- Resource Centre
CSM implements Cezanne Saas-based software
CSM is the largest worldwide supplier of bakery products and a leading player in natural food preservation, green chemicals and biopolymers. Headquartered in The Netherlands, CSM has around 10,000 employees serving customers in 25 countries all over the world, and generating annual sales of €2.9 billion (2009). CSM is listed on NYSE Euronext Amsterdam.
After a stringent procurement process that involved experts from within CSM as well as advice from independent HR/IT consultancy, Reffel Advies, CSM selected Cezanne Software’s succession planning and performance management software primarily for Cezanne’s ability to deliver high profile, global talent management software projects, the in-depth functionality of their modules, and because the software is so intuitive and easy to use.
As a global company, one of the challenges CSM faces is managing employee performance and succession planning across their three divisions. Delivering on these two key strategic areas of HR are a top priority for the CSM board, which recognises how important it to have a clear understanding of the strengths, performance and potential of the employees that make up their management population.
“Being able to carry out effective performance management and succession planning across a global business like ours without a software system is virtually impossible,” explains Renate Visser, HR Development Manager. “Cezanne’s talent and performance management software will provide us with a basis to achieve this successfully. The system will help us to get an insight into our global population for talent management, succession planning and performance management.”
Renate Visser continues: “Building a strong talent management process takes time and having a system to structure these processes is an important step forward. We will be reviewing the system and our processes on an on-going basis to ensure that we are delivering the results the business need. ”
“We also expect the system to give us a better insight into our global talent population, reduce our recruitments costs and increase our internal and external attractiveness.” she adds.
Cezanne Software’s succession planning and performance management software will be used to help manage all of CSM’s managers. Line managers and employees will play an active role and will use self-service to help them complete the performance management cycle. CSM’s HR team will provide expert guidance and support throughout the whole process.
Renate Visser explains: “We will provide line managers with the tools to make them more effective and help them to focus on the operational side of driving people’s performance, rather than on completing time-consuming paper forms, which can only be a good thing for the business.”
For the board and project sponsor, being able to benefit from succession and performance data is critical in order to support effective planning for the future, and to ensure that they get the most from their investment in Cezanne’s software.
Extensive inbuilt reports, as well as graphical dashboards, gap analysis and powerful query, will provide CSM with valuable intelligence about their talent pool. For example; by allowing them to quickly see the status of their current management in terms of the level they are at now and their potential for the future; by helping them to identify possible problems with the leadership pipeline and prevent succession shortages; and by making it easier to align the development needs of managers with current and future business requirements, and relate these to career and succession plans.
Renate Visser says: “We are looking forward to the HR and management teams being able to get important business data instantaneously. At the moment, we do not have one single global HR system, so we will also be using Cezanne’s software to combine all of our key HR information too.”
CSM will be using Cezanne’s talent and performance management software solution on a Software as a Service (SaaS) basis. With this approach, Cezanne Software takes care of all the IT and software infrastructure and provides regular software updates as well as the usual customer support services. CSM simply logs on to the system when they need it.
Julie Windsor, Operations Director for UK and Benelux at Cezanne Software says: “Cezanne is extremely excited to be working with CSM on their global talent and performance management project. CSM’s approach of keeping it simple to start with, and working with the functionality that the system already offers, is absolutely the right approach. It can be tempting when you implement a new system to make a lot of changes and to try to do too much at once. It’s much better to identify a few key goals and address these first, as CSM is doing, rather than over complicate the project.”