Let’s Talk Data: Business Technology Podcast | SAP

In this special episode of Let's Talk Cloud ERP, host Jennifer Frank McGrory welcomes IBM Consulting leaders Bill Pietrowski, Devraj Bardhan, and Jim Griffin to the podcast to discuss the latest developments in IBM's enterprise-wide cloud ERP transformation and the business value achieved since their last conversation. 

 

The team shares how IBM has generated more than $4.5 billion in savings through a transformation strategy centered on process simplification, operational efficiency, and SAP modernization. Listeners will hear how IBM continues to advance its clean-core approach across finance, procurement, supply chain, and other critical business functions while creating a more agile and connected enterprise. 

A significant portion of the discussion focuses on Human Capital Management and the role of SAP SuccessFactors within IBM's broader business transformation. The guests explore how integrating HR with SAP S/4HANA has improved workforce planning, governance, employee experiences, and manager self-service while reducing HR operating costs and accelerating response times across the organization. 

The conversation also highlights IBM's AI-first strategy and how intelligent automation is being applied across HR, procurement, finance, and employee services. With more than 155 AI use cases deployed, IBM shares lessons learned around prioritization, change management, governance, and scaling AI responsibly to drive measurable business outcomes. 

Whether you're leading a cloud ERP initiative, modernizing HR operations, or evaluating enterprise AI strategies, this episode provides valuable insights from one of the world's largest transformation programs. 

 

Key Topics of Discussion: 

IBM's Cloud ERP Transformation Journey 
How IBM has generated more than $4.5 billion in value through process simplification, SAP modernization, clean-core principles, and enterprise-wide operational transformation.  

The Strategic Role of SAP SuccessFactors in Business Transformation 
Why IBM views Human Capital Management as a critical component of its ERP strategy and how integrating SAP SuccessFactors with SAP S/4HANA improves workforce planning, governance, and employee experiences.  

The "Eliminate, Simplify, Automate" Framework 
The framework IBM uses to evaluate business processes, reduce complexity, eliminate non-value-added activities, and prepare operations for automation and AI.  

Scaling AI Across the Enterprise 
Lessons from deploying more than 155 AI use cases across HR, procurement, finance, and supply chain, including how IBM prioritizes opportunities and measures business impact.  

Governance, Change Management, and the Future of Work 
How IBM balances innovation with governance, security, and data privacy while helping employees and managers adapt to new AI-powered workflows and digital ways of working. 

 

Subscribe to The Let’s Talk Data Podcast 

Apple Podcasts 

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YouTube 

 

Connect With Bill Piotrowski 

Linkedin 

Connect With Devraj Bardhan 

Linkedin 

Connect With Jim Griffin 

Linkedin 

Connect With Jennifer Frank McGrory 

LinkedIn 

 

Don’t stop here – discover more: 

Experience SAP Like Never Before: Cloud ERP Simulation Challenge: 

https://events.sap.com/noam-cloud-erp-sim-vew/en_us/home.html

In this episode of the Let’s Talk Data Podcast presented by SAP, host Thierry Audas sits down with Jürgen Faisst and Kristian Rümmelin to explore how the International Business Communication Standards (IBCS) is transforming business reporting, dashboard design, and enterprise analytics. 

The discussion highlights why inconsistent dashboards and reporting standards create confusion, slow decision-making, and reduce trust in analytics — especially in the age of AI and generative AI. The guests explain how IBCS establishes a common visual language for business reporting by standardizing charts, tables, colors, variances, and data storytelling conventions. 

Listeners will learn how organizations can improve report comprehension, reduce interpretation errors, and accelerate executive decision-making using standardized analytics practices in SAP Analytics Cloud and SAP Business Data Cloud. The episode also explores the newly approved ISO 24896 notation standard for business reporting and what it means for the future of AI-driven analytics. 

Practical guidance includes how to launch an IBCS initiative, build executive-ready dashboards, create reporting governance, and scale visualization standards across finance, supply chain, sales, and HR teams. 

5 Key Topics of Discussion 

What Is IBCS and Why It Matters 
Understanding how standardized business reporting improves dashboard clarity, analytics consistency, and faster decision-making.  

The Role of AI in Business Reporting 
Why AI-generated analytics requires strong visualization standards and semantic consistency to avoid “scaling confusion.”  

