Welcome to The Innovation Today podcast where we speak with today's technology leaders about how they're innovating to stay ahead of changing industry Dynamics and reaching new levels of productivity and automation brought to you by service now your partner in digital transformation hello everyone thank you for joining us today for another episode of The Innovation Today podcast I'm your host Spencer B Miller in Innovation at service now and today I'm absolutely delighted to be granted the presence of Gish shasan partner at Dees Gish thanks for joining on Spencer thanks for having me excited to be here excited to have you yeah today we're going to learn a little bit about Erp modernization and I know you're a pro in this area but first why don't you give us a little bit of uh understanding about yourself maybe a bit of your background in your career and then maybe specifically what what got you interested in the Erp modernization world yeah absolutely Spencer and thank you and thanks for all the listeners so my name name is gir Shas I'm a partner at deoy I I've driven a lot of large Tech transformations in Deo over the last 20 years focus and help our clients around the technology landscape how they think about incorporating that in that ecosystem and uh I also lead our TMT service St business and because of the nature of what I do a lot of my clients I advise them on you know what are some of the trends and technologies that need to be implemented in the future and Erp is a Hot Topic that comes all the time so that's excited to talk to you about toight it is a ODOT topic there's a little bit of a pressing thing happening out there in the industry that's almost forcing it to be Hot Topic from from some of the guests that we've had on and just some understanding of the industry there's a there's a mandate of of migration that's happening from onr to sap 4 in the cloud which is kind of naturally I think a good point for a lot of customers to start to think hey what what what what's the best way to migrate this is should we should we take a lot of the old existing stuff and import in or are there other ways that we can solve it in a more agile and an easier fashion so as part of that what what are some conversations that you're hearing in Erp these days is kind of this trend that's that's being forced on the industry is happening yeah you know erps have been around for a long time you know they're there for reason they're complex they do a lot of work for clients just across the entire Enterprise but when you start to think about sort of the the the future uh of Technology a lot of our clients are looking to simplify their overall ecosystem in a way they can engage with these Erb Platforms in a simplistic way get value because a lot of organizations have grown over the years with a combination of either custom Technologies or you know erps they have in the platform in their in their ecosystem and they need to stitch all this together in order to drive value within the Enterprise that there's a there's a classic problem of we know an Erp is going to take a long time to implement call it 12 months 24 months as you think about the migration but in terms of realizing value faster in in ways that they can either you know improve things within that Finance area or supply chain area clients are starting to ask questions about you know how have how can you move faster how can we go faster with this allall solution and that's where there's an exciting opportunity for us to you know explore this the space with St perfect yeah because because my understanding in this space of Erp it's it's not always fast it's not always Speedy sometimes these backlogs of feature functionality can be years long for transformational Progress so it's it's kind of natural to to almost want to rely or want to look for other areas that could solve pain points quicker given the fact that historically speaking these things while they're great at at the transactional data Maybe maybe a little less great at some of the more Dynamic workflow obligations yeah no 100% agree and I think maybe I think a lot of the things let's maybe take an example you know when you talk to finance Executives or you talk to supply chain Executives they've got a lot of custom technologies that exist within that ecosystem and connecting to Erp platforms and you think about simplifying workflows across the foron ecosystem I talk to finance Executives all the time and what we are Focus on is how do you really bring the part of service now which is driving a lot of Engagement across the Enterprise I could go do let's say invoice approvals I could you know work with my finance team using simpler interfaces and then actually getting to the next level of driving simplification of the entire ecosystem of how I engage with these platforms and you know we're spending a lot of time with our clients you know looking at some of these workflows looking at how these processes that are manual in nature can really get simplified through steps having a system of Engagement like service St connecting to Erp systems that ultimately Drive tremendous value for our clients what helps you in that process so as you're looking at a complex Erp environment and you're kind of picking out components to consult the clients and the customer on hey here's an area that works for a modernized plaster platform and here's an area that you could use a a more seamless interface for interaction what does that environment look like when you're when you're engaging with them to help them find those areas yeah no I'll take a couple of examples right like you know typically