Program Director in Germany

Following the Vaillant engagement, established independent practice focused on senior SAP advisory and building ASTRA — a methodology, not a tool. ASTRA is independent and unbiased: the same four pillars serve CIO / Business Leadership, SI / SAP Practice, and Programme Director / Principal with equal weight. No audience is primary.

ASTRA serves three audiences with equal weight — CIO / Business Leadership · SI / SAP Practice · Programme Director / Principal. ASTRA is independent and unbiased — it does not sit inside any SI practice and does not serve any single audience as primary customer. Each audience receives a role-calibrated output from the same analysis.

One methodology, two outcomes:

OUTCOME 1 — SAP TRANSFORMATION GOVERNANCE:

Any active SAP programme: ECC→S/4HANA Greenfield, Brownfield, Global Rollout, AMS. The four pillars answer the four questions that determine whether a transformation succeeds — for any of the three audiences.

• Are business requirements clean — or is the SI building what SAP standard already covers? (Functional Auditor → all three audiences)
• Is the custom object inventory healthy — or accumulating debt that blocks upgrades? (RICEFW Auditor → Director and CIO)
• Is the SteerCo reporting accurate — or is leadership seeing a Watermelon? (Truth Engine → CIO and Director)
• Are people ready for the system they are receiving? (Human Signal → CIO and Director)

OUTCOME 2 — AUTONOMOUS ENTERPRISE READINESS:

Any programme deploying Joule, pursuing RISE, or planning an AE migration. The same four pillars answer the questions SAP does not — again, calibrated per audience.

• Which custom objects block the 224 Joule AI agents? (RICEFW Auditor → SI gets remediation paths, Director gets verdicts, CIO gets financial impact)
• Is the Fiori deployment complete enough to activate Joule? (Truth Engine → all three audiences)
• Is the workforce trained for AI-native working? (Human Signal → CIO and Director)

Four pillars (each serves all three audiences):

• Functional Auditor: Clean Core Score 0–100. Section A (CIO): KG fidelity risk in €. Section B (Director): SI challenge questions, man-day saving. Section C (SI): Language Translation Ledger, SAP alternatives.
• RICEFW Auditor: Joule API Pathway Audit, Clean Core Level A–D, Technical Debt Index 1–10. Section A: financial impact of blocked AI agents. Section B: RETIRE/MIGRATE/REDESIGN/KEEP verdicts. Section C: BTP remediation paths.
• Truth Engine: Watermelon Detection, Fiori Deployment check, Programme Truth Score 0–100. Section A: 3 SteerCo questions. Section B: 48-hour action list. Section C: vendor friction map.
• Human Signal: three-stage Fiori adoption model, HITL Policy readiness, Human Signal Score 0–100. Section A: GUI training weight, AE adoption financial risk. Section B: go-live recommendation, stakeholder resistance map.

On-Demand SAP Advisory:

• SAP Programme Management — end-to-end governance, factory management, multi-stream delivery, vendor oversight, SteerCo reporting for Greenfield, Brownfield, Rollout and AMS programmes.
• Delivery Management — RICEFW oversight, Data Migration governance, Release & Cutover management, Hypercare, SLA/KPI management.
• Due Diligence & Landscape Assessment — SAP landscape review, AS-IS/TO-BE roadmap, RFP structuring, SI selection advisory.
• IT Strategy & CIO Advisory — transformation roadmap, Clean Core strategy, Autonomous Enterprise readiness planning.
• Programme Recovery — distressed programme assessment, rapid governance setup, escalation resolution.

Operating through senior professional networks across EMEA.

• Executive program leadership for complex and critical programs, with focus on governance, stability and delivery in Aerospace, Defence and High-Tech environments.
• Client-side project lead for one brand of a major automotive OEM in a large outsourcing transition, ensuring governance and transparency on supplier performance and enabling client management to steer the transition effectively.
• Co-lead and coach for the client program lead during the set-up of a company-wide PLM transformation, establishing governance, roadmap and stakeholder alignment.
• Co-lead for company-wide ERP harmonisation and roll-out at a production site, delivering harmonised processes and stable system operations to ensure production readiness.
• Interim change management lead in a global programme to streamline product development and implement a new product data management system, improving collaboration between client and external teams with individual coaching for selected leaders.

• Directed global digital transformation programs enabling enterprise adoption of AI-powered retail analytics solutions
• Led migration from legacy platforms to cloud-based ecosystems, improving data processing performance by over 40%
• Served as strategic technology advisor to enterprise customers, aligning technology roadmaps with business objectives
• Managed cross-functional global teams of 100+ resources across multiple regions

• Overall responsibility for software, connectivity and services within the smart-metering organization
• Product leadership for 3 team leads and indirect responsibility for 20 product managers
• Strategic development, organization and scaling of the software and service business
• Managed realignment of software development including governance, prioritization and delivery model
• Achieved over 200% increase in service revenue and 80% reduction in open initiatives through a scalable delivery framework
• Initiated company-wide digital transformation and provided top-management strategic advisory on software, platform and service strategy
• Technologies & methods: Digital Transformation, Business Transformation, Cost Optimization, Scaled Agile, IoT, SaaS, Azure, ITIL