When SAP’s ROI studies for SuccessFactors and S/4HANA appeared – projecting returns of more than 100 percent – they sparked attention across the enterprise community.

But they also raised a deeper question: what truly drives those returns?

For decades, transformation success has been measured by project delivery – scope, schedule, budget.

Once the new system went live, the ROI box was ticked, and attention moved elsewhere.

That model no longer works.

Across more than two decades working with large SAP programmes, I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve seen the same pattern repeat. The cutover completes successfully, dashboards turn green, and the implementation team celebrates a smooth go-live.

I’ve spent more than two decades around digital transformation programs, long enough to see the same story repeat itself hundreds of times.

The Adoption AI Mirage is Unk Unk #6

The Multiplier Miss is Unk Unk #5

In the first two deep dives of this series, I explored the Legacy Loop why outdated change models break under continuous transformation and the Blind Spots, why vanity metrics hide the truth about user behavior.

In the first deep dive of this series, I introduced the Legacy Loop – the trap of relying on traditional change models in a world of continuous transformation.

In the first article of this series, I argued that adoption isn’t a training activity that ends at go-live. It’s an operating model that must be embedded into enterprise infrastructure. Until leaders make that shift, every other risk becomes secondary.

The Hidden Risk in Every S/4HANA Program