Celonis Celosphere 2025 | Robert M. Speer & Mr. Tom Steffens, U.S. Department of War

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Robert M. Speer

Former Acting Secretary of the Army

U.S. Department of War

Tom Steffens

Former Deputy Chief Financial Officer

U.S. Department of War

play_circle_outline Guest speakers: Bob Speer, former acting secretary of the US Army, and Tom Steffens, ex-DCFO.

play_circle_outline Leveraging Process Intelligence in Military Operations: Enhancing Complexity Navigation and Efficiency with Celonis Innovations

play_circle_outline Enhancing Military Decision-Making: The Role of Managerial Accounting and Process Intelligence Across Departments

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Robert M. Speer & Mr. Tom Steffens, U.S. Department of War

Robert M. Speer

Former Acting Secretary of the Army U.S. Department of War

Tom Steffens

Former Deputy Chief Financial Officer U.S. Department of War

At Celosphere 2025 in Munich, Robert M. Speer (former acting secretary of the U.S. Army) and Tom Steffens (former deputy chief financial officer of the U.S. Department of War) join theCUBE’s Rob Strechay to explain why process intelligence is the “missing piece of the puzzle” for complex, multi-function public sector organizations. They discuss how process intelligence helps leaders truly “see ourselves,” complementing, not competing with, existing systems, and how Celonis’ analyze-act-develop cycle accelerates transformation across logistics, finance and ope... Read more

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What attracted you to become an advisor to Celonis? add

What are the challenges and complexities involved in understanding and improving the business processes of the United States Army or the Department of War? add

What role does process intelligence play in fostering communication and understanding among different departments or silos within an organization? add

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Robert M. Speer & Mr. Tom Steffens, U.S. Department of War

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Rob Strechay

>> Hello and welcome back to Celosphere. I'll get this right tonight. It's our penultimate session, another set of customers, advisors to Celonis. We're really excited to be coming to you from Munich. 2025 here. This has been awesome. We've gotten to learn so much about how process is impacting so many different parts of the industry and we have bumping music to take us out into the evening. So I am really excited and honored to have two really, I would say, people who know a lot about process and have been in an industry that is really, process kind of defines life and death in some cases. So I really appreciate, I have honorable Bob Speer. Thanks for coming on board. He was the former acting secretary of the US Army. And I have Tom Steffens, who is the former Deputy CFO of the US Department of War. Thank you both for coming on board today. This is, I think again, when I look at process and I think the military's in the process business because it definitely defines a lot of what's going on. You've spent decades really going about this. When you look at this and you were drawn in to be an advisor to Celonis, why did it attract you? What was the opportunity like, and why did it bring you in here?

Robert M. Speer

>> Well, Ken, for me, it's a case to where the processes are numerous. The complexity of the United States Army or the Department of War is amazing. The multi-functions that you have, whether it's medical, logistics, financial, which we're both kind of a part of, it's very complex and sometimes understanding those business processes took you years to map them, to understand them. And it made it sometimes by the time you really try to get down to it, in an agile world that's trying to transform and keep up with the application today, you need the business intelligence, the process intelligence of like a Celonis to be able to see how it's going and how to make reactions better. And so we were excited when we saw that with the opportunity to say, "Hey, we can make an impact. We can help Department of War, Department of the Army make better improvements faster and also innovate faster if we understand our business intelligence, our process intelligence better."

Rob Strechay

>> Same?

Tom Steffens

>> Yeah. Obviously echo what Bob said, but this capability is almost like the missing piece of the puzzle. We've had great technology solutions that have been developed. We thought we had really good processes. We thought we were following those processes, but I think what we're learning is process intelligence gives us an opportunity to really see ourselves. And hey, well, maybe the process you thought you had or that's evolved over time isn't quite what you think it is. And so seeing ourselves better, nothing wrong with the technology you've employed, that's important, and we've invested a lot in that, but this is the missing piece of the puzzle really for us to take a look at that and say, "Wow." And then the follow through that I like is that they have a cycle here that you want to analyze, you want to go ahead and act, you want to develop. And so that cyclic process I think is very important to compliment that.

Rob Strechay

>> Yeah.

Robert M. Speer

>> Ken, can I add to that too, is that we see an awful lot of buzzwords like data analytics. And to what end though? I mean, what are you trying to achieve? And so when you put the process and intelligence in there and you now understand that I can now apply other applications and other methods, I can innovate and make better use of that data for better outcomes of what my business is regardless of where it was in the Department of War, whether it's logistical or it's financial once again, or if it's trying to put weapons or ammunition on target.

Rob Strechay

>> Right. No, I mean, I think to me, again, when I start to think about this, and we've been talking about this now for two days and talking to just across all these different industries, I think to your point, it's being able to open up and understand those processes, and to your point, how do you optimize those processes? Because efficiency is really key to what you're doing, be it civilian or be it government. How have you seen, as you guys have become really advisors from a public sector perspective back to Celonis, how have you seen that and been able to advise them on where this can really fit very well, either civilian or in the government?

Robert M. Speer

>> Ken, that's a great question. I think part of that, as we, I mean, just being here at Celosphere, we've seen the use and understanding from partners and saying, "Okay, how have they done it?" Where are successes? And now I can go back to the Department of War, Department of the Army and say, "Okay, let me try this now. Let me show you how your process intelligence with your data with artificial intelligence, I can speed up your desire to transform in contact." You need to be more agile what you're doing. Let me show you now, so I'm excited about it. And I can build that excitement and their ability to do things.

