Providing an engaging employee experience is no longer an option for companies, but a must. Every interaction and every contact with the HR department influences how employees perceive their work environment, how they contribute and what performance they perform. But to keep up with high expectations and changes in the world of work, HR teams must find innovative approaches that meet these demands. This means offering individual, high-quality support even faster – on a large scale.
With innovations powered by artificial intelligence (AI) and a unified approach to delivering HR services, companies can create seamless, end-to-end processes that meet the expectations of their workforce. At the same time, they can also implement efficiency improvements and strategic improvements in human resources. This is exactly what SAP enables with the SAP SuccessFactors Enterprise Service Management solution, which has recently been available with SAP for Release 1H 2025 SAPSuccessFactors HCM is available.
Leading companies like Döhlera global manufacturer of natural ingredients for the food, beverage and nutrition industries, are already benefiting from the following benefits thanks to the solution:
- Reducing the time spent processing requests by 33 percent
- Increase productivity fourfold
- Reducing the time spent composing emails by 80 percent through the use of generative AI
Paul Wittig, Head of HR Operations & Services at Döhler, reports: “With Enterprise Service Management for HR, we have come a lot closer to the goal of more digitality – and therefore more transparency and structure – in our work processes.”
The future of HR services
The employee experience is shaped not only by important career turning points, but also by the opportunities we have every day, the interaction with others and the assurance of support when we need it. That’s why one of the most important HR offerings of every company is the HR helpdesk. However, this contact point for employees is also one of the areas that are particularly under pressure.
Human resources professionals at large companies often work together in a central department and are responsible for responding to a large number of diverse inquiries. Accuracy and adherence to compliance requirements are particularly important. HR staff sometimes have to deal with hundreds of service requests per month. Depending on the complexity of the problem, processing can take 1 to 3 days. Questioners therefore sometimes have to wait longer for an answer. And many HR teams are overwhelmed by the sheer volume of requests.
However, technological progress does not stop at this service model and enables a rethinking of traditional HR workflows. It’s no longer about simply being faster and processing more requests – it’s about preventing many of these requests from occurring in the first place. Intelligent, AI-supported tools enable employees to find answers independently. This reduces request volume, allowing HR teams to focus on more complex issues that require human expertise.
As the analyst firm Gartner* reports, “70 percent of companies with more than 2,500 employees will invest in a solution for managing human resources services by the end of 2025.”
Companies that have already jumped on this bandwagon are already benefiting from numerous advantages: fewer inquiries, faster processing times and more seamless processes for both employees and HR teams.
The potential that AI offers in transforming the provision of services can also be seen in some current SAP SuccessFactors surveys. In a survey, 89 percent of employees said that it would make their everyday work easier if they could use AI to get answers to HR questions. In a similar survey, HR leaders cited self-service and other AI-powered management tasks as top use cases for their teams. These offers relieve you of repetitive requests and create space for more important interactions with employees – from professional development to conflict resolution.
But what does the future of HR services look like when integrated AI not only accelerates processes but also enables support to be redesigned?
Advantages of a unified cloud platform based on AI
With SAP SuccessFactors Enterprise Service Management, companies can completely transform the delivery of HR services with a unified cloud platform powered by AI.
Improving the employee experience is one of the biggest benefits of SAP SuccessFactors Enterprise Service Management. The solution delivers value to HR by using AI to search, analyze, and update knowledge bases and policies. This makes it easy for employees to get answers to their questions, eliminating the need for many inquiries. It offers collaboration tools, a comprehensive knowledge base and self-service functions across various channels AI assistant Joule from SAP Useful information and support for employees.
Let’s take an example of an employee who has questions about parental leave. Instead of making a request and waiting for a response from HR, the employee can ask Joule a question directly from their work environment. Based on company guidelines, Joule can then provide precise, individualized guidance tailored specifically to the questioner’s particular circumstances. In this way, the assistant can help ensure that the query can be answered immediately without manual effort. If the issue is more complex or documentation is required, the underlying technology can be used to create a case directly, which is forwarded to HR staff with all relevant details to ensure immediate, expert support. And the best thing about it: Joule is not only available in the HR area, but across the entire SAP system.
With the solution, HR teams also benefit from simplified and significantly more efficient regular work processes. SAP SuccessFactors Enterprise Service Management supports the delivery of HR services through AI-supported case processing, automated document processing and the updating of knowledge content, so that the manual effort for HR managers can be reduced and compliance requirements can be better met. Enterprise AI is central to HR processes. It enables automatic classification of service requests and aggregation of content to give agents a precise, contextual view of each case. The AI also suggests the most obvious option to solve problems quickly and effectively. The solution continuously learns from previous interactions, helping to make the processes for classifying and solving problems smarter and more efficient over time. Generative AI can increase efficiency even further by automatically providing accurate summaries of interactions and solutions and generating professional, customized email drafts. This helps speed up case processing, improve the quality of communication and ensure smoother, more consistent service – for both employees and HR teams.
By integrating SAP Analytics Cloud, HR teams gain real-time insights into service processes and can benefit from data-driven decision making. In this way, processes can be further optimized and the employee experience improved.
Added value for companies, employees and HR teams
SAP customers who already use SAP SuccessFactors Employee Central for core HR processes can quickly implement SAP SuccessFactors Enterprise Service Management and take advantage of its benefits. Together, the two solutions form a unified, AI-powered foundation that enables personalized HR support according to company guidelines with every interaction.
Reliable real-time HR core data from SAP SuccessFactors Employee Central ensures that employees receive the right support. And integrated quick actions make it possible to complete common HR tasks within workflows with just a few mouse clicks. When processing cases in SAP SuccessFactors Enterprise Service Management, HR teams can also directly access employee profiles through interfaces to SAP SuccessFactors Employee Central. This means you receive reliable employee information immediately without having to switch to another system. The solution extends the core functionality of SAP SuccessFactors HCM with a secure, compliant service layer. This enables central data governance, optimization of service processes and a reduction in manual effort. Employees and HR teams benefit from a seamless, intuitive overall experience.
The human resources department is more present in companies today than ever before. HR teams play a key role in shaping the employee experience and improving the bottom line. With SAP SuccessFactors Enterprise Service Management and SAP Business AI, companies can provide employees with the support they expect while reducing HR workload. The solution therefore offers added value for companies, employees and HR teams.
Find out more about SAP SuccessFactors Enterprise Service Management for the provision of HR services.
Lara Albert is Chief Marketing Officer at SAP SuccessFactors.
*Source: Gartner: Market Guide for Integrated HR Service Management Solutions, May 2024
