20 Years of Working With Workday

When the EU announced the new EU Pay Transparency Directive, which will come into effect in June 2026, Workday sought a partner to meet the new regulations—leading them to deepen their current relationship with Kainos, now the first deployment partner for Workday’s Pay Transparency Analyzer. The EU directive is meant to help divulge salary discrepancies and ensure fair pay for all.

Beyond the concerns of adhering to new regulations, a significant concern many businesses have had of late is the return on business value with AI. According to a study by Implement Consulting Group, commissioned by Google, it is estimated that generative AI could boost the EU’s GDP by 1.4 trillion EUR over the next decade, a total increase of around 8 percent. (Source: Implement Consulting Group) Most businesses have been impacted in some way by current macroeconomic conditions, meaning for most, it is not business as usual. Some are turning towards AI to solve the drawbacks current conditions have caused.

According to Carl Eschenbach, Workday CEO, AI removes everyday drudgery. “We no longer work with technology, but the opposite happens, technology starts to work for us”, he explains. An overarching theme at the event was the coming together of technology and humanity—ensuring that kickstarting transformation with AI would not mean losing humanity, or rather—as many fear—making people obsolete altogether.

Humans and AI collaboration

“How do we transform our organizations with AI without losing our humanity?”, was a question that Chief Marketing Officer, Emma Chalwin put forward. For those asking themselves the same thing, Chalwin was there to assuage any fears, “Technology is the engine, but we are the drivers.”

Ashley Goldsmith, Chief People Officer at Workday, went into more detail on this topic in her keynote speech, quoting the World Economic Forum, according to which eleven million jobs are to be created by 2030 through AI. "Humans come through to work with technology and not be replaced by it,” she explained.

Later, when asked about the evolving role of HR in a world of AI and automation, Goldsmith had the following to say: “In a lot of ways, I think the evolution of HR began even before this. And I think it's really just accelerating more and more in some ways. […] And now companies are bringing on AI and the transformation in their workforce. All of that, I think, puts HR at the forefront.”

The aforementioned World Economic Forum report also states that all technologies and macrotrends will result in 92 million jobs being displaced and 170 million jobs being created, all by 2030. That is a net increase of 78 million jobs worldwide.

It is then a question of reskilling to remain relevant in an AI-based business world. To that end, adopting a skills-based recruiting approach, which focuses more on candidates’ skills over education or work experience and which Workday itself already implements, might be the best way for businesses to find talent in the future.

Example: Workday and Paradox

80 percent of organizations are not seeing business value from generative AI (Mckinsey and Company. While some larger companies may choose to invest in building their own AIs, there are several challenges to enterprise AI, such as managing data governance, security, integration, limits in the scope of the design, as well as time and resource limitations. This is why many turn to agentic AI, to circumvent the limitations of generative AI.

80 percent of companies see no business benefit in generative AI (McKinsey and Company). While some larger organizations may invest in developing their own AI systems, there are several challenges with enterprise AI, such as managing data governance, security, integration, design scope limitations, and time and resource constraints. For this reason, many are turning to agent-based AI to circumvent the limitations of generative AI.

According to Workday, 82 percent of companies use AI agents in some form. Workday's acquisition of Sana will give Workday users access to the no-code agent builder from 2026 to create personalized AI agents. This could be particularly relevant in the DACH region, where users are more concerned about how their data is used.

Max Wessel, SVP of Growth at Workday, said: „I think in the DACH region, users tend to be skeptical of these applications where you automatically log in. So I think there's a lot more opportunity for something like Sana, where you give users the tool and they can easily configure how the tool works in their context, specifically for their data and not beyond.“

Payroll accounting in EMEA

Companies operating in EMEA and especially in European Union countries employ many people across borders. With international employees comes the complexity of the different rules and tax regulations that each country has regarding salaries. To address these issues, Workday has introduced the Workday Go Global Payroll solution, delivered through Workday's expanded partnership with Remote, adding additional capabilities to Workday Go, a unified, AI-powered cloud platform.

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"Technology is the engine, but we are the drivers."

Emma Chalwin,
Chief Marketing Officer,
Workday

Max Wessel commented as follows: „We know that we can't do everything in the world. We want to make sure that the data is clean, the interfaces are simple and user-friendly and the active deployment is straightforward for customers. A partnership shouldn't be a headache. Together with our partner Remote, we have developed a unique solution that integrates very easily with Workday and ensures that your data in Workday remains the source of truth, but is bi-directional.

So they can be accessed and updated and it fills a real gap for our clients: If I don't just want to buy a software system, but I really want a managed service that simplifies my complex global payroll, how can I achieve that without having to go to two different providers?“ No other region outside the EU has the same restrictions in terms of governance and data security.

Workday EU Sovereign Cloud

This is to be expected, as the DACH region in particular attaches great importance to data protection. To this end, Workday has announced a solution that meets the stringent requirements of the EU. Workday's EU Sovereign Cloud includes built-in governance compliance, will be managed exclusively by EU employees and will be available to all in early 2026. The new offering will be overseen by an EU advisory board to ensure transparency and compliance and is built on AWS cloud infrastructure.

Transformation at the center

Workday's official position is that the company is not focused on its competition, but solely on its customers. When asked how the company deals with competition from ERP giant SAP in particular, especially in the EMEA region, Rob Enslin, President and Chief Commercial Officer at Workday, replied: „It's not really healthy to focus on the competition. We're really focused on putting our customers and the transformation of our operations at the center.“

Perhaps it would also be good for SAP to focus more on its customers. In this respect, Workday may have an advantage over its competitors. When asked about SAP's recent successes, Jens Löhmer, CTO DACH at Workday and Continental Europe, referred to a recent case. „We have won Bayer AG as a customer. This company has a large corporate base. It used SAP and continues to do so.

They have a huge architecture base and are currently modernizing it, but we were able to convince them of Workday and are excited about this partnership. [...] The Head of Talent Optimization was excited about a wonderful new operating model that gives employees more flexibility. It's very modern for a German company.“

Conclusion:  

Workday has firmly established itself as an ERP powerhouse. From payroll transparency and sovereign cloud solutions to agent-based AI and global payroll optimization, Workday's strategy reflects a deep understanding of both regional complexity and future workforce requirements. The company is positioning itself not just as a technology provider, but as a long-term transformation partner.