social Business, Go-to-Market Strategies, Business Development, Talent Development, and Community Building.
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WSS is a SAP Service Partner for SAP Jam and long-time supporter of the SAP Community Network and the SAP Ecosystem.
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Featured SAP Community Network Blog: The Path to SAP Jam ROI Success

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Prior Blogs:
– View from the Top: Bill McDermott shares his success secrets at a #fireside chat!
– SAP Jam Work Patterns: The Big $ or € &/or ¥ Game Changer for a New Product Launch!
– SAP Jam: The ROI Impacting Sales Productivity

– Split Second Selling with SAP Jam – 7 Use Cases!

– The Customer Go-to-Market Imperative – Transforming Silos to Social Business and Community Building

SAP Jam Work Patterns: The Big $ or € &/or ¥ Game Changer for a New Product Launch!

Posted by WSS on May 29, 2014 | Comments Off

>> For the full blog please visit the SAP Community Network >>

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“A knotty ‘puzzle’ may hold a scientist up for a century, when it may be that a colleague has the solution already and is not even aware of the puzzle that it might solve.”
― Isaac Asimov (on Collaboration)

How a ONE team approach can bridge internal & external boundaries!

For profit and non-profit organizations around the globe have a common mission to launch new products and services to obtain front-line revenues and customer value objectives. For most, the investments (i.e. Dollars ($), Euros (€), Yens (¥)) are large and the stakes are high.

Many people and groups must come together to achieve ONE common set of goals and objectives. The adoption of SAP Jam can make a huge difference to accelerate (& streamline) a successful roll out that requires the collaboration and cooperation of “internal and external” stakeholders.

Go-to-Market momentum takes place through consistent, repeatable, flexible, and efficient small steps which add up to larger efforts and leads to an ongoing set of important milestones (& deliverables).

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>> For the full blog please visit the SAP Community Network >>

World Sales Solutions, LLC (WSS)

Hong Kong: The Sites, Landmarks & Destiny

Appendix – Photo Gallery

From Now to the Year 2030 – SAP Jam Collaboration Will Play an Important Role With SAP Leonardo and the Digital Revolution

The Industrial Revolution – A Look Back & Forward

Collaboration – A View from the Top

SAP Jam Collaboration Plays a Central Role

Collaboration has a Purpose & Unique Place in the Digital Age

Alumni Career Services: Fired, Displaced, Downsized, Restless – How Can I Win My Next Job?

SAP Jam Work Patterns: The Big $ or € &/or ¥ Game Changer for a New Product Launch!

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