Essity: Unleashing value in the lead-to-cash process with data-driven process transformation
Discovering a value proposition for processes
Leading global hygiene and health company Essity Hygiene and Health AB wanted to increase transparency in its finance processes, specifically lead to cash. It decided to deploy SAP Signavio Process Transformation Suite and, in particular, follow a value management methodology using the SAP Signavio Process Intelligence solution. This has allowed the company to speed up data analysis and time to value.
| Industry | Region | Company Size | Partner |
| Life sciences and healthcare | Stockholm, Sweden | 36,000 employees | BPM-Discipline UK Ltd. |
use cases prioritized in order-to-cash and invoice-to-pay processes.
use case realizing value in order to cash, with continuous monitoring.
Global Process Specialist, Digital Transformation and Business Enablement (DTBE), Essity Hygiene and Health AB
Harmonizing processes as part of a large-scale business transformation
Essity Hygiene and Health AB, stemming from “essentials” and “necessities,” offers well-being products, solutions, and services to more than a billion people in 150 countries. The company specializes in consumer goods for personal and home hygiene, holistic health and medical solutions, and hygiene management solutions for commercial applications that are essential to people’s everyday lives. Some of its recognizable brands include Leukoplast for wound care, Lotus tissue products, and Tork soap dispensers.
With 36,000 employees and 70 production facilities worldwide, Essity had multiple, disconnected business processes. It was using various third-party software, including Microsoft PowerPoint and Visio to manually create its process diagrams and documentation, as well as Microsoft SharePoint to manage its process-related materials. Essity sought a single source of truth to increase transparency in its company-wide finance processes. In preparing for a large-scale ERP transformation that would be rolled out across locations to harmonize activities, the company embarked on a business-process transformation journey.
Global Process Specialist, Digital Transformation and Business Enablement (DTBE), Essity Hygiene and Health AB
Adopting value accelerators as part of a value management methodology
Essity has focused on its business process transformation over the past four years, initially establishing a center of excellence to embed process excellence and new ways of working across its teams. The company deployed the SAP Signavio Process Modeler solution, part of SAP Signavio Process Transformation Suite, to consolidate its fragmented process documents. Next, it implemented the SAP Signavio Process Intelligence solution, focusing the mining capabilities on analyzing its lead-to-cash process.
Essity engaged BPM-Discipline UK Ltd. to support the initial enablement and implementation of SAP Signavio Process Intelligence, equipping the company with the capabilities to operate the solution autonomously and drive ongoing value creation and insight generation. In conjunction with process intelligence capabilities, the hygiene company uses SAP Signavio Process Collaboration Hub to view and share process information, as well as the SAP Signavio Process Governance solution to manage its approval workflows.
The business followed a value management methodology to identify and prioritize process improvement opportunities and translate those into quantifiable value, such as financial impact on profit and loss or working capital. Essity signed up for the SAP Signavio Value Accelerators package to access built-in tools and content, including capability maps, reference architectures, process models, ready-to-use metrics, dashboards, recommendations, and deployment details. It chose to use the invoice-to-cash and order-to-cash accelerators in SAP Signavio Process Intelligence.
Experts from SAP Value Management services helped Essity move from the discovery phase of its value opportunities to their realization. The team analyzed nine use cases before prioritizing five cases across value drivers and components of labor productivity (automation), revenue increase (shipped, not invoiced items), and working capital (late payments). It conducted a further in-depth analysis to understand business contexts, with extensive validation and qualification of different patterns and root causes. Then, it jointly defined a clear action plan with recommendations to realize the identified value. Examples are additional automation or applications, a stakeholder session, a system fix, or more user enablement. In this instance, Essity identified cases where goods had been delivered and goods issues posted, but the customer had yet to be invoiced. As well as outlining required actions, the deep-dive exercise revealed monitoring mechanisms that the company will need to continuously refine according to additional patterns and exceptions.
Global Process Specialist, Digital Transformation and Business Enablement (DTBE), Essity Hygiene and Health AB
Accelerating data analysis for faster time to value
Essity has welcomed the data-driven approach to identifying value potential across its different process improvement opportunities. The company can use the value accelerators to quantify and prioritize the right opportunities while actioning recommendations for fast value realization, minimizing effort, and accelerating time to value. With ongoing value tracking and comprehensive process monitoring, Essity sees the value management methodology as a value catalyst, instilling a continuous improvement mindset between value identification and realization.
Some of the lessons learned from the project were the need for strong stakeholder involvement, clear objectives for desired improvements, and good data quality. The project also benefited from a focus on actual value by narrowing the value funnel to reach core issues, as well as the creation of a single use case that brought real value instead of multiple use cases with low value. Another outcome, beyond identifying cases where value could be realized, was receiving help to determine discrepancies or variances from standard processes.
Global Process Specialist, Digital Transformation and Business Enablement (DTBE), Essity Hygiene and Health AB
Continuing with the value management journey
Essity will continue to use SAP Signavio Process Intelligence in the order-to-cash area to enable a deep dive into identified issues, help ensure implementation of the improvements, and monitor their progress over time. The company also plans to expand into other process areas, such as source to pay, with the value accelerators.
Featured partner
BPM-Discipline UK Ltd. helps organizations solve their toughest challenges through process management. Its team specializes in driving operational excellence focused on real results while building up internal teams with the skills and confidence to tackle tomorrow’s challenges from within. The partner guided Essity in its implementation of SAP Signavio Process Intelligence and helped it unpack the insights offered by the solution.