SAP Analytics Cloud and IBCS Integration 
How SAP customers can operationalize IBCS standards using reusable templates, themes, dashboards, and reporting governance.  

ISO 24896 and the Future of Reporting Standards 
The impact of the new international standard for business reporting notation and its importance for enterprise analytics.  

Best Practices for Dashboard Design and Data Visualization 
Actionable strategies for CFO dashboards, KPI reporting, variance analysis, semantic consistency, and executive communication. 

 

Subscribe to The Let’s Talk Data Podcast 

Apple Podcasts 

Spotify 

YouTube 

 

Connect With Jürgen Faisst 

 

Connect With Kristian Rümmelin 

 

Connect With Thierry Audas 

 

Additional Resources: 

www.ibcs.com 
www.ibcs.com/software/sap-analytics-cloud/

In this episode of Let’s Talk Data, host Jose Chicas sits down with Leona Hasani, Product Manager for SAP Business Data Cloud and former data scientist, to explore how modern data platforms are transforming the data science workflow. The conversation dives into the real-world challenges data scientists face—from fragmented data access and lack of business context to time-consuming data preparation and trust issues with datasets. 

Leona outlines the end-to-end data science lifecycle, emphasizing that up to 70% of a data scientist’s time is spent on data cleaning and preparation rather than modeling. She explains how SAP Business Data Cloud (BDC), combined with SAP Databricks, streamlines this process by providing ready-to-use, governed data products enriched with business context, definitions, and hierarchies. 

A key highlight is the concept of zero-copy data sharing, enabling real-time access to unified SAP and non-SAP data without duplication. This reduces latency, lowers costs, and ensures data consistency across teams. The discussion also explores how integrated tools like MLflow enhance model tracking, governance, and auditability—critical for enterprise and regulated environments. 

Through a practical use case—predicting purchase order delays—Leona demonstrates how BDC accelerates time-to-value by eliminating manual data extraction and enabling seamless model deployment back into business systems. 

Whether you’re a data scientist, engineer, or analytics leader, this episode offers valuable insights into building scalable, efficient, and business-aligned data workflows in today’s AI-driven landscape. 

 

Key Topics of Discussion:  

SAP Business Data Cloud for Data Scientists 
Explores how SAP Business Data Cloud (BDC) empowers data scientists with governed, ready-to-use data products that include business context, improving efficiency and accelerating insights.  

Data Science Workflow Optimization & Automation 
Covers how modern tools reduce manual tasks like data access, cleaning, and preparation—allowing data scientists to focus more on modeling, analysis, and delivering business value.  

SAP Databricks Integration & Machine Learning at Scale 
Highlights the native integration of SAP Databricks within BDC, enabling scalable machine learning, AI workflows, and seamless access to enterprise SAP and non-SAP data.  

Zero-Copy Data Sharing in Enterprise Data Architecture 
Explains how zero-copy data sharing allows real-time access to data across systems without duplication, reducing costs, improving performance, and ensuring consistency.  

Data Governance, Data Trust, and Business Context in Analytics 
Focuses on the importance of trusted, well-defined data with embedded business semantics, enabling accurate analysis, better decision-making, and compliance in enterprise environments. 

 

 Subscribe to The Let’s Talk Data Podcast 

Apple Podcasts 

Spotify 

YouTube 

 

Connect With Leona Hasani 

Linkedin 

 

Connect With Jose Chicas 

LinkedIn 

 

Additional Resources: 

To learn more about SAP Data and Analytics solutions, please check out SAP Business Data Cloud athttps://www.sap.com/products/data-cloud.html 
• And to engage further, please join our Data Professionals Community on https://community.sap.com/t5/data-professionals/gh-p/data-professionals 
• To see what's new and upcoming with all SAP solutions, please look at our roadmap explorer on https://pages.community.sap.com/topics/road-map-explorer

What does a day in the life of a data steward really look like? This podcast pulls back the curtain on the people who keep enterprise data trustworthy, usable, and compliant. We will discuss how these data steward navigate through the rhythms of their day—triaging data incidents, curating metadata, negotiating business definitions, enforcing access controls, and coordinating fixes across engineering, analytics, and business teams. We explore both process realities and the best practices in place to ensure trust. 