you think about Erp Master data as a classic example think about account creation think about profit Center creation you know those are the examples where you need to go into Erp platforms you need somebody who knows the sabb ecosystem as an example and and really try to kind of work with the platform but then you got to go get 10 approvals to get that you know overall account Creation in place and when you try to orate that with you know something like a service now where you can eliminate the number of steps that go through this approval process a lot of it can actually be automated and then you're trying to figure out a way when we talk about value in the context of Erp modernization it's the amount of hours you can save for a finance team member a person who's creating and you know a particular profit Center and when you start to look at the hours that are saved right over a month or a year you are now starting to talk about the higher value tasks that Finance team members or supply chain team members in your organization can really work on and that really unlocks a lot of value for them to focus on things that are really critical to the organization and really focusing on higher y that's such a great point I I think of this this notion of incremental progress makes for exponential value like saving an hour here saving an hour there maybe it doesn't seem like so much in the a week or a day time frame but as you expand those accumulative hours out for multiple teams across the entire organization we're talking some serious numbers and some serious hours here so realizing that you can start to take these digestible chunks and something as simple as taking the approval levels out of a system that wasn't meant for approvals into a system that already has an approval agend for you that's some instant value absolutely and I think one of the things that I would all you know I've seen a couple of our clients that I worked with having a true Innovation and an agile mindset because what is required in this is really to push yourself as an organization as an Enterprise to think about the art of the possible of starting somewhere small but then starting to build a complete you know you could think of building a finance Bard you could think of building a supply chain over and that becomes the One-Stop shop where you come and transact with your complex Erb systems in your Enterprise and then you know there's a domino effect you end up implementing 10 use cases in the first year you then start to figure out other things that you can simplify in your ecosystem reduce your technical debt and then get to a common standard across your overall entprise amazing I think it's It's tricky sometimes too I mean I live in The Innovation orgate service now and I'm consult ING with probably similar type of individuals at the executive level at our at our clients and getting to adopt a Innovative mindset where it's okay to try a bunch of things and fail at a lot of things but have a few of those components then filter up to the top to make a whole lot more sense for the area of the business that takes a little while to shift the culture of like you know large companies that have been around for decades upon decades so what what do you think is like a Testament to success in in you seeing customers adopt that Innovative mindset as they're maybe looking at Erp modernization strategies yeah no what I would recommend is start small look at areas where there's a group of use cases that when you start and figure out there's a lot of manual steps think about areas within Finance think about areas within supply chain and to give you a couple of examples like think about allocations think about master data think about eror handling in terms of invoice processing and when you start to group these use cases working out what are the manual steps of the overall process how do you go Implement that in a platform like service now and then when you start to look at the hours that start to save in the Enterprise you may kind of measure your success in quarterly increments to say I'm going to implement 10 use cases over the next couple of quarters and the savings that you get from them then starts to create a domino effect to start to build that overall narrative to take an additional set of use cases that you can bu on the platform so having the Innovation mindset is all about defining a clear path to how you're going to realize value first working with your teams pushing your teams to really get into some of the details and specifics to really innovate and then truly once you're able to demonstrate success in CHS that creates you know a rolling effect for you to go take that across the broader Enterprise I've seen that done with clients in a couple of specific areas I think you know with with a strong lead you know leadership mindset that is innovative and really has the ability to push the envelope of the order of the possible is really the secret source to drive Innovation within an Enterprise yeah I really appreciate that point because I think so often we we forget to used the term evangelize our internal small winds right we we we sometimes do this big transformational process and and we we're realizing that throughout the lifeline of that process we're getting gains and and you know we're saving hours here and there but so much of it is sharing those hours continually to then get the rest of the Y comfortable with oh this is actually you know this is we're we're actually a catalyst of change in this organization and we can think in this Innovative way and if we're winning small on some of these small wins