SAS leads the way through analytics

Johannesburg, South Africa  (20 Aug. 2009)  –  SAS is a leader in business analytics and the largest independent vendor in the business intelligence market. The company's software solutions help customers at 45000 sites make better decisions faster.

Incorporated in 1976, SAS Institute Inc. is the world's largest privately held software company with over 11 000 employees at 400 offices in 50 countries, and is the leader in business intelligence software and services. Customers in more than 100 countries use SAS software to manage and gain insights from vast amounts of data.

SAS' biggest advantages are its leadership position in business intelligence and analytical software and services, the emphasis it places on training and development and perhaps most importantly of all, its unique corporate culture which values each employee holistically.

While one of the biggest challenges facing SAS is the skills shortage, particularly in the IT arena, as the company requires highly specialised skills that are in short supply.

Since its launch in 1976 CEO Jim Goodnight's philosophy has been that if you treat employees as if they make a difference to the company, they will indeed try their utmost to make a difference. It is with this that the company's HR priorities are centred on valuing people, a tenet of the company's philosophy, and the HR division is positioned as a strategic partner to the rest of the business. Six percent of its payroll was invested on training and development initiatives in the last financial-year.

Riad Gydien, Vice President MEA says, "At SAS we embrace the philosophy that bad managers make themselves indispensable good leaders promote independence, self sufficiency and dispensabiity. When leaders become functionally dispensable, they can have time to reflect, create, inspire, anticipate trends and promote group cohesiveness."

A level five BEE contributoi SAS South Africa is fully committed to broad based black economic empowerment, and as a subsidiary of a large multinational corporation is able to provide unique sources of value to South Africans. It also invests heavily in social responsibility.

The types of people who flourish at SAS are those who are sell starters, accountable and good team players, they need to be able to adapt to the family oriented and warm corporate culture and must buy in to the company values.

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