Harmonized Product Operating Model is a 25% workforce optimization exercise

The title speaks for itself. For quite some time, Juergen Mueller and Mohd. Alam have asserted that this initiative is solely aimed at enhancing our product management teams. However, that is not the reality. As a Development Manager at Signavio, I can only share insights from my position. Here’s what we currently understand:

Development Manager roles are exclusively designated for non-technical, non-business personnel. This is due to the fact that technical staff typically command higher salaries, which does not align with the skill set we are seeking for the future. We have DEI-focused coaches, known as People Leads, who come from artistic backgrounds or have no prior experience in tech companies, and they are being appointed to Development Management roles.

The upskilling process for People Leads is inadequate. With my technical background, I will now be working alongside colleagues who lack basic knowledge of front-end versus back-end development or the product development lifecycle. Architects and developers are expected to assist in their training, and any developer who questions this approach is encouraged to seek employment elsewhere. A People Lead has been tasked with determining the necessary upskilling, concluding that the Development Manager position does not require any technical knowledge. Their training will consist of simple refreshers, with a primary focus on DEI and coaching.

SAP is transitioning to a leaner organization that will depend heavily on consultants. We have been informed that team sizes will not exceed seven members. If additional personnel are needed for a project, third-party budgets will be allocated for this purpose. The roles of architects and most developers will shift towards project management to minimize future headcount increases. Following the layoffs in 2025 and 2026, there will be no further hiring.
SAP will move to a low-headcount company that relies on consultants. We are told that teams will never be bigger than 7 people. If we want more people to work on a product, there will be third-party budget used towards this. The job of architects and most developers will be project management to ensure that we do not need more headcount in the future. After the 2025 and 2026 layoffs, we will not hire again.
The entire Works Council is set to undergo significant changes. Following the layoffs in 2024, half of the council members were effectively "let go." While they technically agreed to retire, the remaining members will be encouraged to step down in 2025. This shift is driven by the board's belief that the current 2.4% compensation for employees is excessive, and they aim to reduce it to below 1% in the coming years. Any council member who opposes the Harmonized Product Operating Model will likely face repercussions over time. Therefore, the contents of this message are already receiving full approval from the Works Council.
Product Owners are being urged to seek alternative positions within SAP by the end of Q2. If they fail to do so, they will need to look for opportunities outside the company. This initiative aims to highlight the surplus of Product Managers, indicating that the current number is unsustainable. A colleague from T4PF, who joined Signavio a year ago, has been promoted twice and is now set to become a T5PM Vice President of Product Management, tasked with "optimizing the Product Management unit" and assisting current Product Owners in their job searches.
Principal Product Owners and Chief Product Owners will be reassigned to lower-level positions and encouraged to find new roles within SAP. If they are unable to secure a position, they will participate in the optimization process in Q3, which may result in their departure from the company.
All designers will be consolidated into a central team. While this approach is generally acceptable, it presents a significant issue. Principal Design Leads Sebastian K, Felix H, and Maciej S have faced s-xual harassment allegations, which were even reported in a Bloomberg article. The proposed solution involves reassigning managers, meaning that the female colleague who was harassed by Sebastian K will now report to Maciej S. The Works Council has been asked to endorse this plan, or they may face consequences.
All promotions that do not involve career advancements will exclude migrants, both from Europe and other regions. Senior positions will be reserved exclusively for German employees located in Walldorf and Sankt Leon Rot. While this cannot be implemented directly, alternative strategies will be employed, such as requiring business-level German proficiency or a PhD in a specific field as prerequisites for roles, even if these qualifications are not necessary for the job. This aligns with the plan to eliminate Berlin as an SAP location by 2030.

By the end of May, the goal is to reduce the number of Product Managers and related roles, including agile coaches, scrum masters, and program and project managers, which will account for approximately 5% of the workforce. By the end of the third quarter, layoffs will extend to developer positions, resulting in an additional 20% workforce reduction. Consequently, a total workforce decrease of around 25% in areas like Signavio is anticipated by the conclusion of this process in 2026.

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Hergersheimer 100% DEI

Seen it in action. Not pretty

Can someone confirm if Hergersheimer is part of DEI or not?

On a different thread, this had been suggested. I am sceptical of this

I hear it's very bad in NA

Countless numbers specifically for DEI

Not customer facing or anything that brings in money as profits

Biggest name is someone named Margo or Margie

We all thought that SAP got the “DEI’s dead” notification when Teflon-Lloyd Adams was ushered out.

