PegaWorld iNspire 2023: Siemens GBS End-to-end Process Digitalization Powered by Case Management

Siemens Global Business Services Opportunity-to-Cash started its journey with Pega to implement one use case to run in three locations.

During this session, you will see how this became a part of Siemens’ end-to-end digitalization strategy, a tool that today serves multiple uses cases in 40+ countries – handling more than a million cases per year and helping thousands of users run their day-to-day work more effectively and efficiently within a short period of time.

Watch this replay to get insight into the value drivers, what went well, and what was adjusted over the period of time.

Transcript:

- My name is Daniel Peixoto. Welcome to everyone to this session. I belong to Siemens GBS, so global business services. I'm part of the Siemens Portugal. And today I will explain and explain our journey about this digital order management application. It's a Pega application. We are running for some time, and then today I will give the context and our challenges and then how the things have been working over these past years. So we start with "Houston, we have a solution." So I think I will keep talking... And basically, I will start with our process so everyone can understand where this belong and how the things are working. So in opportunity to cash, we treat the whole life cycle from the lead perspective until the cash is on Siemens bank account. For that we have in Pega different applications. And today, I will explain and I will talk about the second one or the one that is in the middle. It is highlighted that cover the part from the order until to the invoice. So for the first part to the lead to the offer, we are now in the process analysis and in the way in the phase to navigate in that part but there is not yet a Pega application. On the middle one, we have already a Pega application that is digital order management and invoice to cash. We also have another Pega application that called CCMT, Cash Collection Management Tool. But let me deep dive into the second one or the one in the middle. So some years back, we took as part of shared service organization, so we run the processes from the business. But when we start working on that, it was very clear for us that we would need a solution because handling the order management process through email, SharePoint, Excel files definitely would not be efficient and has shared service organization. Every year we have to generate productivity and that would not be realistic to keep generating that productivity based on Outlook, SharePoint and so on. So we, together with Siemens IT, we look for market, what kind of solutions could exist and how could these solutions could help us to keep delivering that productivity. And then Pega came to that game. And then together with the Siemens IT then Pega has been selected for our process. At that time, we had no harmonized processes and for the ones that know Siemens, Siemens has a big portfolio, different type of businesses, different type of customers. For sure, this harmonization in terms of the process was very difficult to achieve at that point and the lack of transparency for the work pending as well. So we knew that the business was running, we were able to book orders, we were able to follow up but not professional to the stage or to the level of a Siemens company. So also the part related to the digitalization to the automation was really not at that point one part of the game. So we really wanted to deliver the orders, performed the activities, but this digitalization was not there at that point. So for sure we would need some solution and that, as I mentioned, Pega came to the game. And since the beginning we believe that we could do good things and improve processes and then generate that automation and digitalization with Pega. And from there, we start to implement our case types. So currently, we have this contract management that is part of this digital order management. Although, the name is digital order management, we do much more than that because for us, the understanding is everything starts with the order, yeah? So if there is an invoice, it's because there was an order. If there is a contract that because there is an order as well. So that's why the reason we call it digital order management. So we book orders through the system is not our ERP system, so the ERP system is SAP. However, when everything goes fine, definitely we don't need Pega. So if there is an integration from the customer ERP to Siemens ERP, Pega is not there. But if there is a gap, if there is a stop, if there is a mismatch, then Pega came to the game, and our case types come to the game to give to the our order managers the work that they have to really handle it. It's not like that they don't need to to check every order because it's technically or human impossible, so there are millions of orders and line items coming to Siemens every year and that will not be realistic. What is needed is definitely when there is an exception, when there is a mismatch, then the order managers came to the game. So the second big use case is related to inquiry complaint. So customers submit orders. Even when they submit the orders electronically, there is always the possibility for questions. And when Siemens deliver, it could be something happened during the transportation, the delivery happened and then for some reason it could be damaged. So then there is a reason for a complaint. So then we had the second use case and this use case inquiry complaint, it handle the big part of the volume still based on emails. So although there are different channels like web portals and e-commerce solutions, so for the customers to submit their requests, there are a lot of customers still submitting requests through email. So email channel, it's very important for digital order management at this moment, and it's where we get the most of the transactions. The exceptions are the second one from directly