Brightspeed: Establishing a clear view of its workforce to better prepare for upcoming work and unexpected challenges
Brightspeed is connecting America with help from SAP
Committed to bringing more connectivity to rural America, Brightspeed LLC is building infrastructure to provide millions of homes with fast, reliable Internet. Urgently needing to integrate 3,300 employees and thousands of contractors into its HR management systems, it adopted SAP SuccessFactors and SAP Fieldglass solutions, enabling enhanced agility with a total workforce management strategy.
| Industry | Region | Company Size | Partner |
| Telecommunications | Charlotte, North Carolina | >4,000 employees | PwC |
Director of HR Information Systems, Brightspeed LLC
Adapting its talent strategy to encompass the entire workforce
On a mission to build a future where rural communities benefit from a more connected life, Brightspeed LLC aims to deploy an advanced fiber network and a customer experience that makes being connected simple. Founded in 2021, this new Internet provider delivers reliable and affordable broadband and telecommunications services through a network capable of serving more than 6.5 million homes and businesses in rural and suburban communities across 20 states.
A big part of building this fiber network of the future requires constructing the infrastructure, which includes physical digging and laying fiber from pole to pole. Brightspeed relies on external workers to meet these needs. While the construction phase of the rollout will take about three years, when it tapers off, Brightspeed will then draw on other contingent workers to serve its new customer base.
Brightspeed also acquired 3,300 employees and a strong contingent workforce of thousands when Lumen Technologies Inc. divested its incumbent local exchange carrier operations to the business in 2022. At the time of the divestiture, a transition service agreement was put in place with a hard deadline for Brightspeed to complete employee and contractor disengagement from the systems of Lumen Technologies.
Greg Williams, director of HR information systems at Brightspeed, managed the critical task of integrating people management systems and processes. He comments, “As part of the divestiture agreement, Brightspeed was given just nine months to transfer 3,300 employees and contractors into our business and get all the systems live.”
Director of HR Information Systems, Brightspeed LLC
Adopting modern HR and talent management tools in the cloud
With external workers playing an increasingly important role in meeting its needs, Brightspeed formulated a talent management strategy that encompasses its entire workforce, with total workforce management.
Lumen Technologies was using the SAP SuccessFactors Employee Central and SAP Fieldglass solutions to manage its internal and external workforces, so Brightspeed decided to adopt these solutions. This would also ease internal and external employee management, onboarding, and workflows.
Guided by partner PwC, Brightspeed integrated the SAP SuccessFactors Employee Central and SAP Fieldglass solutions with SAP Cloud ERP Private solutions. And because training is particularly important for workers in its industry, it also implemented the SAP SuccessFactors Learning solution.
“We have a lot of certifications in the telecom world,” says Williams. “So, we interfaced temporary labor data from SAP Fieldglass with SAP SuccessFactors Learning, which we use to provide essential compliance training as well as any additional fiber and technical training that’s needed. This prompts our temporary labor to take mandatory courses and gives us a digital audit trail for compliance purposes.”
Director of HR Information Systems, Brightspeed LLC
Better understanding of total workforce costs with increased visibility
In an industry with a strong union presence, Brightspeed successfully implemented the solutions in just nine months, giving it visibility across both its internal and external workforces to better respond to workforce shifts. This level of transparency allows Brightspeed to work on cost analysis reporting for rich insights into internal versus external staffing costs to the business. And using SAP SuccessFactors Learning, the company can now better monitor and enforce essential training participation for employees and contractors, helping tighten regulatory compliance.
Since the implementation, Brightspeed has focused on ingraining a performance culture by aligning employee goals with its business objectives through a 360-degree performance appraisal and feedback process using the SAP SuccessFactors Performance & Goals solution. The company is also looking at streamlining career development and mentoring processes with the SAP SuccessFactors Career and Talent Development solution.
And with a goal to improve the employee and candidate experience in other talent management processes, Brightspeed can integrate its HR management foundation built on SAP SuccessFactors Employee Central with third-party applications.
Director of HR Information Systems, Brightspeed LLC
Smoothing the hiring experience for internal and external workers
As Brightspeed continues the build stage of its fiber networks rollout, it is looking to the near future when that part of the project approaches completion. At that time, the company will need a new cohort of cable technicians and other IT and customer service employees to serve its new customers. It will also need to evaluate options for call center technology and consider adopting an onshore, near-shore, or offshore scenario.
In terms of contingent workforce planning, Williams says that it’s important to get more strategic. “Sometimes, it’s just about getting the right person in quickly if there’s a project that’s starting next week. But when evaluating our external workforce needs, it’s important to assess whether we need particular skills for other projects over the long term and embed that thinking into our hiring decisions.”
With future needs to hire a large population of professionals for IT, call center, and customer-facing roles, Brightspeed wants to better mitigate the effort involved in onboarding contractors for short-term projects. It’s also important for the company to help minimize the number of contractors who leave the business at the end of their contract when there are other suitable opportunities for them.
Featured partner
PwC works with organizations globally as a trusted collaborator. It has had a long-standing alliance with SAP for over 25 years, helping clients build and modernize HR capabilities to elevate their workforce potential. Its immersive approach to total workforce management helped Brightspeed implement employee and contingent workforce management solutions from SAP.