Digital Transformation: Phoenix Contact Orchestrates IT Operations, Projects and Resources with Bee360

Overview

About Phoenix Contact

Phoenix Contact Paves the Way for "All Electric Society"

Phoenix Contact is a global market leader for innovative products and solutions in the fields of electrification, networking and automation. Founded in 1923 and headquartered in Blomberg, Germany, the family-owned company today employs more than 20,000 people worldwide and has a global manufacturing network in 9 countries and more than 50 sales companies.

Phoenix Contact's vision is the "All Electric Society" - a sustainable world in which regeneratively generated electrical energy is available globally and economically as the primary form of energy. To make this vision a reality, the company is focusing on the intelligent coupling of the energy, infrastructure, building, mobility and industry sectors through electrification, digitalization and automation. Phoenix Contact sees itself as an enabler of this transformation and is developing advanced technologies and solutions that pave the way to the All Electric Society. Together with partners and customers, the company wants to take advantage of the opportunities for resource-saving development and thus contribute to a sustainable economic future.

Challenge

The Challenge of Coordinating the Digital Transformation

In order to realize this ambitious vision of the All Electric Society and drive forward the associated transformation, Phoenix Contact is not only focusing on innovative products and solutions for its customers, but also on the continuous digitalization of its own corporate processes. The central Digital Processes & Solutions (DPS) unit plays a key role in this, with around 390 employees supporting and driving forward the digitalization of the Group's entire value creation network - together with around 500 colleagues from specialist departments and international subsidiaries. The focus of DPS is to prepare Phoenix Contact's IT for the challenges of a VUCA (Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity, Ambiguity) environment and to support the future growth of Phoenix Contact.

In order to coordinate the programmes and projects of the digitalization project, the DPS unit needed a suitable IT management and control platform: "We needed a new tool to be able to plan and control the human and financial resources required to implement the initiative," explains Pascal Lotzin, Manager DPS Strategy & Communication, Phoenix Contact.

"Bee360 is the control center of our digital transformation. With this platform, we manage and plan the activities of around 900 stakeholders to ensure a seamless and efficient implementation of the transformation."Andreas Breker, Project Coordination Digital Processes & Solutions Phoenix Contact

Solution: Bee360

Bee360 Impresses as a Central Orchestrator

"We were recommended to take a look at Bee360 - then still Clausmark Bee4IT - by a friend of ours," recalls Andreas Breker, Project Coordination Digital Processes & Solutions, Phoenix Contact. "After an initial meeting at our site, we decided that the data model was basically right for us. Using a sandbox project, we were able to ensure that the requirements of the DPS unit could be mapped with the Bee360 platform."

The main drivers of the implementation project for Phoenix Contact were three aspects, Andreas Breker continues: "A major advantage of Bee360 is its ability to orchestrate all facets of an IT organisation's work - both the operation of existing systems, which we have to further develop and keep stable, as well as the project business, where new systems are introduced or transformed. Our previously used project management software became obsolete as a result. Organisational and resource management were also particularly important for us: who do we deploy where and are we well staffed? In addition, we wanted to optimise our IT financial management through central, system-supported planning and in the area of DPS billing."

Standard Is the Key

The implementation of the Bee360 Enterprise Agile Planning (EAP) and IT Financial Management (ITFM) modules was managed by a joint project team from Phoenix Contact and Bee360. In addition, various workshops were held with experts from the DPS unit from areas such as IT controlling, finance, project management and IT in order to align the respective requirements with the processes and functions of Bee360. Phoenix Contact made a conscious decision to stay as close as possible to the Bee360 standard. "We basically assumed that the standard would work for all requirements, after all, a lot of expert knowledge and experience went into the development of the solution. We only made adjustments together with Bee360 in exceptional cases. This approach enabled us to go live with a stable and maintainable system after just eight months, just in time for the turn of the year," says Pascal Lotzin.

Advantage of Integration Capability

"Bee360 is connected to third-party systems from Phoenix Contact via various interfaces. This includes an enterprise architecture management system from which control-relevant information is extracted. There is also a connection to Azure Active Directory in order to retrieve the data required for employee capacity planning in Bee360. The solution is also linked to the SAP ERP system, into which key financial figures are imported from Bee360. "For example, the combination of commitment, actual and plan data gives us a comprehensive overview of our supplier relationships in Bee360," explains Andreas Breker. "Thanks to Bee360's multi-layered integration capability with third-party systems such as SAP, it is now possible to get a 360-degree view of the organisation - for every user who needs it."

