Learn from the SaaS choices of OneOffice™ leaders: Part two—business operations

The Situation: Enterprises valuing OneOffice™ outcomes are most likely to create business value through their software choices. They want their SaaS (software as a service) to deliver improved customer and employee experience, and they want to see how it makes outsourcing business processes easier. As part of our SaaS XXV research, we identified the SaaS choices made by these OneOffice enterprise leaders and compared them with those made by less mature tactical laggards. In this second in a series on the SaaS choices of OneOffice leaders, we focus on business operations.

How we identified the leaders and the laggards

We asked enterprise decision makers how SaaS is changing their business. We identified OneOffice leaders as those who agree or strongly agree with survey statements indicating SaaS improves employee experience, improves customer experience, and makes outsourcing business processes easier. These responses indicate the realization of outcomes indicative of greater maturity in the adoption and use of SaaS, thus a tighter alignment to the HFS OneOffice mindset.

In contrast, tactical laggards agree or strongly agree SaaS is changing how their business operates by improving the flow of information across the business, improving data and information access, improving security, encouraging the business to bypass IT, and making it harder to budget. These responses we identify as indicative of an enterprise that has not yet have moved beyond the technical functionality of SaaS solutions and is missing how SaaS creates real-time “connections” between the company and its customers. We analyzed 411 responses and compared the strength of preference for the use of particular technologies by either leaders or laggards.

The gap in use between leaders and laggards is at its greatest for Salesforce and Workday; Adobe is the third-most-used by OneOffice leaders

Our data—an enterprise customer subset of the overall SaaS XXV responses—shows the gap between leaders and laggards is at its greatest for Salesforce, Workday, and Atlassian. In our surveyed group, 39% of leaders work with Salesforce compared to just 28% of laggards. Adobe enjoys the third-highest usage by OneOffice leaders among respondents.

Exhibit 1: OneOffice leaders are most likely to be using Salesforce, Workday, Adobe, and Oracle

Sample: N=411 responses from enterprise leaders, January 2022 SaaS XXV survey; the total is greater than 100% because some enterprises use multiple business operations technologies
Source: HFS Research, 2022

OneOffice leaders in Exhibit 2 reserve their highest NPS (net promoter score) for Oracle, Atlassian, and Coupa. In our graphics, net promoter scores range from -1.00 to +1.00, where 1.00 = 100%. Anything higher than 0.70 (70%) is usually regarded as outstanding, .50 to .69 (50%–69%) as strong, and .49 or lower as needs improvement. The average NPS across the business operations category in our survey was 0.12.

So, even Oracle, Atlassian, and Coupa cannot afford to rest on their laurels here. Both leaders and laggards are looking for much more from their business operations partners. Adobe’s negative scores should be of particular concern. Both OneOffice leaders and laggards scored Adobe negatively, indicating Adobe has more detractors than promotors among the customers responding to our survey. There is better news for Adobe in our full SaaS XXV report, where it places fifth for OneOffice alignment. However, in that same report, Salesforce places second, reinforcing the performance gap.

Exhibit 2: Business operations vendors should target scores higher than 0.7; they average 0.12

Sample: 411 responses from enterprise leaders, January 2022, SaaS XXV survey
Source: HFS Research, 2022

OneOffice leaders plan to increase their spending for business operations SaaS across the board, but Salesforce and Workday lead the way, with Salesforce dominant with both leaders and laggards. With generally low NPS across the category, customer dissatisfaction is likely a drag on investment plans.

Exhibit 3: Salesforce is dominant with both leaders and laggards

Sample: 411 responses from enterprise leaders, January 2022, SaaS XXV survey; only those with significant data are shown
Source: HFS Research, 2022

The Bottom Line: OneOffice leaders place their business operations bets on Salesforce, and the gap with the rest is widening

Among our respondents, OneOffice leaders clearly prefer Salesforce among the business operations contenders. They use it more now, and they intend to use even more of it in the near future. There is a stumbling block Salesforce will need to convince enterprise leaders they can handle: They need to match resources to demand. The skills gap is real, and it has already led to extraordinary responses, such as Accenture and Salesforce joining forces to address the shortage of Salesforce skills. Salesforce will need to leverage its partner network to keep pace with demand or face the wrath of multiple escalations where resource gaps lead to project delays.

Read the results of our broader SaaS XXV survey here.