over here and this department is talking about it not in a boisterous way but in a way that's additive and collaborative to the rest of the organization and in service of the customer well then we can then we can really like boil up this this lovely Innovation stew that the whole or then is is kind of enjoying at the same time no agreed and and um um one of the things uh spal that you know you've not asked me yet I'm sure you're going to ask me the podcast is this our favorite topic of J we can you know and and and sort of taking the next level of innovation you know one of the things that you know we should probably talk a little bit more is the workflows and the use cases they were talking about that really clear this Domo effect is really fueling a lot of gen conversations also in the Enterprise around you know Erp modernization which is a very hot topic yeah I well now that you open it up let's go there so so gen of course is is kind of a top of a lot of tech technological podcasts and conversations I I like to think of it of or I'd like to at least ask of it in in ways that maybe we can think of it in almost something that's digestible and tangible so are you seeing customers using it in any roles of capacity today like do we do you have anything that we you've seen that's that's kind of either enlightening or or just shows a a a positive path to get customers excited that they can they can start to use this technology outside of the consum cons worlds in their in their corporate worlds yeah know so you know I've got a couple of great examples specifically in the context of you know Erp modernization and how you know the discussion we're just having is a core Foundation to really provide how gen can be used in the context of VP modernization so the example I take is if you think about the classic world of gen right you need large language models you need data to be inputed into these models and these models get train but the start of this entire conversation we had was focused on working with our clients def finding those workflows and getting data created about how you're going to simplify end to end platforms and ecosystems at the end of day and when you start to build use cases and F ads and you know could it could be an invoice error habit use case it could be an account creation use case as you start to put that data in the system and then over time you're thinking about issue resolution on some of these topics that's fueling your gen platform TR provide recommendations in terms of Auto invoice resolution in the future as an example it could take you know it could look at it information over a six-month period and potentially let's say there's a lot of Errors happening in invoices or there's an issue with a particular supplier life cycle workflow it can give you recommendations on what the pattern has been so you can go fix the root of the problem so when you think about geni in the context of Erp modernization defining you know how service St fits in with the overall Erp ecosystem in my opinion is a foundation that really fuels the Plumping required to drive gen type capabilities within this overall within the overall landscape of VP modernization so it's a fascinating and an exciting time and I think if you think more around you know domain specific launch language models and you think about areas like in finance and supply chain I think as we get these areas more and more mature the are the possible of gen geni is just going to be fascinating yeah it's almost it's almost like too hard to Fathom how many things that you can plug it into because there the the like the potential is almost exponential and endless we we do a little something intern service now that we show our customers on this kind of art of the possible CEO dashboard that actually is possible today it shows the different silos of the business it shows how their productivity is operating it shows any risk that we might be seeing in those worlds and then now we've applied jedai to it because we have that data that you were talking about to make smart decisions and predictions based on what we've seen historically so apply that to a finance Erp monetization protocol or apply that to a supply chain mishap that's happening from some Logistics that's happening in the world and the systems can now start to suggest intelligent workaround resolutions for you before those actions are even occurring and that that's what gets really exciting about a workflow platform no 100% agree and I think I've seen clients starting to use that uh you know I I know a lot of the Focus right now in my discussion with our our clients around service starp modation is primarily within the you know it area but you think about sort of the evolution of this I think you know Finance supply chain I think about creative workflows is just a lot of opportunity to Leverage The Power of the platform to drive key insights and value uh for our C totally and and making it simplistic right so now the the business owners in the supply chain verticals or the finance verticals they just know that they need something fixed or they need to know how to speak an outcome or they need to know how to expand some functionality that maybe is stuck in their Erp platform and they can talk about how that solution would be solved but and and not too far away we'll be able to talk it into an existence and it'll it'll start to build the workflow for us to be able to solve that problem for him without any coding or development needed so that that really gets to to be a a fun conversation of thinking where technology can really augment our worlds yeah no agreed