KUALA LUMPUR – With over 60 years of experience, Taylor’s Education Group (TEG) recently embarked on an employee experience transformation exercise powered by SAP SuccessFactors and SAP Concur.
Vice President of Group Human Resources Group Puven Nalatambi explained that the education industry is highly competitive where high-quality talent comes at a premium, and competition for the best people across all functions is fierce.
“To reinforce our reputation as one of the top education providers in Malaysia, Singapore, and Vietnam, we decided to redesign our human resources (HR) systems and processes to empower the team to deliver meaningful, engaging experiences that would help employees learn, grow, and become even more productive,” said Puven.
With its unsurpassed track record built up over the last six decades, it had earned the reputation for being the centre of excellence early years to postgraduate education in Malaysia, Singapore, and Vietnam.
“With Taylor’s University, the British University of Vietnam, Taylor’s College, and a network of successful international schools, we are constantly aiming to deliver educational excellence at every stage of our students’ journeys,” she added.
The facts certainly attest to her statement. According to its website, Taylor’s University is the number one private university in South East Asia, for three consecutive years, and ranked #284 in the QS World University Rankings 2023.
Enter TEG’s Modern, Centralised Platform
By replacing its outdated HR information systems (HRIS) with a modern, centralised platform, TEG aimed to free its HR professionals from routine administrative tasks and enable them to focus on the employee experience.
“By creating an HR Shared Services Centre, HR operations would become more efficient and strategic. And by empowering employees with self-service functionality, TEG would create a dynamic, engaging workplace that would equip it for success over the next 50 years,” she said.
To help design and implement its new centralised HR platform and resulting experiences, TEG partnered with NTT Data, an SAP partner, with over 30 years of experience with SAP technology.
NTT Data made significant contributions by introducing leading practices from market leaders in the HR space, helping TEG understand the current trends and identify areas of its existing HR systems and processes to prioritise for improvement.
“Working with the SAP SuccessFactors team and NTT Data, TEG was also able to localise the solutions for different markets to fulfil legal mandates and gain peace of mind. With the SAP SuccessFactors and SAP Concur solutions in place, TEG now has a powerful platform to help transform the employee experience,” said Puven.
SAP Vice President and Head of Cloud, South East Asia Cynthia Quah said that SAP is committed to enable companies to be intelligent, sustainable enterprises.
“SAP brings together the solutions, technology and best practices needed to run integrated, digital business processes in the cloud,” said Cynthia.
She describes SAP SuccessFactors as a cloud based human experience management (HXM) solution world-renowned for streamlining processes, winning at the recruitment and retention game, training and re-skilling the workforce.
“SAP SuccessFactors also leverages advanced technologies such as artificial intelligence and machine learning for the long-term benefit of organisations,” added Cynthia.
SAP Concur, meanwhile, is one of the world’s leading brands for integrated travel and expense (T&E), and invoice management solutions.
IDC recently said in a study that ‘much business value can be derived from SAP Concur solutions’, including helping finance teams align the dual priorities of improving control and visibility into administrative areas such as budgeting, forecasting, and T&E policy management while delivering a seamless experience to end users.
Puven said the benefits realised have been enormous and ‘priceless’.
For example, with TEG’s new recruiting and onboarding workflows, new hires receive information well in advance of their start date, including a personal email from their manager welcoming them to the organisation. Their goals are clearly set, they have access to the materials and resources they need, and they can be assigned a ‘buddy’ to help them find their feet, so they have a positive day-one experience.
“Feedback from new hires has been outstanding, helping to reinforce the perception of TEG as a top employer across the region. Using SAP SuccessFactors HXM Suite in offering a one-stop solution for all our employees’ HR needs is a transformative step. It shows our people that we are putting their experience at the centre of everything we do,” added Puven.
Surveys show that TEG staff are impressed with the new employee experience: 75% agree that HR systems are now more powerful, more transparent, and easier to use. There are numerous examples of tangible time savings and productivity gains: for example, processing leave approvals used to take 10 minutes per employee; now the process is instant.
“With a single centralised platform, manual data entry is reduced, significantly improving data quality. As a result, payroll errors are largely a thing of the past, ensuring that all staff get paid correctly and on time, including the right expenses,” Puven added.
“As we continue our digitalisation journey, our SAP solutions are helping to empower us to embark on our mission to streamline our HR processes, improve staff retention, and strengthen our position as an employer of choice in the education sector,” concluded Puven.
