Harmonized data is becoming ExxonMobil’s new gold standard — the foundation for predictive analytics, AI, and faster decision-making.
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“Digital transformation often gets mistaken for an IT upgrade,” said Kurt Aerts, business venture executive at ExxonMobil. He was speaking at the ASUG Best Practices event for Oil, Gas and Energy in Houston, Texas. “Our ongoing transformation is a powerful reminder that true change means transforming the business at scale. It’s not about implementing new systems — it’s about fundamentally changing how an enterprise operates and creates value.”
Not just another systems project
This philosophy underpins the company’s multi-year transformation that integrates people, processes, systems, and data across an organization with $350 billion in annual revenue, about 60,000 employees, and operations spanning upstream, chemicals, fuels, lubricants, and low-carbon solutions.
One of the key steps in ExxonMobil’s journey, which began in 2017, was to reframe the mindset. “We don’t want to optimize, we want to transform,” said Aerts.
Process transformation requires challenging deeply ingrained ways of working and prioritizing adoption of industry standards for each process area and service offering such as Record-to-Report, Source-to-Pay or Order-to-Cash, to drive globally consistent execution. This takes a governance model designed for clarity and speed of decision making — two prerequisites for meaningful transformation and to prevent the common trap of consensus-driven optimization.
Transforming the core
Aerts went on to describe ExxonMobil’s three core pillars of transformation:
- Processes are now harmonized to industry standards enterprise-wide versus being executed differently by business or geography.
- Systems are modernized from 12 heavily customized ERPs to a unified, cloud-based platform on SAP S/4HANA.
- Data is being turned from fragmented, trapped information into harmonized consistently defined enterprise assets.
In the past, answering a simple question such as ‘how much do we sell to Walmart’ required hours of aggregating and reconciling across 12 ERPs. Real-time, enterprise-wide visibility will speed up the process considerably. “Harmonized data is becoming ExxonMobil’s new gold standard — the foundation for predictive analytics, AI, and faster decision-making,” Aerts explained.
Managing scale and risk
Large-scale transformation requires effective risk management. ExxonMobil’s approach balances value capture and risk mitigation.
Deployments are phased by the existing ERP ecosystem, not geography or function, to manage complexity and provide business continuity. A layered governance structure — from a sponsor committee of senior executives to operational design boards — supports accountability, transparency, and alignment at every level.
Aerts shared some lessons from the frontline, stressing the importance of foundational principles. When challenges arise, these principles help keep decisions aligned with strategic intent. Next, he reiterated that data matters most, because clean, consistent data is the real enabler of transformation. And finally, the team learned early on that an out-of-the-box approach really works. Industry-standard configurations deliver agility and prevent the drift toward customization that burdens future upgrades.
“We were able to achieve significant simplification,” he said. “For instance, we reduced about 1,400 company codes to under 1,000, and profit centers from more than 15,000 to fewer than 500. This has eliminated significant complexity while increasing transparency across financial reporting.”
ExxonMobil’s key metrics reflect the disciplined execution of the transformation, and is exceeding its targets on its two principal objectives:
- 80% target on Fit to Standard: a testament to the commitment to adopt industry standard processes.
- 90% target on Clean Core: enabling instant upgradeability and system resilience.
Ultimately, ExxonMobil’s enterprise transformation is about creating competitive advantage. By harmonizing data, simplifying systems, and standardizing processes across business lines and geographies, the company is positioning itself for faster innovation and improved experiences for employees, suppliers and customers.
Shaping the future
Transformation is also about visionary leadership in an industry that is adapting to societal needs on how energy is produced, distributed, and consumed. ExxonMobil has a long history of collaboration with SAP to address functionality gaps and ensure the solution is optimized for the oil and gas industry. In essence, ExxonMobil’s journey offers a blueprint for global organizations facing the same challenges, especially lack of agility caused by legacy systems, fragmented data, and decentralized processes.
Aerts concluded: “A successful transformation isn’t about replacing tools; it’s about redesigning processes, data and systems to deliver industry leading performance in efficiency, effectiveness and the experience of our employees and customers, while ensuring agility for adjustments required due to changes in the market.”