People Strategy case study

The HR Platform Case That Did Not Promise Savings

9HR platforms in the cost baseline
20+interviews across HR, finance, IT and the business
10years modelled, standing still against moving
3decision rounds, up to the board

The situation

The question behind the question.

This group’s HR ran on 9 platforms, held together by spreadsheets: talent reviews in Excel, payroll data scattered across countries, no single view of its people. A single suite had been chosen in principle. The executive team, the strategic committee and then the board needed a case they could defend: what it would cost, what it would change, and what would happen if they did nothing.

As it was asked

“Build the business case for our new HR platform.”

As we reframed it

Price standing still as carefully as moving: what the current landscape will cost over 10 years, what a single platform changes for every audience, and what the group risks if it waits.

How we worked

How the work unfolded.

01

Price the status quo

We started with the option nobody had costed: doing nothing. Every platform, licence, contract, internal team and partner went into one baseline: 9 platforms. Then the hidden costs: workarounds, shadow tools, a payroll process still absorbing several people. The status quo was not free; it had never been added up.

02

Hear what it costs people

Then the voices, and the view from outside. 20+ interviews across HR, finance, IT and the business, plus a questionnaire for the HR teams. The pain points converged into 6 themes, and each benefit was mapped to the audience who would feel it and to the 4 priorities of the people strategy. Outside in, we set out which peers already ran a single suite, and where the shortlisted vendors stood in the market.

03

Model 10 years

Then the numbers, over 10 years, because a platform pays back slowly. Moving carried its full cost of change, not just licences and the integrator: backfill for seconded staff, change and training, data clean-up and integrations, and a contingency. Standing still was stress-tested at several rates of cost growth. The result was stated plainly: on IT savings alone, the platform did not pay for itself; with the HR operating gains it enabled, it came close. Over 10 years, standing still cost about as much as moving.

04

Take it up the line

That changed the question the board was asked. Not: will this save money? But: for the same money, which group do we want to be in 10 years? The HR, IT and finance leaders aligned on the numbers first; then the case went up in 3 rounds, to the executive team, the strategic committee and the board, risks of delay next to risks of delivery. It also set the conditions for success: core HR first, because every module needs one clean employee record, then talent; one global process model; named data owners; vendor demos scripted on the group’s own scenarios. Global first, standard by default, local only when required.

The instrument

The cost of standing still

Standing still. Every current platform, contract and team, carried forward 10 years at a cost growth tested at several rates, plus the workarounds nobody budgets.

Moving. One-off investment with its full cost of change, run costs, the systems it retires and the HR operating gains it makes possible, phased in as they arrive.

The difference. Close to zero over 10 years. The case for moving is then about capability and risk, not savings.

A case that admits it does not pay for itself is easier for a board to trust, and harder to overturn.

What moved

What changed, and what didn't.

3decision rounds, from the executive team to the board, on the same numbers
Evidence Decision taken Adopted in practice Measured impact
What moved

After 3 decision rounds, the board approved the platform in November 2025, as the backbone of the people strategy. The vendor selection ran on the shortlist the case had framed, and the implementation started in 2026, with the core HR module first and talent next.

What didn't move

The case named the benefits but not yet the indicators and targets to track them; measuring them became its first priority when the strategy was activated the following year. The learning, recruiting and time systems stayed outside the scope.

What we'd say to a peer

Most HR technology business cases are built to show savings, and most are not believed. Price standing still as carefully as moving, with the full cost of change, over long enough for the platform to pay back. If the honest answer is that both cost about the same, say so. The board then decides on what it really buys: capability, and less risk.

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Method note:

Own approach in 4 steps; 9-platform cost baseline; 20+ interviews; peer and market view; 10-year model with full cost of change and sensitivity tests; 3-round decision path.

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