from SAP, but the first one is the inquiries and the complaints. And then of course related to delivery and then the automating billing, that's also part of the system. Wherever SAP or the ERP cannot handle automated, then there is a task to the order manager and then it has his respective case type how he will be able to handle it. So with this implementation or with these case types, we could cover a global solution. I will talk about that a little bit more. And then the exceptions, that is the part more important for the order managers together with the scalability. So regarding the scalability, I will come to that as well because it's one of the, or what how Pega could really help us to achieve that part. But here you have an overview about all these different case types and how we are addressing the requests. So with digital order management, we cover three main areas. So we streamline the processes, we digitalize, and at the end, we automate them. So part of this streamline, it's really looking to the customer requirements, try to understand what the customers want. Typically, they don't come with solutions, they come with challenges that they have, they don't know how to solve the challenge and that's where we try to streamline this process. The second part is related to the digitalization. It's still real that there are fax orders received. It's still real that there are a lot of WhatsApp messages and team messages for checking the orders and then speed up the order. So that's still available there. We try, of course, to remove wherever it's possible this paper based and this fax into the system. And then, of course, when we know and we have the process digitalized, then automation becomes much easier. And that's where we do automated booking of the orders, we do billing automated as well, so all this part can be achieved after we picked off the streamline of the process and then the respective digitalization. However, for us, it's clear that it had a path. So it was not from one day to the other for sure. And then everything started back to 2014. So we had ideas, we had challenges, we had some people looking to the operations, but had I mentioned then we are a shared service organization? And, of course, the first part was the transactional activities, booking wherever the orders on time, but we really had to start to looking for something else. So we took our time, time to understand the business, time to understand what the hell is order management. And then when we understood what is order management, then we definitely start the this kickoff with this journey with Pega and then with Siemens Center of Excellence. So couple of years after we could do our first Go-Live. So the first Go-Live was for the inquiry complaint use case and that at that time, so we worked with a partner for the development, and we have three people allocated to the project that was overlooking how we can make this real because at that point were just ideas, PowerPoints, some user stories but really nothing concrete. Then '19 and '20 was very, very important for us. So it was our first project with a customer because until then all these Go-Lives in 2018 were for GBS organization. But '19, we officially provided the first solution for a customer. Still with Siemens business but to a customer. So then we decided to set up our transformation team. And '21 and '22, although we were all in this COVID period, but it was really very, let's say excited for us, because we started to grow our team and we started to provide the solution for much customers and for more Siemens divisions. And '23 is being really great. So we have now a major project that we are running. So we are doing the rollout for the application for Siemens division for digital industries in 19 countries in Europe. And as part of that is not only the rollout of the existing solution, but is exploring already and preparing 2024 with the additional use cases. So it has been a journey with a small team but with a very active team. And we try to cover all the demands that we get when we are moving forward. So let give you some numbers. So that will be... When we talked about that possible solution back to 2014, so we're looking for our three main hubs. So for the order management, GBS is providing services nowadays from many other locations. But back to 2014, we had Portugal, we had Malaysia and we had India. So this was our initial scope, we thought maybe we'll have a chance for others, but this was the initial thought and all the concept based on the digital order management were based on these three different locations. Today, not anymore because here is still data from May. So we are in 24 countries and there are some other countries to come because part of this 19 that we are doing the rollout are not here yet. So it's a big difference to try to accommodate not only the rollout but also accommodate the gaps and the deviations from the different locations. So one Siemens that is in Malaysia or is in India or is in Europe or in US, they are all in or they are at this moment all in a different stages of maturity in their SAP systems, in their different CRM systems. And then we have to adjust the application to accommodate all these deviations. So the second part is in term of volumes. So again, always comparing the past with the current scenario. So we are, our last year we crossed the 2 million cases. And these 2 million cases could be many emails inside. It's not one email, one case, but it's really the work for the order managers. For this year we are for forecasting 2.7 and then for the next year with a completely rollout for the 19 countries in Europe, we will cross for sure the boundary of the 3 million cases for the other managers. In term of users also a big change, what we have here, this 5,000 that we crossed this in May, it's active users. So it's not just someone that log into the application once and then they never again connect to the application. These are active users, so people that