Consistency, security, and traceability now at heart of expanding business.

The Saica Group provides sustainable solutions for paper, cardboard, and flexible packaging and is committed to developing circularity in waste management. Having just celebrated its 80th anniversary, it remains an expansive and ambitious family-run business and operates across 11 different countries, with 106 plants and a workforce of over 10,000.

Saica has enjoyed sustained growth following its original formation as a modest paper mill in Zaragoza, Spain. Today, it has operations across continental Europe as well as in the UK and the U.S. The group has four core business lines: manufacturer of recycled paper for corrugated board (Saica Paper), waste management and environmental services (Saica Natur), production of corrugated board packaging (Saica Pack), and flexible packaging (Saica Flex). With an annual production capacity of 3.3 million tons, it is a European leader in the manufacture of recycled paper for corrugated board and has a current group turnover of €4,394 million.

Continued product and process innovation and a deep-rooted commitment to sustainability continues to underpin the group’s success. Following a pioneering move in the 1980s to adopt cogeneration as a model for energy production, Saica introduced biomass boilers at key production sites and is deepening its comprehensive decarbonization strategy in tandem with the group’s continued international expansion

Keeping pace with evolving market demands.

Responding positively to market demand has enabled the Saica Group to maintain a competitive advantage, which is particularly evident around the company’s core values of sustainability and circularity. A detailed analysis of internal processes, however, showed a gap developing between constantly evolving market demand and the company’s ability to meet that demand. There was a clear need to standardize processes, improve management information and to take decisive steps to attract the best people and skills to support business’s next phase of growth.

In view of the findings and the increasing difficulties of managing information across many different countries, the company embarked on a digital transformation program. A detailed assessment of various tools and systems culminated with the company selecting and deploying Workday Human Capital Management (HCM) to help it achieve its digitalization objectives.

Attracting and retaining the best people and the right skills.

Thanks to the versatility and functionality of Workday HCM, Saica is now able to ensure all staff are working in the same way and using the same processes. The digitization of training has been an important feature of the new program and the learning module has already been implemented successfully in Spain to help the company reach all employees and to boost skills development across the business.

The training push is also helping Saica to attract the next generation of recruits in a fast and original way and by providing tangible evidence of the company’s progressive, interesting, and modern work environment.

Self-management both for individual employees and team managers is now on the rise thanks to Workday. Any employee can now manage personal data and payroll details quickly and easily and there is now far better insight and information to help senior staff manage and develop their teams more efficiently and more effectively.

Traceability and security of data is now the default position.

“Because Workday complies with all the European and global regulations on data security, we know that our data is safe in the system,” says José Atarés, People Governance Director, Saica Group. “Indeed, security is of fundamental importance in our digitalization strategy.”

“Our previous reliance on Excel worksheets was not particularly secure and it was certainly very limiting and time-consuming. As we adopt standardized and much more secure processes for data management and analytics using Workday HCM, those days are now behind us.

“We can now see who has done what, when they did it and how they did it. Consequently, we are now able to quickly verify that the data in the system is what it should be at all times and we have a far better understanding of what’s happening and why. This avoids the risk of oversights and errors and ensures all information is reliable and up to date, helping us to adapt and evolve the skills of our workforce with confidence.”

As it continues to integrate new operations into the business and develop its international presence, Saica is maintaining its commitment to long term planning and business development. This philosophy is not just restricted to product and service provision. The digitalization program is also forward-looking and the company was keen to work with a long-term partner that shared its commitment for dynamic growth and development.