1. How long have you been working in the IT/SAP business?
About 10 years in IT and ERP systems and over 8 years in an SAP environment
2. The responsibility of a CIO is not only restricted to operation, but also to strategy management nowadays. What is your opinion about this?
A sound strategy encompasses the direction and priorities of the business. It defines the purpose behind our actions and drives our daily activities. The CIO role often has the greatest “reach” in the business, touching almost every department and process because of the highly integrated systems many companies run. In the past, this reach was used to go downstream for execution. Now, it’s more often the case that business leaders are asking for the CIO to reverse and get information flowing upstream so that they can better understand and gain greater visibility into what’s really happening in the business. The CIO is now positioned to greatly influence both strategy development and the execution. Great CIO’s will learn to bridge these two facets through successful strategy management.
3. When did you hear first time about the ACSU – Chinese SAP User Group?
I was in charge of rolling out a new instance of R/3 for our China operations and found that non-consultant based learning resources were pretty much non-existent. I communicated this back to SAP in Shanghai, and they connected me to the founder of the ACSU organization.
4. Why did you finally decide to join the ACSU in the Management board - what is your motivation to support the ACSU?
SAP and ERP systems in general have a huge market here in China as domestic businesses look to improve business processes, increase efficiency, and improve visibility into their critical operations. The need is growing faster than the knowledge base in many cases, and it’s organizations like ACSU which will need to step up and fill in the knowledge gaps. As a technology leader, more available and skilled resources is always a good thing and the success that other SAP user groups in other countries have had at fostering a strong user community tells me that China will benefit from having a domestic organization.
5. What is the goal for you in the ACSU – what would you like to achieve for the members?
I’d like to see this organization build a self-sustaining group of like-minded individuals who understand, support, and participate actively in the SAP community. First and foremost, the members need to experience the benefits of belonging and this is an area that I want to help focus on. We need to provide relevant, timely, and valued experiences for our newest members, so that they are also willing to be more active. With active engagement by all members, the benefits will increase greatly for everyone involved.
6. Which kind of services and/or achievements of SAP China are you admiring mostly?
SAP has built a great name for them in China. Generally, there is a sense of pride within the community of users with the skills and knowledge they’ve gained along side SAP’s growth in the market. I see SAP helping domestic companies compete in the higher value industries where visibility and process excellence are imperative as the economy moves away from being primarily a low cost manufacturing environment.
7. In your opinion, how should the ACSU contribute to the Chinese SAP community - what is your vision of the ACSU during the next 5 years?
As I stated previously, I’m confident that ACSU will build a strong and active community that makes sharing knowledge and experience as easy is it is in other countries where the user groups are already well established. It will help improve the skills of everyone involved, which means businesses will be able to do more and do things better.
8. What is your vision for SAP China during the next 5 years?
I believe SAP will continue to expand its market reach and penetrate deep into the truly domestic market (vs. the MNC market). Their product offerings will help Chinese companies accelerate their businesses into world class organizations. Who wouldn’t want that?
9. Do you have any suggestions in which areas ACSU can provide more or better services?
To really get a great group together, I believe we need continue working on a bi-lingual format since the majority of the SAP users here in China, well, are Chinese. This will greatly facilitate engagement with our user base here. I believe this is probably the most important thing to make sure works in the beginning stages.
10. The ACSU is a community for both – local Chinese and international – companies. Many international companies joined already the ACSU and are familiar with the User Group model. If a local company asks you why to join the ACSU, how do you convince them?
I would tell them simple things first.
A) Consultants are expensive
B) Formal training is expensive.
C) Finding skilled people with the right experience is very difficult.
Active participation in this organization can help relieve the stress in most of these areas.
