2013/2/27 - Buckeye Partners Builds Talent, Strengthens Overall Business with Ultimate Software’s UltiPro

Buckeye Partners provides mid-stream energy logistics services, operating one of the largest independent petroleum products common carrier pipeline networks in North America. In addition to pipeline transportation services, the 1,300-employee company owns and operates more than 100 refined petroleum products terminals and a major natural gas storage facility in California, and markets liquid petroleum products in various regions around the world. Because of the company’s continued success and expansion, executives at Buckeye Partners wanted to proactively plan for future business needs, especially related to the company’s leadership.

The HR team was tasked with finding better ways to uncover talent gaps, identify high-performing individuals, understand and monitor retention risks, and help employees develop their readiness to step into key roles. With Buckeye’s years of proven success with Ultimate’s cloud-based features for HCM, company leadership chose to leverage UltiPro Succession Management to address its strategic people management objectives today and moving into the future.

“Our previous system for succession plans just did not meet the needs of our expanding business. We had very manual, cumbersome processes when preparing our people for new opportunities. Without an efficient, executable strategy, our business could be at risk when we lost key contributors,” said Dianna Fernandez, manager of HRIS at Buckeye Partners, L.P. “With UltiPro, we now have an automated, effective, results-based platform for our succession management program.”

Buckeye Partners rolled out UltiPro Succession Management rapidly and began the process of evaluating top talent and potential opportunities for advancement as its first initiative.

“Activating UltiPro Succession Management was easily the most successful deployment for technology that I’ve ever experienced. The time from our decision to deployment took just two weeks, and we could quickly convert years of manual data into ready-to-use business intelligence,” said Fernandez. “Plus, UltiPro’s end-to-end features are so flexible. We can easily configure Ultimate’s cloud technology and make adjustments as our business requirements evolve.”

With UltiPro Succession Management, businesses like Buckeye Partners can accomplish proactive, practical strategies for professional growth and career advancement for their workforce. Each employee can define an individual career path and ensure that he or she develops the skills, knowledge, and other talent factors necessary for personal growth and contribution to the company's success. Employees or managers can update a specific talent profile with relevant personal and career information, such as education, previous work history, skills, licenses/certifications, awards, languages, and willingness to relocate in the U.S. and/or internationally. This information populates the individual’s talent card, providing a holistic view of the employee’s talent characteristics.

Embedded reporting and business intelligence within UltiPro also deliver a range of essential information, such as succession readiness, successor impact, candidates with highest potential, talent factors, and more.

After employees update their talent profiles with relevant personal and career information, Buckeye collects qualitative feedback about each member of its leadership team from peers, HR, and executives. The quantitative and qualitative data is then merged, helping to identify scores for succession readiness and leading candidates for promotion.

“Having quantifiable talent and succession metrics are very important to our leadership, and the previous method of sorting through manual reports and spreadsheets to find this information was so complicated that it was ridiculous,” said Fernandez. “UltiPro’s unified HCM is helping us build a stronger future for our business. We can quickly map values for global locations, assess our talent pool, identify promotability, and provide executives with detailed analytics and the valuable data that they are looking for. It’s very exciting for us that HR is helping drive results that have an impact on the entire business.”

“To stay competitive and successful, it’s now essential for businesses to identify talent factors about their employees holistically, including leadership potential, job performance, promotability, retention risk, and role importance,” said Greg Swick, chief sales officer at Ultimate Software. “UltiPro Succession Management provides business-critical information so organizations can build internal talent pools and pinpoint the right individuals to fill key positions in the future. We’re very happy that our longterm customer Buckeye Partners is leveraging UltiPro to create a solid strategy for organizational change, build bench strength, and reduce the risk of business disruption.”

About Ultimate Software

Ultimate is a leading cloud provider of people management solutions, with more than 10 million people records in the cloud. Built on the belief that people are the most important ingredient of any business, Ultimate's award-winning UltiPro delivers HR, payroll, and talent management solutions that seamlessly connect people with the information and resources they need to work more effectively. Founded in 1990, the company is headquartered in Weston, Florida, and has more than 1,600 professionals focused on developing the highest quality solutions and services. In 2013, Ultimate was ranked #9 on FORTUNE'S list of the “100 Best Companies to Work For.” Ultimate has more than 2,500 customers with employees in 136 countries, including Adobe Systems Incorporated, Culligan International, Major League Baseball, The New York Yankees Baseball Team, Pep Boys, and Texas Roadhouse. More information on Ultimate's products and services for people management can be found at www.ultimatesoftware.com.

UltiPro is a registered trademark of The Ultimate Software Group, Inc. All other trademarks referenced are the property of their respective owners.

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