and you know I've heard that the ultimate Nana is really being able to talk into these platforms you can explain a workflow in a simple language and you know creates it for you and then you don't need a lot of coders at the end of the day to really Cote that at the platform so I think again as we look at the future over the next few years I think that those Ambitions are achievable once you look at the foundation they want to the yep totally I mean we're we're already seeing at 50% productivity benefit from our development team since we've implemented text to code internally so I can only imagine IM how quick these developers are going to be in the future well we've talked about some fun stuff here and I I appreciate kind of this expansive thought and and optimistic lens on on how technolog is going to help our lives but let's let's bring it maybe back to close us down on where listeners can start today so you made a great Point earlier of starting small and approaching it in in some in in a a digestible chunk where I can where I know that I can use technology to to solve a problem where would you suggest listeners start or how would you start that process for them so one of the things we use effectively and and you know we launched our industry Frameworks and you know we work with a lot of our clients on sort of business transformation you know we look at capability areas within the entire aach life cycle and we start to look at specific areas within supply chain or Finance where we know there is white spaces that really either there's a lot of manual effort or there is you know things where our Erb platforms are not able to make it easier for our end end users to use and that's where we focus a lot in terms of identifying you know G more than a you know what we call a level two or level three and start to unpack process flows in those areas working with clients to really Define how that can be simplified and then you know helping them along the journey to really build that consumer grade EXP experience combined with workflows that drive optimization in terms of hours and ultimately value insights for our clients so the way you know we bring our capability framework together talk to our clients where we've SE these opportunities really start and then once we create the initial set of use cases start to work with our clients to evolve that overall Journey uh you know depending on the area they want to really optimize that's helpful and to your earlier Point too how to measure and communicate success along the way what do you suggest for them as they're maybe starting or they get their first version of success as as part of this transformation process how how do you how have you seen that communicated well in clients that you've been with yeah I I'll give you an example of a client we just you know I talked to about a couple of months ago where we started working with then we came up with a list of 10 use cases we went through coming up with detailed process flows and then we talked about the optimiz steps that could be done talking about the hours that could be saved and then once you went to the platform we basically measured in terms of realizing those Savings in terms of hours and we start to add that up you know Cula cumulatively over a month and then sort of EX you know extrapolate that to a year that's a lot of savings where they're able to then take people within Finance people within supply chain to either redeploy them to other areas of the business or focus on things that they are trying to drive transformation because we've now taken the the act of alleviating their time on some of these manual tasks or tasks that could be now automated through a platform watch service now so that's where you know I would highly encourage organizations to think about starting small Define what your success measures are and once you're able to get past those measurable checkpoints you're able Evol to figure out the next us that you can transer beautiful and share share share that along the way let's close with this last question now where do you envision Erp systems evolving to what I see in the market a lot of our clients are looking to get to Enterprise platform standardization right they're looking to do more with a small set of Enterprise gate platforms that have Rich consumer experiences are people to drive value at the and so when I think about that combining the the the the process Rich depth knowledge that exists in Erp systems combined with platforms like service out that are able to stitch you know workflows across theic ecosystem is a really powerful way to achieve value realization I think organizations will you know will continue to look at a select set of Enterprise platforms that truly Drive differentiation within the perfectly put yeah I almost envisioned like a a giant web of multiple platforms multiple functionalities but an interconnectivity that creates this seamless almost SYM symbiotic relationship between how service gets done in the OR in an easy fashion and then adding an in AI intelligence layer to be able to route that for us in the most seamless and Speedy way perfect well Gish this has been a lot of fun thank you so much for joining and thank you for your wisdom I'm hoping the audience found this interesting and I'm sure our listeners felt pretty excited to hear some of the stuff that's happening in your world so to all of our listeners out there thank you for joining and if you like what you heard today please give us a share and tune in for our next episode of innovation today thanks so much thank you Spencer for having me appreciate it [Music]