 
Listeners will hear examples of the types of data sources stewards wrestle with and learn how stewards set and enforce quality rules, measure trust, and assign clear ownership to ensure accountability. From root-cause investigations and remediation workflows to balancing speed with governance, the podcast surfaces recurring pain points and pragmatic solutions, with real-world stories, lessons learned, and actionable tips for improving processes, tooling, and cross-team collaboration. 

 

 

Key Topics of Discussion: 

The evolving role of data stewards 
How data stewards act as “data guardians,” ensuring data is accurate, consistent, and usable across the business, and how the role is becoming more strategic over time.  

Cross-functional collaboration and breaking silos 
The importance of working across finance, IT, and other business units to treat data as a shared enterprise asset rather than something owned by one team.  

Data governance, prioritization, and business value 
How teams decide which data issues or projects to tackle first based on impact, business value, and dependencies across processes.  

Challenges: stakeholder management, education, and pushback 
The need to educate others about data, handle difficult conversations, and push back on requests that could harm data quality or long-term outcomes.  

Technology and tooling enabling data stewardship 
The role of tools like data catalogs, lineage tracking, master data governance (MDG), and unified data platforms in supporting transparency, quality, and scalability. 

 

Subscribe to The Let’s Talk Data Podcast 

Apple Podcasts 

Spotify 

YouTube 

 

Connect With Corrie Birkeness 

Linkedin 

 

Connect With Ralitsa Dakova 

LinkedIn 

 

Connect With Grigor Kartev 

LinkedIn 

 

Connect With Tina Rosario 

LinkedIn 

 

 

Additional Resources: 

To learn more about SAP Data and Analytics solutions, please check out SAP Business Data Cloud at https://www.sap.com/products/data-cloud.html  
And to engage further, please join our Data Professionals Community on https://community.sap.com/t5/data-professionals/gh-p/data-professionals

This episode of Let’s Talk Cloud ERP features Jennifer Frank McGrory in conversation with Lindsay Callaghan, Director of Business Systems at Rytec Corporation, a North American leader in high-speed, high-performance doors. The discussion explores how Rytec's ERP transformation journey has evolved within a long-standing SAP environment and how new business realities are shaping its future. 

Rytec has operated in a stable SAP system for over a decade, supported by a lean team and strengthened by a recent smart factory manufacturing transformation. As the company began planning its move toward SAP S/4HANA, it was acquired by Nucor in 2024—an event that increased the urgency for process visibility and strategic alignment. 

A major turning point was the use of SAP Signavio. Within 24 hours, Lindsay’s team gained clear, data-driven insight into real business processes, data gaps, and system flows. This shifted conversations away from opinion-based workshops and toward visual, fact-based discussions. As a result, meetings became more focused, resistance rooted in past ERP project fatigue decreased, and the organization could better determine which legacy processes should be improved or retired. 

Looking ahead, 2026 is set to be a pivotal year, with Rytec evaluating RISE with SAP and preparing for S/4HANA—emphasizing continuous improvement, strong partnerships, and process intelligence as keys to long-term success. 

 

 

Key Topics of Discussion: 

Fact-based transformation beats assumptions – Real process data from SAP Signavio replaced guesswork and opinion-driven workshops. 

A stable ERP foundation enables smarter modernization – Rytec’s long-running SAP system allowed for strategic planning toward S/4HANA rather than reactive change. 

Process visibility reduces resistance to change – Visual insights help business users understand impacts, shortening meetings and easing “ERP fatigue.” 

Transformation is a chance to eliminate legacy baggage – Data helps identify which processes add value and which are just being carried forward out of habit. 

Strong partners plus modern tools accelerate success – Combining SAP best practices, experienced partners, and process intelligence supports better decisions and continuous improvement. 

 

Subscribe to The Let’s Talk Data Podcast 

Apple Podcasts 

Spotify 

YouTube 

 

Connect With Lindsay Callaghan 

Linkedin 

 

Connect With Jennifer Frank McGrory 

LinkedIn 

 

Don’t stop here – discover more: 

Experience SAP Like Never Before: Cloud ERP Simulation Challenge: 

https://events.sap.com/noam-cloud-erp-sim-vew/en_us/home.html