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Herman Rolfers is a prominent leader in the human resource management space, with an extensive career spanning over 25 years. Driven by innovation as a catalyst for transformation and a key enabler of a consumer-like employee experience, he leads and delivers global digital programs with creativity and strategic thinking, to help the business change and adapt for the future. People are at the heart of his decision-making, ensuring that employees are empowered to thrive, grow, and succeed.
Herman Rolfers, Director of Global Digital of HR Transformation, The HEINEKEN Company [AMS: HEIA]
Currently, working as the Director of Global Digital HR Transformation at The HEINEKEN Company, Rolfers is renowned for transforming conventional HR approaches. His dedication to delivering value-added HR solutions and services is instrumental in driving business profitability and bolstering employee engagement. Ultimately, we want to give HEINEKEN staff the same high-quality digital user experience as we provide our customers and consumers.
In an interview with HR Tech Outlook, Rolfers shares his insights on the challenges and emerging trends in the global HR function and modern ways to adapt to the upcoming changes.
Could you talk about your experience within the HR industry and your role in the current organization?
I previously led large-scale HR transformation programs across global companies, including through mergers and acquisitions (M&A). This experience equipped me well for the challenge of completing the digital overhaul of a global HR infrastructure with the adoption of a single global solution to optimize employee HR experience. This HR technology renewal at The HEINEKEN Company has been an absolute career highlight. It's very fulfilling to see how our investments in digital space are paying dividends to becoming fully employee centric and people insight led.
Consisting of 75 operating companies around the world and with more than 85,000 employees we had a mission – to become the best-connected brewer in the world. Prior to the digital overhaul, over 60 different HR systems were in use within the company, making a uniform and centralised approach difficult. With the implementation of the global solution, we are equipped to meet our ambitions to become a data-driven organization delivering the best employee experience by bringing a consumer-like experience to everyone at HEINEKEN.
A key focus from the start was improving the employee experience. Beyond just technology consolidation, we aspired to become fully employee-centric and people insight led by creating a consumer-like employee experience and empower our employees to take charge of their own career. By creating value for leaders through People Insights-driven decisions in key areas like recruitment, talent management and succession planning. And by empowering HR as strategic partner in streamlining and automating standard, simple, global processes and building Communities of Expertise to push the strategic agenda.
And, next to managing our cost of ownership, deliver a number of benefits for the organisation:
Employee centricity - A consumer-like experience for employees, with direct access anytime, anywhere, all the time. People Insight - Direct access to real-time, accurate and reliable HR data, automated reporting and actionable People Insights for better succession planning and top talent identification for leaders And empower HR as a strategic partner - HR steps up as business leaders, driving people plans and matching talent to value, as time is freed up thanks to increased automation
What are some of the predominant pain points that client really faces when it comes to HR transformation?
To get these benefits, you cannot treat this as a pure IT implementation. We fundamentally believed that our programme would empower employees and leaders in new and exciting ways, changing the way we worked together.
From day 1 we had plans in place to support our people along this journey. To start with we looked at the wider implication of the implementation of SAP SF, in terms of
Foundational objects and processes, like master data and job structures. We thought through release management, cloud support and data privacy. And spent good time agreeing which governance would be effectively guiding us, how we could embrace agile ways of working and how strategies for testing, migration and decommission should look like.
Throughout the programme, change management has been key to success. Running early discovery sessions and allowing sufficient time for detailed solution design discussion with OpCos.
Furthermore, preparation has been key, we engaged local teams well in advance to fully understand local tech landscapes and identify integration and local solution needs. By closure of the programme, we had over 80 integrations live, including 40 payroll interfaces.
We invited business representatives and an HR delegation to design One Global Template with simple and end-to-end global processes. Too often these initiatives suffer from HR led thinking and HR led design. This perspective shift unlocks the full value of any HR digital transformation.
Can you describe any specific project where you took the lead role and implemented necessary changes that led to successful transformation?