are really using application every day and it consider our focus of course the order managers but also the sales team, the contract management team, so controllers, finance team, that they log in to check on the stages of their orders, they check the log in to check the stages of their billing process. So they have the full transparency in the system and then they can connect it to understand what's going on. And to complement the number part. So back to 2018, so we had this small team, six headcounts, where we try to deliver the solution for all the different locations, all the different places. And nowadays, we have 32 people participating in this project. So these 32 are considered business architects, it has project management, it has integration manager, and it has as well the senior system architects or the SAs. So we have our own development team and we work with a partner as well for whatever it's needed additional capacity or additional projects or specific projects. Then we have or we work with this partner as well to increase the capacity and be able to deliver on time. So how we were able to achieve all these different numbers as we... We just saw that it's really different from what we have planned to where we are today. And there is one sentence from Pega that's we really can see it can apply to us. So for a lot new products, regions or channels without copying or rewriting your applications. So this was key and is key for us that we have a big variety of customers. So we have customers in US, in Asia Pacific, in Europe, Latin America, so we are almost everywhere. And had I also highlighted in Siemens, it's a very diverse organization in terms of products and services and the different level of maturity is also different. So only with Pega we could achieve that. Otherwise it would have been really challenging to make that possible without completely rewriting or rebuilding different applications. So three topics here, very important one is this ambition part. So we are a small team. At the beginning, we were even a smaller team, but we always believed that we can make it and let's go for it. So when we started we were looking for simple, very simple application to handle these exceptions, to be connected to SAP, but it was never the plan to book orders through our system or to have self service portals where the customers can connect and submit their requests or they can perform their challenges, their investigation for the dispute for example. Later with the time, we really took to the chance and looked to the opportunity to say let's do it, let's be bold and let's try to make this bigger than what we have planned initially. And that was key for us, that part of keep motivated and make sure that this can work. The second part was this resilience. So we are not all in the same location. So I typically, I say that we work in a network environment. So we have business architects, we have project managers, we have interface managers, and then the system architects, but we are all in different locations. So the two main hubs are centralized, one in Portugal and one in India. But we have people in US, we have people in Czech Republic, we have people in France or in different locations. We have different people, different resources that can make that happen. And as a shared service organization, we are competing I'd say with the other partners. So Siemens, its divisions are not obliged to use shared service. They can use shared service, they can go to the market, they can build their own hubs, they can do what makes more sense for their business. So this resilience was really important for us because during COVID some of the businesses stopped, some of the business decided to slow down and then of course there is always a competition from the market. There is always other companies can just get to Siemens and then make their own offers and then Siemens can decide to go somewhere else. So there was some periods not so easy for us as a small team, but we could make it. And then together as a team then this resilience was very important. And last but not least, this reasonability, it's what make our application be available in 34 countries. Be possible to use many different configurations. So one of the most important thing for us in the digital order management in this technology is the ability to delegate the configurations. So we have a lot of tables and a lot of configurations that the business architects can do. So if there is a new team that just want to join the application, they can join in two, three days. And then it's like the business architect get in touch with them, then they have a set of configurations that they can do. The business architect upload the configurations and then they are ready to use. Of course, if they want customizations, if they want to different case types, that's a different story. But if they want to use what exists already today, in two days, three days, they are ready to use, and without any intervention from the development team. So everything can be done through the business architect and then through this configuration. That's really important for us because we have teams going live every week, every two weeks there is a new team going live. So we could not always be blocking our development team that constantly looking for innovation and looking for new functionalities, improving performance, whatever is being impacting to the system and popping up in PDC. So we could not always be blocking our development team for that. And fortunately, we keep developing, every two weeks we have new sprints coming and always new stories to be developed. It's really important, this usability part that Pega can offer. And then we took it seriously since the beginning and it's really paying off. So where are we today? So we deliver out of two main locations, Portugal and India. It's where we have the business architects and it's where we have the system architects, but has also mentioned, there are a lot of people