The beginning of a New Era
Andreas F.J. Obereder
CEO and Founder | ATOSS
Interview, Annual Report 2022
Andreas, “Digitize or Die” was your key message in this space two years ago. Is this still the number one issue for companies?
Let‘s not kid ourselves: The world has become a more complex place over the past two to three years. We are at a turning point in time that holds substantial strategic challenges for companies -catalyzed by the recent crises. This is evident in the rapid acceleration of digitalization, which has become mandatory in many areas - and has even triggered a five-year leap in development in the world of work. As far as we can estimate as a company, this will continue at breathtaking speed.
Could you have imagined such developments earlier?
It‘s curious. When I decided to work in the IT world almost four decades ago, I had the strong feeling that a lot was still in its infancy. When I look at the IT world today, I still have that feeling! Measured against what is in store for us in the next few years, we are still at the beginning - at the first move of a chess game. On the positive side, there is great potential ahead of us - and we need to leverage it!
What happens to companies that don‘t have this willingness to change within them, or can‘t keep up the pace?
There are developments that cannot be stopped. Take two currently very popular technological trends: cloud computing and artificial intelligence (AI). The company PsiQuantum from Palo Alto, California, has succeeded in increasing computing power by a factor of 50. In the past, people were proud when computing power doubled every 18 months. When it comes to AI, applications like ChatGPT give us a foretaste of the sheer unimagined possibilities of artificial intelligence. In this new world, it is imperative for every company to tackle the digitalization of all processes. Companies that do not go down this path will damage their profitability in the long run, and this will subsequently threaten their very existence. Once this is understood, the opportunities offered by digitalization can be recognized: They create freedom and make a decisive contribution to economic success and to creating a climate of opportunity in companies.
Do you have a suitable example?
Take HORNBACH Baumarkt AG, ATOSS customer and digitalization champion. While 50 percent of German companies see the shortage of skilled workers as an obstacle to growth and profitability, HORNBACH is on the winning side. With its “working time made to measure“ model, the company with over 25,000 employees has managed to offer its employees and applicants enormous flexibility. At the same time, efficiency, effectiveness and, above all, the attractiveness of the company are all on the rise. There can be no better advertisement for a company. However, I must emphasize: Without prior digitalization of processes and firstclass workforce management, such a successful program as “working time made to measure“ cannot be implemented at all.
What advice do you have for companies about the shortage of skilled workers? Can workforce management solutions be as successful at every company as they are at HORNBACH Baumarkt AG?
The shortage of skilled workers - in fact, we should already be talking about a labor shortage - is a bitter reality and will continue to worsen. There is currently a shortage of eight million workers in the EU - two million in Germany alone, according to a recent survey by the German Chamber of Industry and Commerce (DIHK). That means 100 billion Euros lost value creation potential per year - the damage is enormous.
Corporate leaders must recognize and exploit the opportunities presented by digitalization. Those who fail to do so will not be able to compete in the long-term.
Andreas F.J. Obereder | CEO and Founder, ATOSS
This situation represents a paradigm shift for every employer ...
The employer market has changed into an employee market. Companies that promote intelligent employee self-autonomy are becoming more attractive to applicants. And this is achieved through the digitalization of processes, greater transparency for employees and tool-supported integration into processes. The fact is, however, that even excellent workforce management cannot solve the problem of a shortage of skilled workers on its own. But it does help companies to position themselves better than the competition. And it helps us as a company to integrate as many people as possible into the world of work through flexible models - we need everyone.
The shortage of skilled workers has already noticeably changed the importance of the HR department for companies. Nevertheless, you say that we are on the verge of a revolution in this area.
Absolutely! To be sure, human resources has long been of great importance. But in recent years, HR has become a strategic partner to management and a differentiator in the fight for talent. Now it‘s time to take the next steps: Soon, we will see HR applications that rely on artificial intelligence and open up new possibilities with data analytics. This includes, for example, recognizing skills or making forecasts about employee default risks so that preventive measures can be initiated at an early stage. This is human capital management on a completely new level.
What can you imagine by this?
One ATOSS customer, Mainz University Hospital, is a fine example. There, people are already talking about a “weather report for employees“ created with our workforce management solutions. The system learns from past data when and how employees have encountered stressful situations. This information, possibly enriched with data from comparable hospitals, is used to anticipate future stresses and to act proactively in planning. In this way, the hospital aims to significantly increase employee satisfaction - especially in the highly sensitive nursing area - and reduce sickness, absenteeism and termination rates. And that, in turn, benefits the patients.
Now, there will be companies that do not want to deal with workforce management neither because of the digitalization wave nor because of the shortage of skilled workers - but at the latest case law forces every company to introduce a system like the one from ATOSS, doesn‘t it?
