Wendy’s recipe for a high-quality HR transformation- Client Testimonial

Rich Isola :

This move to the cloud is really intended to be your last software implementation. The relationship that KPMG had with Wendy's really was summarized in two parts. There was leadership and governance that was truly an enabler, and then we collaborated aggressively and do that such that we're delivering the right solution the first time.

Coley O'Brien :

Myself, the CFO, the CIO were very active and hands-on as executive sponsors. We knew it was critical that we needed to work together to align, make those decisions, and then get the team going. One of the things though that I really appreciated about KPMG was they were willing to offer suggestions or ideas or maybe a contrarian point of view, all in the spirit of helping us get to a better solution or outcome.

Elise Baer:

KPMG's support in implementing Oracle HCM allowed us to go from multiple systems and a disparate data model to one data model and one system. We would not have been successful if the KPMG team did not bring their absolute best people and operated as a one-team mindset with our Wendy's organization.

Amy Woods :

We recognized that we needed some expertise in change management to make this implementation go well. KPMG was really helpful in bringing the outside thinking to how you structure a change plan and helping us craft our messaging to our identified audiences in a way that would be received culturally within Wendy's.

Stephanie Shaw :

Wendy's is a really special place. Our goals are to create joy and opportunity through food, family, and community. We found hands down that Oracle was the integrated solution that would unify our people. From my perspective, it's one of the best implementations I've been a part of. The way KPMG offers opportunities for Wendy's folks to grow their thought leadership and grow some of their skills is just amazing.

Suzie Thuerk :

We paid over 14,000 associates with that first pay run accurately and timely, and we also closed our books for the quarter end within our allotted period of time, and all of our integrations, journal entries and systems worked appropriately. So we were really excited about the goals that we achieved.

Coley O'Brien :

There was tremendous cross-collaboration between Wendy's, KPMG and Oracle to dramatically transform the systems that help really drive the employee experience for us at Wendy's.

Wendy's: Enhanced Employee Experience with Oracle Cloud HCM Platform 

Coley O’Brien:    

We were able to not only make a better employee experience, but also elevate capability in our people systems, which has just been tremendous. We are providing support to our employees in a more effective way. In a way that's gonna add more value. Again, to elevate that employee experience. 

Bailey Capper:    

One huge efficiency that we found is our managers actually have reporting capability at the restaurant level, which they've never had before. So now they have that real time access to their own data for their own restaurants. Oracle Cloud HCM actually allows our employees to be in control of all of their data and not just within the four walls of their restaurant. They can access their data anytime. 

Suzie Thuerk:      

The employees really appreciate that. They're able to log onto the system, they can see their pay, they can make a life change, they can do their expense reports. So it's really neat to see the employees have a curated experience. Wendy's is all about culture, so the happier our employees, the better.

From Testing to Success: Wendy's Oracle Cloud HCM Implementation Journey

Trisha Hastings:  

As part of any successful cloud implementation, it's really important to focus on robust testing. So at Wendy's, we took our comprehensive powered enterprise catalog of test scripts and tailored those for Wendy's to really ensure robust end-to-end testing, encompassing full business process, functional aspects, and of course, complex use cases associated with testing, security integrations and reports.  

Steve Troth:       

Our parallel payroll testing experience was fantastic. The tools that we utilized, the rigor that was put into the process and the detail helped us to really identify variances early on in the process. And that allowed us to communicate prior to go live. So then once we went live, we weren't getting a lot of questions from employees about pay variances and other things, so we were able to focus on more value added activities post go live. Our HCM transformation was done on time and with quality due to our collaboration with our KPMG team from initial design to testing, and then also then to go live and Hypercare post go live.  

Suzie Thuerk:     

We paid over 14,000 associates with that first pay run accurately and timely. And we also closed our books for the quarter end within our allotted period of time. And all of our integrations, journal entries and systems worked appropriately. So we were really excited about the goals that we achieved. 

The Wendy’s Story: Ready Set Deploy  

Elise Baer:           

To make cutover successful. We were being incredibly detailed in what had to happen. Working together with KPMG as our collaborator to check that information, we were really shoulder to shoulder in the trenches, if you will, making sure the project could get where we expected it. 

Trisha Hastings:  

We also rehearsed cutover multiple times throughout the project, running full data conversions and engaging those key cutover stakeholders to validate the data and perform those tasks as part of dress rehearsals. So everyone was really well versed.

Melanie Trudell:               

They came and said, Hey, we've done this before. Here is the framework that we recommend that you use. But that was an area that really set them apart, knowing that they had a demonstrated framework that we could leverage. We worked with KPMG on our cutover and production and such critical times in the project to ensure that we were able to take the best practices from KPMG and apply Wendy's culture to that framework to ensure that we could deploy the Wendy's way, that dedication during Hypercare and their support. KPMG did a fantastic job of setting us up to be successful.

The Wendy’s Story: What does the future hold for Wendy’s?

Coley O'Brien:

We're sitting here at this amazing Lakehouse facility, uh, where our team's been invited to be part of a bit of a postmortem of our project, but also thinking about the future and how we optimize all of the investments that we've made.

Amy Woods :

So this is really awesome to be together and hear from folks who have seen, you know, way post implementation. What could this look like? How could you leverage a system to unlock even more at your organization? And so it'll be a really important piece of feeding our strategy and our prioritization efforts into what we want to focus on over the next few years.

Stephanie Shaw:

We are really excited about the art of the possible. I think AI is gonna impact the HR and finance space in the future immensely. There's massive opportunity to create automation, to create more efficiency and really augment the roles that our teams are performing today to drive insights faster and outcomes faster.

Suzie Thuerk :

We're really excited because with the new HCM and finance platform now on Oracle Cloud, we are going to unlock a lot more opportunities in our continuous improvement journey. Being a leader in finance, I am really excited because I know that our work five years from now is not gonna look how it looks today. We have the technology and the foundation set to unlock that growth. We had to make sure that our employees are focused on using their skillset in a way that is most impactful to them and the business.