SAP

SAP: Turning Purpose Into Enterprise Strategy

The Challenge

SAP is a global leader in enterprise software, enabling organizations to run core operations with real-time intelligence at massive scale. Their core mission was to improve lives—but as stakeholder expectations intensified and sustainability moved from aspiration to business imperative, SAP faced a strategic question: How do you operationalize purpose across 13 lines of business and translate abstract commitments like the UN Sustainable Development Goals into concrete innovation opportunities and competitive advantage?

Leadership needed a purpose framework that could guide long-term growth, unlock white space in the technology sector, and position SAP as the purpose leader among enterprise software competitors.

The Transformation

We First partnered with SAP across three strategic initiatives: the Purpose Development Project, Purpose Integration Project, and Sustainable Development Goals Innovation Matrix.

Purpose Development Project: We First built the business case for then-CEO Bill McDermott on leading with purpose in the technology sector. This involved competitive analysis, mapping purpose to SAP's capabilities, and positioning SAP as the leader of "The Purpose Network"—a global ecosystem connecting business leaders and technologies committed to collaborative impact. The work made purpose commercially tangible: projecting increased revenue, demonstrating how purpose drives loyalty and talent attraction, and benchmarking SAP against competitors to claim unique positioning.

Purpose Integration Project: We First mapped SAP's purpose framework directly to the 17 UN SDGs across Economy, Society, and Environment. We identified where SAP's platform could address specific goals—from financial inclusion to clean energy infrastructure—giving business units clear pathways to integrate purpose into product development.

SDG Innovation Matrix: We First analyzed SAP's thirteen business lines against all 17 SDGs, creating an opportunity matrix and heat map showing where capabilities aligned with high-impact needs, where cross-business collaboration could unlock value, and where market demand was accelerating. The matrix revealed obstacles and opportunities, giving leadership a strategic tool to prioritize innovation.

The Impact

SAP now has a purpose-driven growth strategy that:

• Positions SAP as a purpose leader in enterprise technology by claiming competitive white space around collaborative impact
• Translates purpose into revenue opportunities through The Purpose Network, creating new business models tied to shared value
• Provides a strategic roadmap for innovation, enabling leaders to identify where SAP's platform could solve pressing challenges
• Aligns strategy with stakeholder expectations by mapping capabilities to global sustainability frameworks
• Anticipates market shifts by surfacing emerging customer needs tied to sustainability and impact

The result is an enterprise that operationalizes purpose across business lines and customer value creation. SAP proved that purpose isn't a constraint on growth—it's a framework for identifying where growth will come from next.

This isn't CSR. It's strategic architecture for a global technology leader determined to prove that improving lives and building enterprise value are the same mission.

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