Most companies are painfully aware that their current systems and processes weren’t designed for the modern, digitally intensive, customer-centric business environment.
Oracle faced that same realization several years ago—and it began the process of moving its finance, HR, supply chain, and other on-premises systems to Oracle cloud applications, while simultaneously shifting its business model to subscription-based services.
At Oracle OpenWorld (September 16 to 19 at Moscone Center in San Francisco), attendees can get an in-depth look at how Oracle achieved that complex, multinational transformation and the lessons it learned along the way.
Register today for Oracle OpenWorld in San Francisco.
OracleThe Oracle@Oracle Experience offers conference attendees the chance to talk with Oracle IT employees who managed the implementations and continue to manage the quarterly updates; employees on Oracle’s finance, HR, supply chain, marketing, and sales teams who use these cloud applications every day; and the Oracle executives who are leading the charge.
“We’re now one of the largest customers of Oracle cloud applications—and I have to say, we’re one tough customer,” says Doug Kehring, Oracle executive vice president of corporate operations and corporate development.
“We’ve learned a lot in our own journey to the cloud—and by using our own cloud applications and the modern processes they enable to create a different business model,” Kehring says. “We want to use this experience to help our customers think about their own unique situations, map their path to cloud, and make that move as smooth and beneficial as possible.”
Take a Deep Dive
The main emphasis of the Oracle@Oracle Experience at Oracle OpenWorld will not be on stage presentations. Instead, company employees from the company’s IT department and from its front- and back-office operations will be available to talk with attendees, answer questions, and provide demos. Information sessions are planned for each functional area throughout the first three days of the event—and each session will build in plenty of time for questions.
Curious about the role that executives played in the migration, the benefits they’re seeing, and the insights they’re gaining? Choose from a range of sessions and discussions hosted by those functional leaders. Other sessions will highlight the fundamental business process changes Oracle made as it moved to the cloud.
For example, Oracle completely rethought its sales contracts for its move to cloud applications. Three years ago, the company introduced the Accelerated Buying Experience, which streamlined and significantly sped up the customer purchasing process while removing unnecessary and time-consuming administrative steps for Oracle’s sales team.
“Our on-premises customers had long told us they liked our technology but that we were hard to do business with at times,” Kehring says. “Given that we're now in the service business, we don't want obstacles that can result in a bad customer experience, so compressing that whole cycle was very important to us.”
Using capabilities in Oracle CX Cloud, the Accelerated Buying Experience enables Oracle salespeople to choose what the customer needs and the appropriate terms, and present those to the customer in an intuitive way so they can simply click and Docusign. No multiple levels of approvals, no complex contracts.
“Whenever you have to leave a system and accomplish something offline, it slows things down, makes things more complicated, and degrades the overall experience,” Kehring says. “With this contract process, our transaction cycles are two times faster in the cloud than they were on premises. It’s a great example of streamlining and simplifying process with the end user in mind.”
Focus on Your North Star
Oracle has also tapped features in its cloud applications to streamline processes for hiring people and submitting and approving employee expenses. Each of these process-reinvention initiatives is led by a cross-functional steering committee—which has been critical, Kehring says, because it keeps the focus on the end user.
For example, functionality that benefitted Oracle’s finance and tax groups was added to the expense submittal process but, when it became apparent that those changes complicated the user experience, the committee removed them. Today, expense submissions that used to take employees hours can now take seconds.
“Because cloud applications continue to iterate and add new capabilities that leverage machine learning, chatbots, voice commands, and other technologies, you can easily enhance and further automate your systems with each quarterly update,” Kehring says. “Your target outcome is your North Star, so that you won’t get mired in functional improvements that don’t align with your true goal.”
Among the other big lessons Oracle learned on its cloud journey:
- Figure out how to use the new features in each release of a cloud application rather than add custom capabilities. “Customizations bring headaches,” Kehring says.
- Look beyond the initial implementation of the cloud service. “Organizations need to plan how they’re going to manage the quarterly updates, how they’ll train employees on new capabilities, and how they’ll schedule updates and decide which new functionalities to use,” he says.
- Emphasize cultural change. As a services company rather than a product company, Oracle understands that it’s not business as usual. For example, Oracle has always listened closely to customers, but the cloud increases the scale of that listening and the pace at which Oracle can deliver on fresh ideas. As much as 80% of the features in a new Oracle cloud application release now comes from direct customer feedback, much of it from online communities Oracle has set up. “You have to change the culture in order to make cloud technology truly effective,” Kehring says.
He continues: “We’ve learned a lot by implementing cloud in an incredibly complex organization, and we’re really looking forward to sharing our insights with fellow cloud practitioners at Oracle OpenWorld.”