around, there are CRM, there are people that customer demand managers that they are the ones that bring the work, of course, to the team and that they convince the customers to keep investing into the application and developing further. We have this motivated team but there is for sure a lot to improve and to learn. And there is something that we invest every year now we just also with the learning from the Pega world, definitely we will make a plan again. So we need to revisit the plan. There's a lot of things to learn. There is a lot of things that to try out and then to be able to apply as well. So one of the example, it comes with a process mining. So for many people it's new and for many people you will learn this during this Pega world. We are one of the early adopters and then we will have our first results in the next four, six weeks. Let's see what is coming from there. So innovation for us, it's really important and then we always want to learn more and to see what we can apply. Sometimes we'll fail, sometimes we will not fail and then it we will succeed. But it's important to keep that part into the team and really to make that more important, more active. So I mentioned about 34 countries. In each country there are different teams. So currently we cross these 240 different teams and they all probably have different configurations. They all are different somehow in one part of the other. We have the case type will be the same, the logic will be the same, but not every team will use exactly the same logic or exactly the same configuration. So that's really possible as I mentioned also with Pega. Otherwise, then would be or would have been really a big challenge for us to keep all these different teams using the application. We always try to keep the standard, however, not always possible. And when it's not possible, then we come with a new logic. The new logic or the new rule for us, what is important is to understand is this requirement something that we can reuse or any other customer can benefit? So if the answer is yes, then we will do the development on the framework. Otherwise, then we will do the development directly on the application for the customer. So Pega help on that part and it really being very good to support this journey that we are having. So now a little bit talking a different topic. So connecting the digitalization to a better world. So here two important aspect. From one side, for at Siemens it's really important that we make real what matters. It's really important that we help the Siemens divisions to help their customers. We are a shared service but we are really convinced that if we are able to deliver solutions to digital industries, smart infrastructures, Healthineers, Siemens energy to the different businesses, they will be able to serve their customers better, faster, quicker, and then their customers will be able also to change the the world. So we are really convinced about that and that's why we also contribute to that. And if you ask me how digital order management contribute to that? It does not contribute only by providing that solutions and to make the customers active or acting quicker and having faster solutions, but we also contribute to the community. So what we are doing as part of this digital order management, so we dedicate one part of the revenue that we have to the environment. So we look to the case volume coming from each location from each country, and then based on that, we invest in the nature. So we plant trees based on the volume of the cases, based on the contribution of every country. Then we give a little bit back to all of us. We contribute all a little bit to a better world and that's what we do as well as part of digital order management. "We will keep dominating." That's how we say. We all have an hashtag as we are all the dominators. We will keep dominating not only the order management part, but as mentioned we will go also to the first part where we will try to cover the lead management, where we will try to cover the original part of everything where it comes an opportunity, and that part will be our next adventure. Currently, we will keep with the order management part and we will keep dominating everything that it's on the order management perspective. So now we have the opportunity for Q&A. So the time it come to that point now. So you have micro there. If there are any question anyone wants to put a question then feel free. I will try to do my best to answer your question. It should be on. It's not. Now look... Yep. Okay, thanks for the question. So if I could understand or hear, then you are asking if do we have any plan to make this application available in China, yeah? So China is a very, let's say protective market. We have discussed this within GBS and within Siemens already two times. There is, I don't know if it's coincidence or if it somehow comes with generative AI, but we will have another discussion next week, so to see what are the opportunities. 'Cause from one perspective, there is a lot of points on the data protection and on the exposure of the data. We are using Pega Cloud based in Frankfurt. And based on the previous discussions we had to implement also a cloud in China. So we would not be able to reuse the existing cloud from Frankfurt. For us, I would say that it's not a priority. We have still a lot of things to do in Europe and then in US as well because of the dimension of the market. But let's see, so it's not a priority. However, if that will be really a demand where we can see that there is volume or attention, I think it'll be an important because the dimension is huge, right? So the thing is do we really have customers there that they will be ready to use our application? That's the different question. But if we realize that definitely it'll the market, there are customers, potential customers, we will have to explore again that part of the cloud on the data protection and could be. But I would say that not in the next six months for sure.