Its becoming clear that DEI at SAP is more of a secondary (to the VERP) cost cutting maneuver to trim higher paid employees.

The fun thing to watch is that the lack of meritocracy is sinking the ship. I have never seen so many confused people.

@pf+1jqkxgqxx If DEI has to go, so do the People Leads in Signavio. They have been incorrectly assigned to Developer Managers to ensure their retention. Such hypocrisy has to end. What do we recommend doing? The Works Council lacks the authority to act. And developers who raise this issue are told by management that if they do not comply, they will be fired during the next round of layoffs.

The entire DEI unit needs to go

It's dead weight across the board

As bad as it is here in EMEA, I can only surmise the countless layers of cost across the pond in NA

These people are a drain of €€€

So the P25 commences

How soon is this coming to LOBs like Ariba , Concur , Fieldglass in H2?

How soon is this spreading to lobs like field glass , Ariba ,Concur etc ?

This is interesting, except I don’t understand why they were throwing money for hiring during the pandemic. I assume it’s the lawsuits and bribery charges and payouts they have incurred additional costs

How pathetic, this has become. What an utter shame

SAP and other technology vendors think that they can manage their product portfolios with out product development expert by hiring third party developers. There is a big risk involved in this. One is intellectual property that SAP may be embezzled . No r&d as people manager may not know how these solution works. Everyone manages of what ? If we donot have soldiers in war and every one is commandant, commandant may not go and fight in war. He just give commands to work . In this case SAP may not have soldiers from SAP , SAP have outsourced pu--y buds like TCS who is expert in embezzlement of what SAP is doing. Finally SAP will be bought by TCS and all employees will be laid off.

Point 8: Read other threads, which have first hand accounts of stories of mental and physical harassment by design managers and product design leads at Signavio.
Many of those stories and threads have been deleted by the website moderators to curb the free speech.
https://www.thelayoff.com/t/1jmagsep6

Bad $#IT is coming in the garb of next level transformation

@e7+1jqkxgqxx Agreed. This is very different from what Marty Cagan had suggested. SAP twisted this a bit to fit their needs. Signavio took it in a diametrically opposite direction. We practically have a situation where People Leads made the decision to assign People Leads and Development Manager and People Leads are evaluating what skill sets they need and decided that technical skills are unnecessary. It’s like the police policing the police. Never going to work. But what is surprising for many of us is that the Works Council is fully supporting this. It’s a shame if we have more than 50 non-technical development managers with less than 5 years of entire work experience while developers with more than 10 years of development experience will not get to grow.

Funny thing is this is the diametric opposite of what a product organization is supposed to be, the dev manager/lead is supposed to be hyper technical and its about empowering the highly technical people in the org to lead it. Sounds like usual SAP is doing things ar-e backwards

Andreas Lindenblatt is another name to remember. He joined as a Product Lead and was promoted twice in two years. Currently he is an acting Vice President which means he will be promoted the third time in the third year. That’s a 7 percent appraisal increase every year. Do you know why he gets that? Because he is the „Head and Sponsor or DEI in Signavio“ meaning that he can pull the plug the moment they ask him to. He works in Product Management and controls the implementation of HPOM and decides which product owners should be fired. Basically, if you do what the Signavio management wants from you, they’ll give you a 7% salary hike every year.

Perfect. We can expect s-xual harassment to go up in Signavio as there are no repercussions. In fact, the people in question in s-xual harassment cases have been promoted twice as fast compared to their peers.

Torsten Zube should be ashamed. But then most of us know how he was instrumental in the previous SAP layoffs. He is a snake and cannot be trusted. It‘s stupid to think that consultants produce the same quality of work as employees when they don’t get the same level of access to customer data.

Who is Felix Leiter?

Where are they going to hire the consultants from? Consulting companies and partners?

'This shift is driven by the board's belief that the current 2.4% compensation for employees is excessive, and they aim to reduce it to below 1% in the coming years. '

Is that right? Having a hard time believing it :/

Number 8 speaks to Felix.

Is that Felix Leiter?

Bo-m- fake transformation for stock$$ all about lowering cost nothing about innovation.

Thanks for sharing brother

Fu-k! This makes a lot of sense though.

Thread regarding SAP layoffs

Harmonized Product Operating Model is a 25% workforce optimization exercise

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