When you implement a business platform like SAP SuccessFactors, you will need to make sure to take a holistic approach. Not only implement standard, simple global process. But also clarify roles and responsibilities, build capabilities, drive a mindset shift to work differently and be clear about what success will look like.
While the system implementation was technically difficult, this was not our biggest challenge. Yes, the technical overhaul had its difficulties, but the biggest challenge we faced was getting everyone to embrace a new way of working. We were constantly engaging with our internal stakeholders, from managers to employees to HR, to identify pain points and where we could bring the most benefits. They were our sounding boards from the very start of the programme as we wanted to engage the entire workforce and absolutely avoid treating this exercise as a corporate HR party.
To ensure deployment readiness, six operating companies were selected for implementation before the new solution was fully deployed. This phase was a key ingredient to our success by allowing us to test out the new system, build stakeholder confidence in its ability to deliver and create momentum, said Rolfers. Once the deployment stage was officially launched, the implementation was done in phases starting first with Asia-Pacific region, followed by the Americas, Africa, and lastly, Europe.
We built and sustained momentum, show potential at the right time to guide and pace the various stakeholders and audiences along their change journeys. And of course…..one team, with one goal to drive to successful deployment across 4 global regions, with 75 operating companies, 65+ countries with more than 85,000 users and a user adoption of 95%
In parallel we designed a technology competition called the HR Brewhouse, which aligned to our values of being curious and entrepreneurial. Open to start-ups, universities and our partners, the Brewhouse’s guiding philosophy is that innovative ideas can come from anywhere.
The aim of the HR Brewhouse was to create win-wins for the start-ups and HEINEKEN. We wanted to engage with start-ups and look for mutual opportunities to help one another. The winners all got the opportunity to take part in an innovation sprint to drill down on whether their solution could be used to solve our challenges.
From Brewhouse we learnt that HR transformation will never be easy and as a corporate business, we must be more prepared to fail. When we fail, as you will during any experimentation, make sure we fail fast and fail forward.
We now have established a future-proof foundation for our global HR processes but we are far from crossing the finish line. We will continue to fine-tune the new HR landscape and roll out new innovations to constantly evolve to meet the demands of future generations. Nothing is ever finished – just upgraded.
Are there any specific technologies or solutions that you're really looking for in the future?
Generative AI is what everybody is talking about nowadays. I also believe that it can help to build stronger, leaner and more agile HR functions.
Our business and expectations of employees are continuously changing – “what got us here, won’t get us there”. Data, technology and standardisation continue to be key enablers complimented by Operational Excellence – simplification, standardisation and flawless service execution.
We will explore the potential of GenAI with an inspiring ambition to balance automation / productivity with augmentation / better outcomes for our people and the organization; we are a growth company, we want to inspire to unlock the full potential of our people and the organization. Leveraging GenAI in our processes has the potential to enhance efficiency, decision-making and the employee experience.
As we consider integrating GenAI into our operations, we will start small with targeted use cases. This approach allows us to assess the impact of GenAI on specific areas, providing valuable insights and minimizing potential risks. By gradually expanding our use of GenAI we can unlock its full potential and ensure a seamless integration with our existing practices.
What advice would you offer to the emerging HR professionals who are just starting their careers?
My main advice for new HR professionals is to be curious. Continuous learning is essential to deeply comprehend the business and how your work relates to wider goals.
The HR field of knowledge has grown immensely, so explore new areas like HR analytics. It is not enough to just track attendance; you must explain how it affects outcomes. The reality is that the world around us is changing.
Also important is having the bravery to challenge conventional HR practices. What was valid 5-10 years ago may not matter today. Stay current, especially on technology, by continuously interacting with professional communities. The future of HR is linked with technology, including emerging areas like generative AI. While these developments are significant, they cannot substitute the human aspect in human resources. HR professionals will always remain the guardians of every organization's most valuable asset—its people. My suggestion is therefor also to make sure the human aspect stays at the core of any job as you do in HR.
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