At the 2024 ASUG Executive Exchange Summer Summit, hosted in Seattle in August, an engaging SAP customer panel explored strategies for building intelligent and innovative teams capable of addressing today’s most complex business challenges.
Drawing on personal experiences and best practices, the panelists identified three pivotal considerations for enabling sustained innovation: leadership, skills and talent development, and strong partnership between business and IT stakeholders.
Fostering a Culture of Innovation
As panelists discussed the importance of leadership, they emphasized that fostering a culture of innovation is essential for organizations to thrive in competitive industries and environments. Creativity, continuous improvement, and a willingness to embrace change, panelists agreed, are crucial components of such a culture. However, they stressed that innovation cannot be unbridled; instead, meaningful innovation is always guided by effective change management, clear governance, and a strong sense of the organization’s values and purpose.
You can’t foster innovation and propel organizational growth if you’re set on maintaining the status quo, noted one panelist. The consensus among panelists was that strong leaders play a vital role in creating and sustaining an environment where new ideas are encouraged, but always within a framework that aligns with the organization’s long-term goals.
To help communicate goals and priorities, one panelist recommended that organizations hold quarterly town halls at which core values, strategic priorities, and major initiatives can be discussed openly. In this setting, leaders are also enabled to identify how their specific business areas are contributing to these goals, contributing to cross-departmental collaboration.
Developing Talent and Prioritizing People
Another pressing issue in the world of business is talent management, particularly in the context of skill sets related to IT systems that, though increasingly complex, remain critical to business operations.
Panelists highlighted the importance of developing strategies to keep pace with technological advancement, including creating environments where employees can experiment and learn new skills without the fear of failure, leveraging online learning resources, and recognizing those who actively seek to expand their capabilities.
Organizations must be open to making mistakes and learning from them, one panelist stated, especially as technologies like cloud computing evolve rapidly. Talent retention was also a key concern, with panelists advocating for continuous learning opportunities and clear career growth pathways as essential elements in retaining top talent. Their underlying message: organizations need to be adaptable and supportive of their teams to ensure long-term success.
Building strong teams is all about prioritizing people. In conversation, the panelists stressed the importance of continuously asking themselves and other managers whether their organization is doing enough to ensure teams are fully engaged and motivated. Understanding each team member's individual value and keeping track of their contributions and impact on the business is paramount.
Additionally, talent acceleration strategies are important, as is recognizing that not all required skills will be available in-house. Strategic partners, the panelists agreed, can help organizations enhance internal talent while reducing the amount of time it takes to achieve key business objectives.
Strong Partnerships Between Business and IT
Also top of mind for panelists was the value of investing in relationships between business and IT functions. As technology evolves and contributes to achieving business goals in an increasing number of ways, this partnership has never been more important than it is today. Modern business leaders and end-users are more knowledgeable about technology than ever before; as the panelists reflected, both groups often demand specific technical capabilities and expect seamless implementations.
Productive relationships between business end-users and IT teams ensure that technology solutions are not only implemented efficiently but also that these solutions are aligned with broader strategic objectives. Effective communication between business and technical communities is essential in strengthening this partnership, meaning that stakeholders on both sides of the organization need to focus on developing mutual understanding and appreciation, the panelists agreed.
From developing ongoing education programs for business teams around AI and cybersecurity to build knowledge of technology investments across the organization, to incentivizing IT teams to invest in understanding business operations and goals to inform technology deployment strategies, synergy between business and IT will invariably benefit the greater organization.
Over the coming weeks and months, ASUG will continue to explore the topics and takeaways from the 2024 ASUG Executive Exchange Summer Summit to drive relevant insights to our member base.