Flexibility and Solution Focus

As part of the implementation of the solution, Phoenix Contact also took advantage of Bee360's process consulting "Our goal was to develop a sustainable and effective concept for global cost allocation. Bee360's support was of crucial importance here," reports Andreas Breker. Bee360 also scored points in the project implementation with its flexibility and solution orientation: "We are in regular contact with Bee360 to find out together what is possible and what is not," continues Andreas Breker. "An individual report for evaluating the key financial figures was provided within a short space of time."

"Bee360 provides transparency across the entire DPS service portfolio, showing which teams are working on which topics and what financial resources are required. This enables us to make targeted decisions."Pascal Lotzin, Manager DPS Strategy & Communication Phoenix Contact

Rolling Planning: Transparent and Efficient

Adjustments were also made to the planning cycles: Instead of the standard automated reports with financial KPIs and status of work packages at intervals of six, east or twelve weeks, Phoenix Contact decided to shorten the cycle for all reports to four weeks. "Since we started using Bee360, our planning has also improved," adds Andreas Breker. "Before using Bee360, we worked out the budget in different systems, sometimes in a spreadsheet. This was time-consuming and error-prone, and there were also some media disruptions as not all relevant information was mapped centrally. With Bee360, we now work in an integrated database, which is a clear advantage for our organisation. We benefit from more transparency, as we can see all the financial and personnel challenges for each specific task that needs to be implemented during the execution phase of a project. We have been able to stabilize the planning process on a monthly basis. As a result, we now have a sound basis for strategic discussions and decisions at a very early stage. Our colleagues plan these execution items in Bee360 18 months in advance. Planning for the following year begins with the 6+6 forecast. The budget planning for the following year is submitted as part of the 9+3 forecast."

"Bee360 also allows us to look back at historical data and see, for example, how a particular service has developed over time," adds Pascal Lotzin. "We use this experience to further optimise future planning."

Phoenix Contact has already used a project management system in the past. The day-to-day business and operation of the DPS organisation was not mapped in this system.

"With Bee360, we can see exactly what topics employees are working on within operations and projects, as well as whether and how much capacity is available for additional tasks," adds Pascal Lotzin. "This allows us to plan and organise projects within our digital transformation much more precisely and effectively in collaboration with project managers and leadership."

For Andreas Breker, another crucial aspect of managing digital transformation is the content component. "Across all projects, we plan specific deliverables with defined completion dates. Bee360 provides us with an excellent overview of these key milestones. This significantly helps us keep both the overall direction of our digital transformation roadmap and the current progress in focus."

Global Performance Billing

One of the main drivers for Phoenix Contact's adoption of Bee360 was the ability to map global performance billing within the IT management and control platform. To achieve this, only supplementary information needs to be uploaded—specifying which services were used and in what quantities by different organisational units. All other necessary data is already available in Bee360.

"In the past, this performance billing process required a great deal of effort," emphasizes Pascal Lotzin. "Figures were recorded using spreadsheets, and invoices had to be manually created and maintained in the ERP system. With Bee360, this process has been automated. Quality checks ensure the completeness and accuracy of the data. Thanks to Bee360, we have managed to reduce a process that previously took days or even weeks across the global organisation to just one day."

Joint Development of Bee360

Within this context, there are continuous opportunities for optimising Bee360. Andreas Breker and Pascal Lotzin not only support the global DPS organisation in using Bee360, training colleagues, and facilitating processes, but they also serve as key contacts for Bee360 to collaboratively drive the solution's further development with a customer-oriented approach.

"Based on our requirements and ideas, Bee360 continues to enhance its standard template functions. For example, we have pragmatically implemented a milestone trend analysis. This visualisation shows when a milestone was originally planned and whether it remains on track or shifts over time.

The fact that the customer and supplier work together to improve a product is something we find extremely valuable. It creates a sense of being part of the process and ensures that the final product aligns precisely with our needs."

Outlook

Currently, Phoenix Contact is in the process of integrating the Hiring Request Management function for the global DPS organisation into Bee360. The goal is to centrally and systematically provide all necessary data for hiring new employees within Bee360.

In the future, Bee360 will also be utilized within the international DPS organisation.

The plan is to expand the user base to approximately 500 DPS employees. Additionally, Phoenix Contact is working closely with Bee360 on developing a standardised integration framework with SAP S/4HANA—both to further enhance Bee360's template and to ensure its usability after Phoenix Contact's planned migration to SAP S/4HANA.