Chow Tai Fook Jewellery: Driving global expansion for a century-old industry leader with data-driven talent transformation
A unified, modern, and efficient HR empowerment system
Chow Tai Fook Jewellery is transforming its talent management in different regions by deploying SAP SuccessFactors HCM. The company has standardized and shortened its recruitment process while simplifying talent acquisition, development, and retention. It can now rely on a unified, modern, and efficient HR system to support its global expansion.
| Industry | Region | Company Size |
| Consumer products | Hong Kong, China | >25,900 employees |
reduction in recruitment cycle time.
increase in employee self-service activity.
Deputy General Manager, Information & Communication Centre, Chow Tai Fook Jewellery Group
Addressing talent management bottlenecks from franchising and expansion
Founded in 1929 in Guangzhou, China, Chow Tai Fook Jewellery Group has evolved over 96 years from a small shop into one of the largest jewelry retailers worldwide. Ranking seventh in Deloitte’s “Global Powers of Luxury Goods 2023” report, the business actively drives brand transformation to achieve its vision of “leading the jewelry industry and accompanying generations through life.”
From 2011, the company expanded into emerging and overseas markets, growing to 7,000 franchise stores over a decade. This rapid growth challenged its store-centered management model, whereby each store operated as a relatively independent unit and managers had complete control over staff allocation. However, the group-level executives increasingly needed to gain a comprehensive understanding of both the frontline and back-office talent allocation. They wanted to achieve a cross-regional, cross-system view and use data analysis to support timely policy adjustments.
Regional and market differences in labor regulations and compliance requirements also raised issues in areas such as employment contracts, social insurance contributions, working-hour management, and performance evaluations. This made it difficult for the talent management team to keep pace with business growth and the accelerating digitalization process.
So, Chow Tai Fook Jewellery sought a more modern and integrated approach to HR management to address the realities of franchising, global expansion, and attracting a younger workforce. The business wished to balance unified and streamlined management with the unique characteristics of its local markets to empower talent and enable its centennial transformation.
Deputy General Manager, Information & Communication Centre, Chow Tai Fook Jewellery Group
Adopting a unified structure, data integration, and intelligent compliance
Chow Tai Fook Jewellery chose SAP SuccessFactors HCM to standardize and unify its global organizational structure. Although historical regional differences created considerable technical challenges during the implementation, the business adopted best practices that balanced standardization and local characteristics with help from SAP Services and Support. Additionally, differentiating between frontline sales personnel and back-office staff meant that employees in both roles could benefit from a more convenient and streamlined digital system.
Using several SAP SuccessFactors solutions has provided Chow Tai Fook Jewellery with unprecedented insights into talent management. The company now has the capabilities to track data across the employee lifecycle, from recruitment and development to retention. Based on these insights and key data points, the business has been able to build a targeted and integrated leadership development system.
The built-in country templates in the solutions allow its talent and culture functions to benefit from an intelligent assistant that is well-versed in individual country labor laws. Previously time-consuming tasks such as currency conversions and time-zone coordination can now be easily managed with a single system setting while the built-in compliance suggestions have significantly reduced the auditing and adjustments workload.
Deputy General Manager, Information & Communication Centre, Chow Tai Fook Jewellery Group
Fostering a stronger sense of belonging with talent empowerment
By integrating SAP SuccessFactors solutions with the company’s digital office, finance, and business systems as well as deploying the same solutions in different regions, talent data now flows autonomously across the business. This greatly simplifies the process of managing the talent lifecycle and lays a solid foundation for process analysis and optimization.
For example, Chow Tai Fook Jewellery has reduced its recruitment cycle by almost one-third while introducing a unified global talent system and consistent job structure. The more-visible and real-time talent data supports the group executives in more efficiently overseeing talent strategies, facilitating precise labor-cost calculations and intelligent compliance-risk alerts.
Implementing SAP SuccessFactors HCM has helped raise the employee self-service rate to 85%. Staff members can access their personal development paths, learn about company culture, and stay updated on business trends through their mobile devices at any time. This transformation has not only enhanced the employee experience, but it has also freed the talent and culture teams from daily tasks, allowing them to focus on strategic talent management.
SAP SuccessFactors HCM has brought tangible changes for frontline store managers, enabling them to flexibly schedule employee shifts, view team skill matrices in real time, and create personalized training plans. The increased flexibility has improved the stores’ operational efficiency and strengthened employees’ sense of belonging.
Deputy General Manager, Information & Communication Centre, Chow Tai Fook Jewellery Group
Furthering digital transformation in financial management
Going forward, Chow Tai Fook Jewellery will continue to advance its comprehensive digital transformation. After successfully integrating SAP SuccessFactors HCM, the company is turning its focus to harmonizing its financial systems. It has adopted SAP S/4HANA Cloud Private Edition and is currently centralizing its globally dispersed financial systems to support multicompany, multicurrency, and multistandard financial management. By standardizing processes and data models, the business can further reduce operational costs and enhance compliance.