»ÆÉ«¶ÌÊÓƵ

Smith & Nephew, a global medical devices company, realized that eliminating manager approval of expenses would not be easy. ¡°One of the biggest challenges of removing manager approval is¡­ensuring managers and people managers that expenses are being properly controlled and that we are keeping everything compliant,¡± says Jorge Monge, the travel and expense lead at Smith & Nephew.

Since moving to Artificial Intelligence (AI) technologies, Smith & Nephew has been able to not only completely remove the manager approval step, but also increase the accuracy of expense reporting. ¡°»ÆÉ«¶ÌÊÓƵ Detect has allowed us to radically change the business in a positive way. The fact that we have been able to, thanks to this advanced tool, remove manager approval for good has been quite a change,¡± shared Jorge. ¡°That allowed us, not only internally but externally to position ourselves as a benchmark. That has really helped us drive the process in taking things to the next level.¡±

Smith & Nephew knew that successfully removing the need for a manager approval would require a top-down approach, ensuring they had buy-in from their key stakeholders, such as compliance, legal, and communications. Jorge states that they focused on emphasizing the benefits of efficiency and compliance, adding ¡°In general terms, SAP »ÆÉ«¶ÌÊÓƵ allows you to implement a more efficient, more accurate and more compliant system from normally what you expect to find in localized for specific markets.¡±

The move to AI technologies has improved Smith & Nephew¡¯s internal processes, but also, according to Jorge, ¡°has allowed us to be regarded not only as a tactical operation but mostly as a strategic business partner.¡±

?

Watch how Smith & Nephew increased spend accuracy here. (Part 2)

Watch how Smith & Nephew streamlined executive spend management decisions here. (Part 3)

Watch how Smith & Nephew struck a balance between employee experience and compliance here. (Part 1)

Listen to this episode on , , , , , or your favorite podcast player.