In the constantly evolving field of travel and expense management, SAP Concur is an unrivalled leader. But how do you ensure the success of your implementation projects? For Sofia Abrunhosa, Project Manager at Arago, the key lies in functional expertise, leadership and collective intelligence.
Concur is a modular cloud solution designed to manage the entire business travel and expense cycle, from booking to reimbursement. For Sofia, Concur stands out for its seamless user experience, integrated compliance and end-to-end coverage. These are decisive advantages for HR, finance and IT departments seeking to digitalize, harmonize and secure their expense management processes.
A project manager or team leader can't be a boss. They have to be leaders," asserts Sofia, a conviction she shares on a daily basis with her teams and customers. He or she must embody close leadership, capable of involving, supporting and uniting all stakeholders around a common goal.
This posture is all the more crucial in Concur projects, which mobilize a complex ecosystem: finance, purchasing, IT, security, travel agencies, credit card suppliers...
Her ability to communicate transparently and master the solution down to the smallest detail (Sofia is Concur Travel, Concur Expense, and Master Concur certified) enables her to navigate steering committees with ease, and guide customers in their trade-offs.
Sofia recommends building a global core model, a harmonized foundation for the entire company. This centralized model makes it possible to review often highly decentralized processes, in order to align them with common practices, while allowing targeted local adjustments. This approach facilitates multi-country deployments and guarantees greater scalability.
One of the main pitfalls Sofia identifies with customers is the temptation to reproduce their existing processes identically in the new solution. This logic leads to stretching the capabilities of the standard model, to the detriment of simplicity and sustainability. She cites the case of a customer who rejected Concur's standard functionalities in favor of an advanced configuration to suit his habits, resulting in delays, additional costs and technical complexity. For her, staying as close as possible to the tool's standard is essential to guarantee stability, support and access to future innovations.
Sofia applies a waterfall methodology, but does not hesitate to introduce agile elements into large-scale projects. Daily meetings, incremental deliveries and continuous readjustments energize follow-up and reinforce team involvement. This flexibility is invaluable, particularly in times of crisis, as demonstrated by the simultaneous launch of Concur in 24 countries for SWIFT in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic - a challenge successfully met.
Sofia's feedback is clear: the success of a Concur project depends as much on the tool as on its governance. Adopting a long-term vision, simplifying, harmonizing, trusting the expertise of partners and, above all, initiating genuine change management are the pillars of a successful deployment.
Find out more in the full version of his video interview:
