Delivery Centre Capability, Talent & Innovation Lead - South Africa

Innovation is and will always be at the core of SAP Fioneer , and it is the promise of why we were spun out of SAP: agility, innovation, and delivery.

SAP Fioneer builds on a heritage of outstanding technology and a deep understanding of corporate and consumer demands. At the heart of it all, we bring financial services to the next level with innovative software solutions and platforms.

We help companies in the financial services industry achieve speed, scalability, and cost-efficiency through digital business innovation, cloud technology, and solutions that cover banking and insurance processes end-to-end.

A global company, rapid growth, innovative people, and a lean organization make SAP Fioneer a place where you can accelerate your future!

About role

We are looking for a Delivery Centre Capability, Talent & Innovation Lead to play a key role in the strategic growth, capability development and long-term scalability of our South African Delivery Centre (SADC).

This is a newly established, cross-functional role combining Delivery Centre capability development, strategic workforce planning, talent pipeline development, external partnerships and innovation enablement.

The role will work closely with Delivery leadership, Talent/HR, Product and Technology teams to build the people, capabilities, processes and ecosystem required to establish the South African Delivery Centre as a sustainable, commercially competitive and globally integrated delivery capability.

A key focus will be translating current and future delivery requirements into practical workforce and capability development initiatives, strengthening the local talent base, accelerating employee development, enabling greater cross-resource utilisation and supporting the adoption of technologies and ways of working that improve delivery productivity.

The role will evolve as the Delivery Centre grows and will play an active part in shaping how we attract, develop, deploy and retain talent, leverage global organisational capabilities and continuously improve delivery effectiveness.

This is not a traditional recruitment, HR, marketing or software development role. The focus is on building and strengthening the capability engine that enables the Delivery Centre to grow, scale and operate effectively.

Long-term role ambition

This role is central to the next phase of the Delivery Centre's growth. As the Centre matures, the role will evolve from establishing core capability foundations toward shaping an increasingly strategic, innovation-led delivery environment.

The ambition is to create the talent pathways, strategic partnerships and modern, AI-enabled ways of working that allow the Centre to become an ever more valuable part of the global Delivery organisation over time, a destination for emerging talent and a benchmark for sustainable, high-quality delivery capability.

Requirements

We are looking for someone with relevant experience in a technology, consulting, banking technology, software, professional services or delivery environment, with demonstrated exposure to several of the following areas.

• Establishing, scaling or supporting the development of delivery teams, capability functions or professional services operations.
• Strategic workforce planning, capability development or talent pipeline management.
• Graduate programmes, early-career development or professional development initiatives.
• Organisational learning, onboarding and structured skills development.
• Technology, consulting or delivery programme management.
• Cross-functional initiative management and stakeholder coordination.
• University, educational or industry partnerships.
• Innovation, digital transformation, AI adoption or process automation initiatives.
• Development of operating models, frameworks or scalable organisational processes.
• Working across geographically distributed teams and international delivery environments.
• Experience within enterprise software, financial services technology, banking transformation or related consulting environments would be considered plus.

Responsibilities

Support the strategic development and sustainable growth of the South African Delivery Centre in alignment with regional and global Delivery objectives.

Translate business growth plans and delivery pipeline expectations into medium- and long-term workforce, capability and capacity requirements, including a scaling roadmap covering capability mix, seniority mix and resource flexibility.

Identify current and future skills needs across products, technologies, consulting disciplines and delivery functions, partnering with the Talent Manager to define role profiles and job descriptions for new and evolving positions.

Anchor growing delivery areas with experienced and specialist capabilities that mentor junior staff, build sustainable local expertise, and support a commercially sustainable model balancing demand, utilisation, workforce composition and cost competitiveness.

Improve resource flexibility and cross-project utilisation, enable South African resources to contribute to international engagements, and integrate the Centre into wider organisational resource planning and delivery structures.

Develop and continuously refine the Delivery Centre's talent pipeline, aligned with delivery demand, capability needs and growth priorities.

Partner with Talent/HR and the existing Lift Programme to attract, develop and progress graduates and early-career talent, including internships, graduate programmes and university engagement while avoiding duplication with existing initiatives.

Establish clear pathways that move emerging talent from onboarding and foundational learning, through supervised project exposure, into independently deployable delivery roles.

Work with Talent/HR to attract experienced professionals and specialists, supporting a sustainable mentoring structure that blends graduates, junior consultants and senior experts.

Collaborate with HR and local stakeholders on South African employment, skills development and transformation objectives, including B-BBEE where applicable focusing on strategy and pathways, while recruitment execution and hiring approvals remain with Talent/HR and Delivery.

Maintain and continuously improve the Delivery Centre's capability framework and development roadmap, including a transparent view of employee skills, proficiency levels and capability gaps to guide workforce planning and deployment.

Establish structured onboarding processes with mechanisms to assess their effectiveness, capability progression and deployment readiness that move new employees quickly into productive delivery roles.

Partner with Delivery and Product teams to identify training, certification and development needs, and build structured learning, mentoring and knowledge-transfer pathways aligned with delivery requirements.

Create opportunities to upskill and cross-skill existing employees across products and technologies, facilitating access to product and technical expertise and promoting knowledge sharing between local teams and the wider organisation.

Develop multi-skilled teams and increase internal mobility and deployment flexibility, with the goal of a sustainable, increasingly self-sufficient local delivery capability that stays integrated with global expertise.

Own the innovation and AI roadmap:

Coordinate the Delivery Centre's innovation and AI adoption roadmap in alignment with business, Delivery, Product and Technology priorities, staying informed on relevant technology trends and assessing their applicability.

Spot practical opportunities where AI, automation and emerging technologies can improve delivery productivity, quality, efficiency and scalability, then evaluate and prioritise initiatives based on value, feasibility and expected outcomes.

Bring together Delivery, Product, Technology and AI specialists to translate opportunities into actionable initiatives, while tracking progress, dependencies, risks, adoption and measurable outcomes.

Standardise delivery activities through reusable assets, automation and AI-assisted workflows, and support the adoption and scaling of successful innovations across teams, ensuring alignment with organisational, security and data protection standards.

Evaluate real benefits such as improvements in delivery effort, turnaround time, quality and productivity focusing on enabling adoption and value, not developing AI solutions or acting as the technical solution owner.

Own enabling partnerships and reporting:

Take direct ownership of strategic educational and skills-development partnerships, and monitor and report on capability development, talent pipeline and innovation outcomes — working in close partnership with Delivery leadership and functional teams for implementation.

Operate within clear accountability boundaries:

Delivery leadership retains overall strategy, delivery, resourcing, headcount/budget and P Talent/HR retains recruitment and employment processes; Product and Technology retain technical ownership of their solutions and platforms.

This role collaborates closely with:

• South African, regional and global Delivery leadership; Delivery and Project Management teams; the Lift programme.
• Talent Management / HR; Delivery Centre employees, technical specialists and mentors.
• Product Management and Product Development teams; Technology, Automation and AI teams.

Business Planning / Finance (where relevant to capability and workforce planning); universities, colleges and external training providers; relevant technology, professional and industry communities.

Benefits

• Collaborative culture with smart people in a fast-growing company.
• Opportunity to shape the future of the financial services industry.
• Flexibility to work across different projects, markets, and areas of expertise as you grow your career.
• Fast-paced environment with an experienced team, a strong brand, and an established customer portfolio.
• Opportunity to work on complex core banking implementations and transformation engagements.
• Competitive compensation package aligned with your expertise and skills.
• This appointment will be made in accordance with our Employment Equity Plan and the company’s commitment to transformation and diversity.
• Originally posted on Himalayas