You are referring to the case law of the European Court of Justice (ECJ) regarding the obligation to record working hours, which was confirmed for Germany by the Federal Labor Court (BAG). Yes, this effectively forces companies to take this route. But this is - contrary to numerous prejudices - quite simple. For example, a secure, traceable and legally binding working time recording system is ready for use by companies of any size in a very short time via app - with the least amount of effort. Once companies have taken the first step, they quickly realize how easy such digitalized processes are to manage and what other opportunities they open.
For which company size is this particularly relevant?
We offer our solutions for companies with between two and 200,000 employees - we have seen a huge push in 2022, especially among small businesses. The new legislation has led to a doubling of new customers for our Crewmeister solution - we count 8,000 companies here to date.
Is time tracking a purely German issue?
No, the ECJ ruling affects all companies within the EU - and at the same time, it is only one element in the multitude of rules and laws that companies worldwide must comply with when scheduling and recording working hours. Our customer Lufthansa Group, for example, already has over 140 collective agreements. Compliance is an enormous challenge, especially for companies with international operations. That is why we have recently seen an increase in demand for global solutions that enable companies to operate legally compliant workforce management across all international locations.
Do you have an example here as well?
Our customer Barry Callebaut, one of the world‘s largest chocolate producers, has shown how it‘s done. Together with us and Accenture, they rolled out the ATOSS solution in 18 countries on our continents in just 24 months. In doing so, we cover the legal requirements from Mexico to the Ivory Coast to the Philippines from our standard.
You named the need for digitalization and the shortage of skilled workers as strategic challenges - both topics that have been with us for some time. What about the major challenges posed by current and future political developments? To what extent can workforce management help here?
We live in volatile - or in other words - uncertain times. High energy prices, disrupted supply chains, rising inflation all threaten productivity and profitability - especially in Europe. It highlights the urgent need to transform our economic area and lead it into a stable future. A key component of this is making companies more flexible. If they can manage the deployment of their staff with pinpoint accuracy and respond flexibly, individually and at very short notice to fluctuations on the supply and demand side, they gain a major competitive advantage.
Which companies are particularly flexible?
Let me give you an example from the DAX. One of our customers, a global manufacturing company, has responded to the high energy costs by shifting some of its production hours to the night, when energy is cheaper. A great idea! But it only works if they can change their entire shift planning at the same time and adapt it to the new conditions - in a cost-optimized way. Without a modern workforce management system, this would be impossible with many thousands of employees.
Applications like ChatGPT give us a foretaste of the sheer unimagined possibilities of artificial intelligence. In this new world, it is imperative for every company to tackle the digitalization of all processes.
Andreas F.J. Obereder | CEO and Founder, ATOSS
What do you think it will take to overcome all these challenges?
Courage and a sense of responsibility. Courage to change and progress. As well as the sense of managers that they must lead the way and guide their companies into the future with the help of technology. Then a lot can succeed, even and especially in a crisis. Workforce management has become a topic for top management these days. All the projects I have seen in which management or board members were at the table during planning and implementation have been extremely successful. Their business models have benefited massively and sustainably as a result!
ATOSS has been able to announce record results for 17 years in succession. You are obviously convinced that your company is also equipped to meet these strategic challenges. How do you ensure that ATOSS will continue to make a substantial contribution to the necessary changes at your customers in the coming decade?
Our vision of economic efficiency in combination with humanity has no expiration date. We work every day to ensure that this vision remains a reality in the future. To this end, we invest around 20 percent of our sales each year in expanding our technology leadership. We have more than 300 software developers with an average of ten years of specific workforce management experience. This team focuses exclusively on developing the best solutions to meet our customers‘ challenges. In doing so, we are now in the home stretch of migrating our solutions and the entire company to cloud-native.
That was certainly a big challenge ...
It was a huge effort over the past few years. But it was necessary to be able to take more than 15,000 existing customers with us into the future. In essence, this transformation will soon be complete, so that we will have additional capacity for new features - for example, in data analytics or true artificial intelligence. At the same time, we are continuing to drive forward our internationalization to meet customer demand for solutions that can be deployed internationally. We do not do this alone, but in association with a steadily growing partner network with companies such as SAP, Deloitte, Accenture, Delaware and many more.
In your opinion, what is the greatest challenge and the most important asset for the future success of ATOSS Software AG?
We are no different to our customers - the biggest challenge is certainly to lead the people at ATOSS and the processes into a new dimension, a fully digitalized world! However, I am confident that ATOSS can count on employees who not only develop and sell software solutions, but also see a purpose in their work, a real meaning and cause, and pursue it with passion and verve. I can proudly say: This is teamwork at its best!