On April 22 2016, SAP Montreal hosted its second edition of Design Day. A commitment to great design and elevating the customer’s experience is a cornerstone for many employees at SAP Montreal. Design Day is an opportunity for employees to learn about the newest developments in design strategy, share design experiences and challenges with colleagues from all roles and get hands-on knowledge on how to create great user experiences.
“Double up” emerged as a theme for this year’s Design Day, with double the attendees, double the offices engaged and twice the amount of content over last year’s inaugural event. Sam Yen, SAP’s Chief Design Officer delivered the opening keynote. Sam talked about the role of Design Thinking in the digital transformation, and how Design Thinking is the success criteria that made SAP the company it is today. He discussed how the incorporation of good design into SAP’s products has certainly been a journey and that we have come a long way, with important design awards like the Red Dot award now under our belt. Ending on a positive note, Sam reaffirms Bill McDermott’s strong belief that SAP has the opportunity to be a market leader in UX.
In addition to the 250+ colleagues from Montreal, the day attracted attendees from Germany, Palo Alto, Vancouver, Chicago and Ontario offices.
After Sam’s opening keynote, the day consisted of 4 tracks in total including a 4-hour introduction to Design Thinking workshop that challenged participants to improve the experience of eating poutine, a beloved Quebec dish. The other 3 tracks comprised of 9 talks. Speakers included SAP designers, developers and design leaders – most prominently, Gabriele Lahme, Kimberly Williams-Czopek and Robert Kapp who covered topics like design, design thinking and usability.
Everyone then reconvened for a customer keynote by Denys Lapointe, Bombardier Recreational Products’ (BRP) Vice President of Design and Corporate Image. BRP provided deep insight on how a manufacturer of recreational and snow vehicles tackles the design and innovation process to get to the best end product. The keynote was followed by a cocktail reception featuring poutine, smoked meat and SAP Montreal’s own house band to end the day on a musical note. Attendees were able to network and exchange design ideas with Sam Yen, Denys Lapoint of BRP, the Montreal Executive Leadership team, and each other.
Design Day marked its second year with a great success and the Design Day committee made up of Ziad Slim, Robert Westphal and Ruturaj Mody expressed their joy and relief in closing of a greatly appreciated day by all SAP Montreal employees.
An Earth Day- (also celebrated on April 22nd) themed giveaway was given to the first 200 colleagues who registered for the event. The gift consisted of a pot filled with earth, a bag of seeds – representing the and including instructions on how to plant it.
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