- [Participant 1] You are operating this in 34 countries, but developing it into just Portugal and India?

- That's correct.

- [Participant 1] How do you handle translating into all of the different languages?

- So translation for the application, there's two components here. One is we always try to do the case management part. So if we segregate our application, we will see two dimensions. One dimension is the case management part and another dimension are the self-service portals. So the case management part, we only translate when it's strictly mandatory. Like, if we work for France, definitely they will ask the translation of every single word. But if we work for all the other countries, then the application in English, it's more than enough. If there is this mandatory requirement than we use, otherwise, we just use the English part. On the portal, it's a different story, because when we talk about self service portals, we touch the end customers. And to attract the end customers to really using the application, definitely everything is translated. So in terms of that part of the translation, what we have done recently... I mean, I will not be able to explain very technically, but basically there is a file that is downloaded and it's translated uploaded and it's done. So it could be, I think we hear today or yesterday as well in the keynote. It'll be perfect? No. It'll be enough? Yes. So it could that the translation, for example, for the Portuguese from Brazil, it'll be a little bit different from the Portugal from Portugal, but it'll be understandable, it'll be enough for the team. And then if a developer needs to do a translation for 20%, that's still fine, but a 100% of all fields then definitely it would be a bigger challenge. Anyway, this part of the translation for the web portals, it's more one, let's say, one topic to convince the customers to use because definitely the challenge for the customers, why they should go to a web portal instead of sending an email or instead of just a phone, do a call and then try to get his answer. And we always try to find all the arguments for the customers to use the cell service portal and the translation with the local language, of course, is one of the advantages that they can have when they access the portal. I would resume or the short answer is yes, the medium answer would be... Let's go there. Okay, so in fact we do already, so we do spare parts, we do returns, but it's in a very early stage. So that's why I didn't even mention here in the use cases. So we do for digital industries in India, so there is a portal where after whatever has been delivered or two things could happen. One is they want to return because something happen, right? Then the second part is when it's a contract that is already in customer service, then the customer might need a spare part to replace a motor or to help in the reparation of that motor. And that spare part, it comes through the portal. If you ask me why it's still not here because it's not mature enough and does not have volume enough. However, the part of the process is already there, and the customer can use is part of the application. But it would need or it need more to be more mature to contribute and to be part of a big picture like what we have here. But it's already there in terms of the spare part in terms of customer can check their invoices as well. All the, everything that goes to the customer service that typically in the business when there is really this big project or big contract after let's say the project is finished, it moved to the contract to the customer service team, which in Siemens it's still a separated organization, then the customer can access, they can see what they have in their install base and then they can submit a request for that additional spare part. It's already there, but again, it's not so mature that can be part of, yeah, already, so included, yeah. So the whole application is integrated with SAP. So Siemens, currently we have 60 to 70 different SAPs and then they are all connected through the middlewares. So if you ask me, every single use case is connected to SAP, to all the 60 SAPs, probably not, because some countries belong to the same SAP but order creation, order fetching, order simulation, it's all connected to SAP. It has also other different applications connected, so we have an OCR for optical correcter recognition, although we have big customers that the orders come through the ADI channel and then it goes directly to SAP. There are still some customers, especially in different industries, like, Healthineers, for example, for the healthcare sector that we get faxed orders. So these faxed orders for us at the end, it'll not be a fax, it'll be a PDF because we have the service to convert it into A PDF. And then to book that order, we need to extract the data from the order. And for that, our order application is connected to an OCR technology which extract the data, simulate and try to book it in SAP. If during that simulation there are no warnings, no messages, then for the customer who just get a notification "Your order has been successfully booked. If you have any inquiry, do mention this number." That is in fact our sales order number. If during