SGS is the preeminent market leader in testing, inspection, and certification, boasting a legacy nearly 150 years old. With approximately 100,000 people operating across 118 countries, the organization views its workforce as its most valuable asset.
Because SGS sells knowledge and service rather than manufactured goods, “our people are our product,” explains Keith Savage, Head of Global HR Operations.
We're a people company. We sell knowledge and expertise. And so we put people at the top of our agenda.
Head of Global HR Operations
The challenge of fragmentation.
Years of significant growth and autonomous innovation by local business leaders led to a fragmented landscape. While this entrepreneurial spirit fueled expansion, it left the company without a unified view of its workforce.
SGS needed a strategic platform to understand its people better and ensure the company remained an easy place to work: Enter Workday Human Capital Management.
We set out to solve the implications of our growth by putting in Workday as our strategic platform for human capital management; the foundation for us to understand our workforce better.
Head of Global HR Operations
Speed, scale, and strategic success.
SGS executed an ambitious deployment, reaching its entire global population in exactly two years. The team utilized a phased approach, starting with a three-country pilot to develop a global template before rapidly expanding to more complex regions. By focusing on critical areas like security and payroll first, they moved quickly without letting “perfect be the enemy of good,” as Savage describes one of their main drivers of success.
To ensure long-term success, Savage and his team made sure to have all the internal partnerships in place between HR and IT and to have the executive support from the CEO and CFO.
Savage also built an internal team to own the platform from day one. This strategy not only saved costs by reducing reliance on implementation partners during later phases but also ensured a seamless transition to daily operations. “We didn’t have a long hypercare period. We were ready,” says Savage.
Workday gives us the opportunity to innovate, to know our workforce and to reinvent the way we think about human capital, which immediately has an impact on our business that generates value for our customers through our people.
Head of Global HR Operations
Driving innovation through opportunity.
By harmonizing disparate processes on one platform, SGS gained the visibility needed to align and simplify operations globally. Workday provides the organization with real-time insights into human capital, allowing leaders to better deploy expertise to solve customer problems.
SGS is now looking toward the future, specifically exploring how AI can further accelerate their business and HR agenda.
By partnering with Workday as their unified people platform, SGS remains positioned to take immediate advantage of emerging technologies. As Savage summarizes the impact: “I would describe the Workday effects on SGS in just one word: opportunity.”