How Leica Geosystems transformed disparate data silos to connected performance management with PeopleGoal

Leica Geosystems has been revolutionizing the world of measurement and surveying for more than 200 years. The Swiss headquartered company, which is part of the Hexagon group, provides innovative geospatial products and solutions to a diverse mix of industries, including aerospace and defence, safety and security, construction, forensics and manufacturing.

Keen to standardize performance management across the company’s global markets and provide its 20,000 employees with better opportunities for development, HR Director for EMEA & Asia, Kevin Vaz, began the search for a best-fit HR technology solution. Here’s his story:

The Challenges:

Disparate systems and siloed data

When Kevin joined Leica in 2018, the company was using SAP for most aspects of HR management though this did not extend to performance management. As a result, a number of local markets had signed up to multiple different performance tech providers or used manual, paper-based methods. This created an ongoing lack of consistency and an inability to benchmark performance data across different markets. The reality was that performance data wasn’t being tracked. Data analysis - if possible at all - was admin heavy and time consuming and worse still, performance management wasn’t achieving its true purpose of effectively managing and developing talent.

Change was the order of the day and Kevin was determined to improve performance management as a key priority:

It became evident to me pretty quickly that we needed one unified solution that could support better engagement and performance development across all our markets - that was really priority number one for me when I came onboard.

A headache for HR

To gauge what type of performance solution would work best for Leica, Kevin first asked his regional HR teams what wasn’t working:

The overwhelming feedback was that performance management - even where there was some sort of system in place - was a tedious and frustrating process that still involved a lot of manual input. It was a low-value exercise across the board and for HR it was headache-inducing.

Kevin also explains that existing performance processes made it extremely difficult to manage reporting from both a cost and logistics point of view:

We were working with disparate data pulled from different platforms - it was a mess. On top of this, we lacked any real ability to report accurately and consistently in terms of ROI because of the cost variables involved. Logistically, it just wasn’t working on any front.

Performance for performance sake

Kevin was determined to improve performance processes at Leica not only for those working in HR, but for the 20,000 employees for whom the current system was failing:

I knew from speaking to local managers that they wanted to create a better experience from performance management - not only for our employees, but for themselves too. Performance had become something we were doing for the sake of it. Creating an ongoing feedback and improvement culture was crucial to how we would transform the performance and growth of the regions and the priority was to implement a performance-driven culture, adopting progressive, data-driven systems and processes to ensure its effectiveness. This required change management in the way we used to do it for several years which was something that we needed to take into consideration.

Kevin continued:

There was huge potential to do better by our people and transform their perceptions of performance management. We wanted them to see it as something that can really support growth and development as opposed to an admin exercise that delivers little to no value. Because of this, our decision to seek a new solution was a no-brainer.

Why PeopleGoal?

Speaking about his decision to engage PeopleGoal, Kevin explains he started with a shortlist of 12 vendors before narrowing down to a final three and then choosing PeopleGoal. So what stood out about PeopleGoal over other providers?

Simple yet effective

Kevin says he was particularly struck by the solution’s quick time to implementation - something he felt would have a positive impact on end-user engagement and adoption:

PeopleGoal is simple but effective - that’s a great combination and I knew it would be key in terms of securing employee buy-in. Quick time to implementation was also an important criteria for us and PeopleGoal was able to meet this need. The focus was on the employee-manager engagement and to ensure regular feedback, both ways, took place.

Clear roadmap for continual improvement

According to Kevin, PeopleGoal’s focus on continual development was also especially appealing:

In my initial interactions with Nik (Nikolaos Lygkonis, Founder & CEO at PeopleGoal), it was evident there was a clear roadmap for enhancing and continually improving the solution. That gave me the confidence that this was neither a static product nor simply a transactional relationship - I felt confident that it was going to be a collaborative partnership and that was really important to me.

Designed with customer challenges in mind

Another key motivator in Kevin’s decision to choose PeopleGoal was the fact the platform is designed to solve real problems:

PeopleGoal has been designed with customer challenges in mind and that really stood out for me. They make it easy for the customer to execute on what they want to achieve without having to constantly go back to the developer and make changes. Because of this, I was reassured that PeopleGoal would stay relevant into the future.

Big benefits

“As easy as breathing” - a performance transformation

With the PeopleGoal platform now in place, Kevin says the benefits have been clear for all to see:

We’ve been able to transform how we manage people and how engaged they are. We can now actually see projects being moved along and goals being achieved without having to make multiple phone calls or check ten different systems. The solution is very clean and can be seamlessly used to solve many of the current challenges we face. It’s really as easy as breathing.

Complete visibility

With Leica’s performance data previously held hostage in disparate systems, Kevin says the level of global visibility lent by the PeopleGoal platform has been revolutionary:

We now have an holistic view of performance and that’s completely transformed how we track, manage and develop our people. The sentiment reports provide us with actionable insights which means we’re no longer having to take stabs in the dark. Because PeopleGoal is user-friendly, employee feedback has also been very positive - and that confirms we made the right choice.

Attributable top-line growth

Referring back to one of Leica’s primary objectives - to give purpose to performance and make it work better for people and business, Kevin says one market in particular tells a compelling story in this regard:

Our collective revenue from our Asia markets has more than doubled in just two years from 2018. That’s a phenomenal growth rate and I’d like to believe that PeopleGoal has driven a sizeable percentage of that. Other markets tell a similar story too. The UK and Benelux have seen significant uplifts on the top-line for example, as have some of our emerging markets.

Stand-out customer service

Kevin cites customer experience as another strong-point for PeopleGoal:

I can honestly say that both execution and follow through have been great. The PeopleGoal team doesn’t just talk the talk, they walk the walk. It’s a partnership that works because communication is very transparent and there’s a feeling that we’re working together towards a common goal.

The COVID catalyst: accelerating adoption

Kevin’s story paints a clear picture: Leica Geosystems is driving real business performance with the support of PeopleGoal. But there’s one not-so-small matter of a global pandemic that we haven’t yet touched on… How has the 2020 COVID crisis impacted the company’s roll out plans? According to Kevin, it’s actually had the positive effect of speeding up company-wide adoption:

We’ve seen a stark rise in adoption rates over recent months due to COVID. Suddenly a whole lot more countries such as China and Indonesia signed up - markets that were previously behind the curve in performance terms. It’s been great to get these additional markets onboard and the fact they can use PeopleGoal in their local languages has certainly helped to make that a smooth process.

What’s next?

So what’s next for Kevin and the Leica team in performance management terms? Kevin explains: