Meeting potential bloggers at SAPPHIRE 2009

I will be heading to SAPPHIRE 09 next week, and plan to meet with several potential Seamless Workforce contributors.

SAP has a large HCM practice, and I’ve actually had the good fortune to work with a number of its members over the past three years. The group has conducted significant benchmarking research around the disciplines crucial for maximizing value derived from workforce management, so I’m hopeful they’ll agree to share that wisdom with readers. (Note that the ASUG site requires you to register, or sign in as a member, to view their research.)

On Tuesday and Wednesday during SAPPHIRE, I have a packed schedule, meeting with some of the larger consulting firms that will be at the show. Sometimes referred to as "tier I Systems Integrators," these firms have very synergistic relationships with the likes of Oracle, Microsoft, and SAP.

Their long and successful practices of evaluating Human Capital Management processes and helping clients align them in a way that increases the overall workforce effectiveness have resulted in dramatic results over the past two decades. It will be interesting to share some of Yoh's recent research with them, which shows a low level of control over specific categories of the workforce, and validate whether they are seeing the same trend.

While I will be meeting many of these folks for the first time, I am very familiar with their work. In the past, I often used their research when writing about methods employed by professional services firms to move their talent pool toward a talent supply chain model. With a true mastery of how to drive clients to connect their people, process and tools, each of these firms should have great insight into how to create a complex, yet seamless, workforce.

I am not sure which direction these conversations will head, but am anxious to talk with the consulting firms because I do know from experience that they are almost always on the cutting edge of process improvement, and actively pushing technology to serve the ever-growing maturity of supportive business process.

I'll also be speaking with Nakisa during SAPPHIRE as a very different sort of contributor. It is a software application firm that provides tools for the strategic planning and development of the workforce.

We will see how it goes, but it is exciting to see such a variety of contributors show initial interest in the Seamless Workforce. I will let you know how it goes!