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American Honda Motor Company brings the future of HR to put associates in the driver’s seat

In this story:

  • Human Capital Management (HCM) strategy
  • HR portal building and deployment
  • Change management strategy

With a legacy dating back to 1959, American Honda Motor Company is more than just a multinational automotive manufacturer. With a portfolio that spans everything from power equipment and motorcycles to light jet engines, Honda’s diverse offerings and dynamic organization needed an HR strategy that was as innovative as the company itself.

After consolidating multiple US Honda entities into just two larger companies, Honda engaged with Deloitte to solve for complexities in their HR operations and help them “bring the future” to their workforce. With Deloitte’s leading human capital management strategy and the power of the ServiceNow platform, teams helped modernize Honda’s HR information technology (HRIT) infrastructure—empowering HR agents to effectively serve more than 30,000 employees, known as associates.

To scale down their high-touch approach to HR service delivery (HRSD) and adopt a contemporary digital environment with a unified HR organization,  the Deloitte and Honda teams selected ServiceNow to build out a centralized technology platform. Together, Deloitte and Honda launched associate-facing and HR agent-facing solutions for easy self-service, fast access to virtual and live agent chat, and a robust knowledge repository.

An HR transformation success story

Watch Honda’s journey to a unified HR experience, designed by Deloitte and powered by ServiceNow

The challenge

To achieve Honda’s goal of best-in-class HR experience with a feature-rich associate portal and an efficient HR agent workspace, Deloitte was engaged to help:

  • Streamline enterprise technology: Honda’s HR technology stack involved multiple point solutions. HR agents worked between their legacy ticketing system, custom-built tools, and shared mailboxes. The team needed a consistent and uniform way to measure HRSD health, including satisfaction and service level agreements.
  • Enhance consistency and satisfaction: Honda aimed to elevate associate experiences by improving visibility, streamlining data access, and reducing friction in team handoffs between Tier 1 and Tier 2 HR agent teams.
  • Optimize request management: Honda aimed to improve efficiency by ensuring inquiries and requests were directed to the appropriate HR operations teams, allowing senior HR personnel to focus on strategic initiatives.
  • Strengthen brand perception: Honda's HR team aimed to enhance associates' confidence in HR services by implementing a thoughtful, comprehensive approach to new system and tool rollouts—fostering trust through strategic and well-executed solutions.

 

Through previous experiences with Deloitte, their knowledge of the automobile industry, and previous projects, we knew that we were entering into a good partnership with a talented organization that really brought the right capabilities that could drive the outcomes we were trying to achieve.

- Rich Richardson, Senior Vice President of HR, American Honda Motor Company

The solution

Guided by Deloitte’s leading Human Capital Management strategy and inspired by Honda’s global tagline, “The power of dreams: how we move you,” the teams made several key choices that helped establish ServiceNow as a unifying technology to serve as the digital gateway to all services, including:

Deploying an HR portal distinct from IT:

  • The HRConnect portal was specifically optimized for HR to host knowledge articles that retrieved relevant content based on employee personas, as well as a service catalog that helped get requests directly routed to the right teams serving US associates.
  • The portal features both virtual and live agent chat solutions to increase access and answer associate inquiries faster.

Prioritizing and delivering associate adoption strategies

  • The teams implemented a robust change management strategy that included communication with impacted associates, the creation of a change agent network to share information and gather feedback, and a training program to upskill HR agents.
  • To support HR staff, a new HR Agent Workspace provided the tools and training necessary to effectively manage tickets and enhance service delivery.

Leveraging Deloitte methodologies

  • Deloitte’s hybrid, agile methodology applied a persona-based approach and aligned ‘sprints’ with end user priorities to ensure that new technologies would benefit specific HR roles.
  • The Deloitte Greenhouse Lab helped Honda identify areas for support for the new HR organization, including needed reskilling and hiring resources.

 

The impact

Honda’s ServiceNow implementation has delivered exceptional employee experiences to associates across the country. The launch of Honda’s ServiceNow instance has been foundational in giving Honda the ability to build its HR strategy and continuously innovate on the ServiceNow platform. As associates embrace the new technology, Honda is prepared to go even further by injecting AI into their operations, with 80% of associates involved in AI pilot groups reporting they will continue to use AI tools to enhance speed and access critical information.

With support from Deloitte practitioners and the power of the ServiceNow platform, Honda delivered a more streamlined HR experience for its associates and HR agents, leading to:

29%

of employees accessing the portal in the first two months, reflecting 8,700 unique users

42 HR

services and 5 virtual agent topics deployed supporting more than 85 HR groups

30K

employees supported through change management channels, including email, signage,

200+ HR

power users trained by Deloitte to support the rollout of the platform

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