Employee experience has become the hottest buzzword in human resources (HR). A bad employee experience can impact the company in many ways, including low productivity, poor customer service, and decreased profits. In comparison, a first-class employee experience makes employees feel connected to their colleagues and work, dedicated to the company’s mission, and empowered to get the information they need from selecting benefits to developing their careers. 

This new way of thinking about HR has given rise to employee experience solutions, and one of the solutions many organizations have adopted is the SAP SuccessFactors Human Experience Management (HXM) Suite. SAP HXM builds on the best of SAP’s human capital management (HCM) solutions and puts greater emphasis on employee experiences and engagement.

In this article, we’ll cover the features and capabilities of SAP HXM, as well as what makes it unique in delivering employee-first experiences. Let’s start at the beginning—just what is HXM, anyway?

What is HXM?

HXM is the next iteration of SuccessFactors HCM. It was developed to manage the entire employee lifecycle—from recruiting and onboarding to performance and payroll—to help take the employee experience to the next level. 

Customers include businesses of all sizes, including small midmarket customers to global enterprises. The software supports 43 languages and other localizations. 

Sold on a subscription basis per employee per year, the cloud-based solution comes with standard maintenance support. Customers can expect two updates to the software a year as well as routine patches and maintenance fixes deployed by SAP. Making it even more flexible, the SAP HXM suite of applications is available on desktop or mobile. 

Human Experience Management uses O-data and X-data to provide users with insights that help them improve the HR experience. O-data refers to quantifiable data and information, like the number of people applying for a specific job post, the number of employees with a certain title, or the number of employees leaving each year. O-data gives HR an overhead view of what is going on within their organization, so they can delve further and create plans on how to resolve specific issues.

On the other hand, X-data refers to qualitative information that HR cannot measure with numbers alone. X-data includes more complicated factors like emotions, thoughts, and opinions. This type of data analyzes how these qualitative factors influence the employee’s feelings about their workplace and organization. Looking at X-data can help HR assist individual employees in resolving personal issues that impact satisfaction and productivity.

Reviewing O-data and X-data can help HR resolve an array of issues that impact the organization. For example, an HR specialist might look at O-data and see a decline in employee productivity over a certain period. X-data can be gathered using employee experience management tools, like surveys, to collect information on what conditions lead to burnout. Both types of data inform each other and allow HR to better understand employee needs and align them with the organization.

Overview of SAP SuccessFactors HXM Suite

The HXM suite consists of four main categories. Let’s dive into each one.

HR and Payroll

The core HR and payroll solution helps organizations streamline and automate processes. This includes tools for document management, time tracking, payroll, and digital workspace experiences—all from a single platform. 

Employee Experience Management

Employee experience management is a set of solutions covering employee engagement, staff survey analysis, employee benefits, and lifecycle feedback. These tools help organizations respond to employee needs to increase engagement and productivity. 

Analytics and Workforce Planning

The analytics and planning solutions in SAP HXM help you improve decision making with intelligent technology. With the ability to tap into data from various business systems, it’s easier than ever to analyze trends in hiring, turnover, diversity, and performance, information that will help you see how your investments are directly impacting your business results. These insights can also be shared with visualization reports to help improve understanding across the company.

Talent Management

SAP HXM’s talent management solutions deliver personalized experiences across the talent lifecycle, including recruiting, performance management, onboarding, compensation, learning, and development. It’s powered by embedded intelligence and automation to help provide those “people-first” experiences that align with your strategy.

What Sets SAP HXM Apart

The HXM suite is designed around principles that focus on employee efficiency, individualization, and opportunity. Here are some key differentiators that set SAP apart from the other solutions on the market. 

Individualized Experience: Not everyone is the same, and an employee-first approach helps you deliver personalized experiences customized for how each person works, behaves, and what they need to perform at their top level.   

Modern HR Capabilities: SAP has a strong history of delivering innovative HR solutions that allow organizations to tackle their business and workforce transformation initiatives. 

Automated Global Compliance: Gain resources for country-specific and regional regulations with solutions that support local legal compliances and best practices for hundreds of countries, including payroll in many cases. 

Integrate With Ease: You can easily extend the foundation of the HXM suite by leveraging other SAP solutions such as SAP ERP Central Component or S/4HANA, not to mention various third-party systems. You can also use more than 300 partner apps to further customize your employee experience. 

Getting Started with SAP HXM Suite 

The SAP HXM suite helps organizations transform employee experiences and boost business success across a modern, global workforce. Not only that, but the suite also makes it easy to gain better insight into HR processes that lead to faster, more informed decisions.  

If you’re ready to boost your HR capabilities, Surety Systems is your rocket fuel. Our US-based SAP consulting team can help you implement or extend your organization’s HR solutions with HXM. Need help with another type of SAP project? Not to worry—our senior-level consultants have the skills and knowledge you need to get the job done right (the first time).

Contact us today to get started.