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ExecutiveBrief

Winning in a fast changing

environment growing

small to medium size

businesses in Europe

The economic environment is changing rapidly and dramatically. Companies

must adapt to new market forces and set new directions for their organisation.

Under these conditions, your future success depends on a sound strategy buteven more on how effectively this strategy is carried out.

Many companies are now turning to a new generation of technology solutions to

ensure that they can deliver and emerge even stronger from the challenges of

today.

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Any company that fails to adapt quickly and efficiently to

market changes can miss important opportunities or even

risk their very own survival. But now more than ever, the

opportunities for smaller to medium sized businesses have

never been greater!

Where others fail and markets change, windows of opportunity

open

If your company is like most businesses, your employees represent close to 70% of your

operating budget. With such a large investment in people, it is critical that you ensure

everyone is performing at their full potential - your companys productivity and

profitability depends on it.

Businesses must be able to not only devise strategies to embrace the opportunities arising

from the current market conditions, they must ensure that their employees understand

and act upon the directions set by their leadership. A study published in The Harvard

Business Review shows that most companies typically realise only 63% of their strategiespotential value due to deficiencies in planning and execution.

Todays Performance and Talent Management solutions are helping companies improve

revenues by regaining value lost through misalignment. They lower their costs by running

tighter operations, and achieve competitive advantage by driving effective business

management that is difficult for competitors to imitate.

With more than 2,600 customers on five continents, SuccessFactors has identified a

number of key messages that can be your recipe for success. With our scalable, web-based

suite of talent management software, we help business of all sizes, whether you have 5 or

500 (or 500,000) employees, achieve

Cost savings by automating manual processes and reducing loss of valuable

employees by 6-7%.

Revenue growth by improving productivity through alignment and engaged

employees

Accelerated business performance by providing managers with real time data to

proactively develop and re-align their employees

Over 55% of CEOs rate Effective Executionof Strategy as their number-one challenge,

given todays global marketplace chaos.

The Conference Board, CEO Challenge 2008: Top 10

Challenges Financial Crisis Edition, March 2008

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A clear line of sight

A dynamic environment coupled with strategy

changes can leave employees confused and

unproductive.

Employees often continue working on old projects

that do not serve the new strategy, or they simply

become disengaged as they fear for their own jobs

and career. The best way to help is to give them a

clear line of sight to your strategy.

Cascading strategic and tactical objectives from

the managing director through each department,

team and individual is the most effective way to

clearly define the actions needed.

Communicating clearly how each group will

carry out a component of the strategy ensuresthat company-wide efforts are aligned.

Paying for performance. And finally, tying

objectives, performance measures and rewards to

the strategy holds every person accountable,

increases motivation, and fosters the co-operation that leads to success.

Provide the tools your organisation needs to act out your strategy

A company must have the ability to move people, processes, budgets, and partners to

support a new direction without disrupting the flow of business. Although this sounds

straightforward, many companies rely upon outdated management practices that decouple

strategic planning from resource allocation.

Market

Change

Arm with

Talent to Execute

Strategy Change

Align Teams

to Execute

Strategy Change

Strategy

Change

Course

Correct

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Given todays lean staffing levels and the budget restrictions in smaller organisations,

where more people have to carry out various job functions, it is more essential than ever

to have the right people in the right jobs.

This will likely require identifying and developing people with the needed skill sets to

support critical projects; and triggers a domino effect of position vacancies that requires

backfilling and succession planning. And even the smartest restructuring can leave gaps,

which must be filled either by training existing employees to step up, or by hiring external

talent adding yet another complex and costly challenge to this critical process.

Performance and Talent Management Solutions for managing your business

Given the dynamic changes in the business environment, it is difficult to get your strategy

right on the first pass. Until recently, management lacked access to early warning signals

to spot problems before it is too late such as whether critical actions have been carried

out or resources deployed as planned. Worse yet, when problems eventually surface, it is

difficult to correctly diagnose the root cause and avoid taking actions that could make

matters worse.

With todays Performance and Talent Management solutions, small to medium sized

companies can now easily access real time and forward-looking data that are leading

indicators of future results. By monitoring these predictive performance drivers and

tracking progress in real-time, you have a greater ability to make course corrections to

stay on track and achieve your intended business objectives.

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About SuccessFactors

With more than 4.5 million end users in 185 countries,

SuccessFactors is the leading provider of Performance and

Talent Management solutions that enable organisations of

every size, across every industry and geography, to drive

business performance by helping them bridge the strategyand execution gap, cultivate top talent, and optimise their

workforce to drive business execution and deliver superior

business results.

Since 2001, we have been helping our customers use

technology and best practices to increase top line results by as

much as 2-3%* or more, and significantly reduce operating

expenses in both strong and uncertain times.

For more information, please visit www.successfactors.eu or one of our regional sites

across Europe.

*Strategic Talent Management Solutions and Superior Topline Growth - March 2008 - Saugatuck Technology