The deal comes amid ongoing changes brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic, although it follows a longer-running trend in state and local government toward cloud adoption and data-driven decision-making.
“COVID-19 has permanently shifted the way we all conduct business due to the necessity of teleworking,” said Louisiana Chief Information Officer Richard “Dickie” Howze in a statement. “Cloud computing allows the Office of Technology Services to meet the rapidly evolving needs of the state agencies we serve. It’s not a luxury anymore; it’s a necessity.”
The news release said Louisiana will use five cloud-based tools under the “SAP SuccessFactors” label as part of the deal: SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting, to identify and recruit qualified employees; Onboarding, to formalize and digitize the employee onboarding process; Learning, to ensure compliance with state-mandated training and to replace an existing, on-premise SAP learning solution; Performance and Goals, to standardize employee evaluations; and Workforce Analytics, to produce real-time reports with detailed HR and talent metrics for the state’s Department of Health.
“There’s an unspoken urgency to bridge the technological gap many government agencies face to not only meet citizen expectations and deliver on critical missions, but to also recruit young talent,” said Brian Roach, SAP North America senior vice president and managing director of regulated industries, in a statement. “The state of Louisiana is taking that challenge head-on in the fastest, most flexible way to transform with cloud-based solutions.”
SAP’s contract with Louisiana is the latest in a series of projects helping state and local governments modernize operations with cloud services and data analytics. Earlier this year, SAP moved Arapahoe County — part of the Denver metropolitan area — to its enterprise resource planning (ERP) cloud system SAP S/4HANA, as part of the county’s five-year plan to become more efficient and improve budget forecasting.
