Discover how AAK partnered with Octily to personalize their HR platform, creating an engaging experience that reflects their brand and supports their global workforce.
AAK
Octily
Are you looking to make your HR platform more engaging and aligned with your company’s culture?
In this interview, Denise Broberg, Global People Data Insights Manager at AAK, shares her journey of transforming AAK’s Cornerstone OnDemand implementation to drive employee engagement and achieve ambitious sustainability goals. Through a close partnership with Octily, Denise created a personalized, branded experience that truly connects with employees across the globe. Let’s dive into how AAK is “Making Better Happen™” and learn practical insights that could help you on your own transformative journey.
Can you tell us about your role and what drives your passion for Talent Management?
ABOUT AAK
AAK is not just about oils – it’s about making everyday products better, from the chocolate you crave to the ice cream you indulge in. With a rich history spanning over 150 years, AAK’s mission of “Making Better Happen™” is brought to life by over 4,200 employees working across 25 regional sales offices, 16 Customer Innovation Centers, and 20 production facilities worldwide. Headquartered in Malmö, Sweden, AAK is committed to fostering a vibrant, inclusive company culture that unites its global workforce and supports its sustainability ambitions.
What are the main challenges AAK faced before working with Octily?
Denise Broberg: “When I joined AAK, they had been using Cornerstone OnDemand for several years, but hadn’t fully utilized and optimized the platform since the implementation. However, the standard Cornerstone setup didn’t support the biggest challenge – integrating our global teams across five continents, speaking 9 different languages, to build a common company culture in a sustainable way. While Cornerstone’s functionality is exceptional, without corporate branding and personalization, it wasn’t living up to its full potential. I knew that with some expert assistance, we could truly “Make Better Happen”.
We are on a digital and cultural transformation journey at AAK. We need to attract, engage, and retain employees on a global scale. To do this, we need to engage new employees right from the start, encourage current employees to learn and grow, and support our managers by providing the tools to help shape the new culture. We want to create a new way of working, a new way of behaving toward each other, and create a safe environment for all our employees. With the help of Octily, we are on a good path.”
How will the collaboration with Octily impact your Talent Management strategy?
Denise Broberg: “Our work with Octily is transforming how employees work with our HR platform. It starts with new employee onboarding. We only get one chance with each employee to make a good first impression of Cornerstone. We want to give every employee the same onboarding experience, no matter where in the world they join AAK. In addition, we want new hires to understand the breadth of AAK – its farms, factories, laboratories, and offices – and its inclusive programs for diversity, equity, and employee engagement. Octily has helped us create a beautiful, tailored Onboarding Page that gives new hires a great impression of the breadth and depth of AAK and the feeling of being part of a big, connected family all over the world.
This smooth onboarding experience continues with beautiful, personalized Welcome Pages that optimize each employee’s experience with user-friendly interfaces, streamlined navigation and access, and alignment with our corporate brand values. Cornerstone OnDemand is a great platform, but if people don’t log in or can’t find what they need, everything is impeded, and they don’t come back for more. Our employee engagement metrics showed that employees were logging in only once every two months, mainly for basic HR tasks like compliance training and performance reviews. I knew we could make this much better, but we did not have the in-house resources to make the necessary changes. Octily, with its deep expertise in Cornerstone and exceptional creative and technical team, was able to help us build inspiring, compelling pages that align beautifully with our corporate brand and messaging.”
What specific customizations will make the most significant impact, and how did they enhance your team’s experience?
Onboarding:
Onboarding is every employee’s first “taste” of what it is like to work at AAK and with its HR platform. We want to give each employee the same onboarding experience, no matter where in the world they join AAK. Octily’s customization provides a personalized welcome message, a welcome video from the CEO, links to self-service custom HR forms, quick access to learning content from the Global Induction Program, and information about AAK’s new ‘buddy program’ for new hires. This combines to make every employee feel they are an important part of the AAK team.
Welcome Pages:
Manager’s Hub:
Octily quickly delivered designs that fit our corporate culture and haven’t stopped impressing us since. Their creativity and precision helped elevate our HR platform far beyond our initial vision.
What advice would you give other organizations considering a similar approach?
Denise Broberg: “Because of my work as a Cornerstone Customer Success Manager, I knew how much the Cornerstone platform could be tailored – with corporate branding, page personalization, improved navigation, process flow, and much more.
When I worked at Cornerstone, there was a buzz in the air amongst Customer Success Managers about the Octily team and how they could transform Cornerstone for our clients. I knew if we wanted to quickly transform into a beautiful, on-brand, bespoke Cornerstone, the right team to engage was Octily. This was the right choice. We are on our way!
The collaboration with Octily was really great right from the start. We brainstormed as a team, and with a simple request, much like giving an AI prompt – ‘Bring me something that you think is nice, that fits our corporate culture’ – Octily quickly delivered the perfect designs and hasn’t stopped impressing us since.
We realized that, similar to working with a generative AI, the more context and clarity we provided about our needs, the better the outcomes. Octily thrived on the input we gave, continuously delivering designs that were not only on point but also beautifully aligned with our brand. It’s been a truly collaborative process, with Octily responding to our feedback with creativity and precision, helping us elevate our HR platform far beyond our initial vision.”
Conclusion
AAK’s journey with Octily underscores the power of tailored customizations in transforming employee experiences and driving business outcomes. Denise’s insights highlight the importance of collaboration, creativity, and a forward-thinking approach in navigating the evolving landscape of Talent Management.
“I am very satisfied with the whole collaboration with Octily as a creative partner. They contributed new ideas, approaches, and perspectives from their long, broad work customizing Cornerstone for other clients. I can come to a meeting and say, ‘I have nothing. Would you come with something, and we can work from there?’ And, so they would. The inspirational collaboration sessions have been really helpful for AAK as a company. We could go from nothing and have a way forward. Such win-win working together.”
She adds, “We aim to launch the new interfaces before the end of the year, transforming the current experience into one that truly aligns with AAK’s vision for employee engagement and growth.”
Want to learn more about how customization can transform your HR platform?
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