Germany's most popular employers

Human Resources at SAP

It must be a disastrous result for SAP to come in 39th place among Germany's most popular employers for engineers, far behind Deutsche Bahn and the Bundeswehr. This poor performance is definitely not the reason why HR Director Sabine Bendiek will be leaving the ERP group at the end of this year. She is leaving of her own accord, and the story at SAP is that she never really arrived. Obviously, the chemistry wasn't right or HR work at SAP is a very special challenge.

In any case, her colleague Cawa Younosi, who is responsible for HR in Germany, is satisfied with himself and his work, as can be seen from the above-mentioned text from Manager Magazin. On LinkedIn, the "Global Head of People Experience" has more than 90,000 followers and promotes equal opportunities and more diversity. In Germany, Cawa Younosi is responsible for around 24,000 employees.

A large space of questions opens up here: The Executive Board member for Human Resources, Sabine Bendiek, is leaving SAP; the HR manager for Germany, Cawa Younosi, seems to be popular and well-known far beyond SAP's borders - but the company itself has massive difficulties in being an attractive employer for young engineers. What's going on?

It seems to be a current problem at SAP: loss of reality! On the one hand, SAP is celebrated for equal opportunities and more diversity, on the other hand, even the German railroads and the German armed forces are more popular as employers. Last year, SAP was still in 37th place in the rankings, but as the supposedly leading technology company in Germany, that was no mean feat either. The reason for this divergence between the company's own perception and official facts is a lack of self-criticism.

SAP has created an information and communication bubble for itself that exists apart from the real IT world. An IT group that doesn't feel the need to share its 50th anniversary celebrations with the community, that doesn't have an invitation management system for the Sapphire in-house trade show, but still tries to keep journalists from visiting as well, seems to have fallen out of time.

We live in an age in which popularity and communication are becoming increasingly important. The craziest company in the world, Red Bull, may sell a lot of beverage cans, but it thrives on communication, entertainment, show and popularity. Over the past 50 years, corporate values have changed and adapted. There was no social media, no bloggers and no popularity scales for employers when SAP was founded - no Red Bull either. However, nothing is as constant as change! SAP should work energetically to become more popular again.

In any case, the gap between self-perception and external perception must be closed. The SAP bubble should be dissolved and the Group could once again enter into communication with the community.