Christopher M. Carter, a seasoned SAP industry professional with almost three decades of experience, took the reins of Approyo with a vision to provide a comprehensive range of SAP services, including hosting, management, upgrades, and migration for clients. He passionately ensures that his team is mentored and nurtured, similar to a father figure, to foster growth in the SAP ecosystem and beyond. Outside of work, Christopher enjoys indulging in some free-spirited fun, accompanied by a fine glass of scotch.
Below are highlights of the interview conducted between World’s Leaders and Christopher M. Carter:
Tell us about the inception of the company. How did it all start?
I started this company literally in the backyard of my home with a bottle of Scotch and a good friend of mine who was working at SAP at the time. He literally told me I needed to get my **** back in the game and understand what this new stuff around the new database and the cloud was going to do on an ongoing basis, and that’s what we did. We sat there, we talked, we had a couple of drinks, we moved forward, we discussed, and I made the decision right then and there to start a company and to integrate it immediately with SAP. I was very fortunate to know the right people. I literally flew to Germany and then to California to meet with the executives of the organization, and I was very blessed that they gave us one of the first ever SAP startup focus program partnerships. We were one of the first 25, and we used that to our advantage to become a leader in supporting SAP in the cloud and to create the first SAP cloud itself.
What has made you successful?
That’s a great question, but it’s also a very tough question. I feel that it’s my staff who have made me extremely successful, and secondarily, it’s my drive and determination to never stop moving forward and to always keep helping my customers, my staff, and my partners grow and succeed. If you can keep moving forward, if you can keep getting up off the mat, you will succeed, and that is my philosophy to keep moving forward and to help. What do you value? I value and trust people who tell me the truth and are willing to go to battle with me no matter what we do. I want individuals around me who are willing to sacrifice the betterment of themselves for the team and for our customers. If you are not willing to give of yourself to a customer to help them and to help them sleep better at night, you probably will not last long in a company that I run.
Which are the major services of the company and how do the company to get ahead in the competition?
We are very fortunate to be able to provide an end to end solution for organizations with SAP needs we can provide licenses we then can implement from a technical standpoint any of the SA licenses that we provide to an organization and then we can take that technical implementation and put that either on a cloud or bare metal or data center because we have those skills will then manage and monitor that entire landscape for an organization so they don’t have to either retrain their staff or train a net new staff we will provide all of that on an ongoing basis and we will take the cost of that service and bring it over a three to five year plan for these organizations were the very first organization to be able to provide the cloud the implementation the license and you will know in advance what your monthly cost is because we have the skills as a managed service provider and as a CSP to support your organization with your journey as you grow with SAP courtesy of Approyo.
What value-added services does the company provide?
Here is where the company shines we as an organization do something that most partner companies in this ecosystem do not do and that is to be able to provide not only the licenses the implementation and the management and support of an SAP environment but we can also proactively support the organization with where they want to put the infrastructure and quote and support them with that in advance of them acquiring the landscape then providing them the discounts they deserve based upon the landscape in whatever cloud ecosystem they want because we are an SAP partner a cloud partner and a managed service partner we’ve literally bundled everything together for that customer where others have to go out to other partners to make that happen we do it all under one roof and get that to them in an immediate timeframe.
What are the most important aspects of a company’s culture?
I feel what’s most important is our team concept. Our organization with our staff feels that we are a team one-on-one with our customers and with our partners day in and day out. We want to make them sleep easier at night, and as a team, that’s what’s most important: making sure that they can sleep well at night while we maintain and support their organization’s SAP structure 24 hours a day.
Give us your opinion on; do organizations rely heavily on individual heroics or team processes?
Our team relies heavily on the team concept of a team process. We use our Overwatch tool to maintain and monitor an organization, but it is truly our team process that makes us different from organizations. We do not want heroes on our team; if you are a hero, it’s because something is broken and no one caught that system, caught that error, or caught that missed step. All our team catches those activities, understands those activities, and works together because no one knows everything our team knows and gathers all details before making an informed decision and a go forward strategy.
What advice would you give someone going into a leadership position for the first time?
I fully believe that if you are going to be a leader and you have really worked hard and have started to understand the leadership concepts, you can’t do everything yourself. That is the first rule I would tell someone going into leadership: get a great team around you and have them work and support you. Then I would literally tell them to learn as much as you can about the trade you are going into, just as I have with SAP and the cloud. You really need to make sure that you know your stuff inside and out. I grew up in the SAP ecosystem with infrastructure and security. When the cloud came about 15 years ago, I dove head first into it and learned anything and everything I could, and I still learn today everything I can about every tool that we use, maintain, and monitor. So it’s one of those things where you’re constantly learning and supporting yourself, your company, your customers, your partners, and your team.