that simulation there are some topic that does not work, could be material does not exist anymore, could be price deviation, could be quantity. So we do have logics in Pega, not based on AI yet, but logic that compare if the customer, the average of the last month, it has been 10 quantities for this product and now he's order 50, maybe something is not correct. So we don't let the order go to SAP, we give an exception and we assign to the order manager. But this process is all integrated from... It's even included or integrated with the Salesforce, so it could be request that comes from the Salesforce team that goes to stop in Pega to check or to the other manager to perform some activities. It simulate or book to SAP and then it continues the process. So we have that, all these integrations, but we handle exceptions. If the customer submit an order and it goes till the end, everything perfect, then we don't handle it or we don't have any exception and it's not implemented any use case in Pega, it would not make any any sense from our perspective. Every time that in the whole flow there is something that fail, then there is a case, then there is a connection to the order manager. Has you asked about integration? I will benefit or profit to mention here One thing. So between the middle where at the middle where we have this order management part and then at the end where we have the invoice to cash. So invoice to cash as I mentioned at the beginning, we also have a Pega application for cash collection management tool and we are doing the connection between the two applications as well. So in case there is in this CCMT application a dispute because the customer for any reason, he will not accept that invoice, could be a wrong price for example, then through the APIs as well and the web services, then the CCMT application, Pega application will open a case into the order management team and then the order management team will be able to interact with the cash collector. So they will all have everything in or we will have everything integrated. No more emails, no more phone calls between the teams. So although they are working in two different Pega applications, but at the end it doesn't matter because both applications are talking to each other via a web service, everything is online, and then all these things should work seamless. So we are starting with one use case, it's called dispute, but there are many other things that it could be done better. When the collector is calling a customer today, he does not have transparency enough to understand what kind of conversation he will have with a customer because the customer could have 20 invoices not paid. But if Siemens is delayed providing delivery of orders, also for six months, maybe the conversation of the collector with the customer should be in one way. If the customer had everything delivered properly and everything on time and then still he doesn't pay, the conversation maybe should be in a different way. And to date, that transparency is not there, because there are two different applications and it would require the collector to log in and see whatever is going on for this customer. But it's definitely a use case to explore after we successfully complete the dispute, then we could go to a second one to understand and give more power to the collector to answer and vice versa. The same thing on the order manager. If it's a very good well-pay customer, then maybe it should also get benefits from the order management team and then it can also play different roles. But today that transparency is still not available. So there are two aspects here. One is in terms of volume, so it's millions of transactions of probably billions of transactions because just Italy, they have 1 billion line items per year. And just to have a, let's say an application where we could see the whole flow but everything ticked off or everything in green, that probably happened from one day to the other and no one realized that this order was received, was booked, was approved, and then was delivered to the customer. We don't see benefits from that. From one point of view it'll be a lot of volume. It will be also licenses wise also impacting a lot. And then the second part is the exception is where we need the order manager to work, is what needs to be resolved quickly. And that is the beneficial that we see, or yeah, the beneficial part that we see where we give to the right order manager the right order or the right inquiry that he needs to work at this moment. So the prioritization, it's very important. All these different aspects in terms of of exceptions and the different type of exception that could happen in the process. Give it to the right order manager in the right moment. It what he needs to act and resolve the discrepancy or resolve that dispute quicker. But all the volume there, we don't see the big beneficial 'cause there are tons of orders booked every day, full automated. No one can realize that this order was even booked or being delivered to the customer right now. That part is not there and then it's full automated already through the ERP systems and it's not, yeah, we will not see has a big benefit. The exception part is where we see the advantages.