Tom Steffens

>> If I could offer, it's not in competition with some of the resources that we've employed before in the systems, it's a compliment. And that compliment, it's so, so important. And I think that is the, and what I've been impressed with here the last two days that we've been here is the learning environment that's been fostered. And I think that also, I'm sure, carries over to how Celonis works with their clients too. And Celonis wants to learn from the client too, not just prefer a solution, and that's vitally important.

Rob Strechay

>> I think absolutely. I mean, this has actually been back to back public sector. We had Janet on who is the director of risk assessment and compliance. And she was talking about AP and AR for state of Oklahoma. I think ties in very nicely with the fact that, again, I look at it and say, to me, it makes a lot of sense where it fits, but how do you guys see it fitting from just a transparency, audibility, and really shining a light on all of these different things?

Tom Steffens

>> Yeah. So it starts for me, and I really want to make sure that we are doing this at the end state, it's public trust. And what's a tool out there that can help us ensure public trust? And why do we, we get public trust from integrity in our financial reporting, right? And right now, we have been struggling with that. We think we're doing a great job at DOD. We've got to prove it. We've got to prove it with the documentation, with the ability of our reporting to be accurate and to be auditable. And a tool to get us, to compliment, again, as I said earlier, that hard work that's already being done is a solution like Celonis. Yeah.

Robert M. Speer

>> I would add to that, that's important, because again, we always fall back on our roots, which is financial accountants and CFO. I was basically the equivalent of CFO of the Army. He was the DCFO of defense, but financial audits are beyond just what happened in the past. It is the accuracy and the timeliness of the data for decision making. If the data's not right, I can't do the things I need to the future to better perform. So it's not only the accuracy and the transparency, which is important to Congress and our stakeholders, American population, but it's also important to the war fighter that the data I'm giving you, whether it's logistical or financial that this is based upon, is actionable data that make a decision.

Tom Steffens

>> As a kid in high school learning accounting for the first time, there are two types of accounting, financial and managerial. The financial we look at, for us, that's the upward reporting to the treasury and Congress, right? But to Bob's point, that managerial accounting is also important. Why? That informs the leadership. Are we making good cost informed decisions? And what's, again, a Celonis solution will much, much better inform that.

Rob Strechay

>> I think again, one of the common themes that's gone across almost every guest that we've had on that's been a customer guest has really been bringing together a process intelligence language that is common, a common language across different silos. How has that really been? And when you look at the Department of War and the US Army, again, you have still different parts of it, I'm sure, that you have to bring along and to get speaking the same language.

Tom Steffens

>> So great point. Because of those silos and because of those processes, so acquisition, logistics, I believe we have to go in and kind of prove a point here. What process intelligence does, it actually gives us a receipt. It gives us our, it's a show your work type of thing, right? So you can with confidence go into, let's just say acquisition, and say, "Well, do you realize that when you're processing a purchase order, that you're really doing it about four different ways? And oh, by the way, the data that you're providing isn't exactly what we need. And the decisions you made on how to process that data, we really weren't involved maybe at the table on that upfront." Through the process intelligence, we really, again, getting to see ourselves as a whole, not just the accounting function, but the whole and how that affects us is vitally important. And so you can now go with authority and say, "This is what you're doing here." And it's pretty hard to argue against that, right?

Rob Strechay

>> Yeah.

Robert M. Speer

>> Yeah, Ken, I would agree 100% with what Tom just said. I would add to it goes back to the outputs once again. I mean, most governmental and even your Department of War is there for the trust and the security of the nation. And you have outcomes that you're given resources to produce. Now if the business processes and the outcomes, I can show them I'm doing them effectively, I'm doing it efficiently, I can show that through the business processes also. And I can adapt innovation and change to even approve that, because I now understand the process intelligence.

Rob Strechay

>> Yeah.

Tom Steffens

>> And the key proving is, improving that business process and making more efficient enhances readiness. And if you want to get the senior leader's attention, the tactical senior leader, the senior leadership, if we're improving readiness, we're doing great things.

Rob Strechay

>> Yeah. I mean, I think that you actually hit on a really good point. And I think it's one of these things, I mean, being the DCFO, former DCFO, when you look at that, you still, like you said, you have to balance some of the financial stewardship, but how do you also balance the financial stewardship with experimentation and innovation as people go forward? And how does Celonis help kind of do those balancing acts?

Tom Steffens

>> I think, sir, I'll steal your transformation and play your tick, right, philosophy, is that you've heard this thing, we'll build the airplane while you fly. But really what it is, you have to transform it while you're in process, right? While you're continuing operations. You're not going to be able to change a major legacy system overnight, but what can you do? So what measured solutions do we have? And that's really the important thing, and informing leadership and prioritize that. Where are the major areas where you can do the most benefit early on? And looking at those processes. You're not going to change everything overnight, but I think what process intelligence does, what are the most vital things you can change?

Robert M. Speer

>> It also allows me to do it quicker. It allows me to do it across a large entity faster. If you can imagine every time the Department of the Army wants to fill a new weapons system, they want to change and improve a personnel system or they want to change a financial system, if I can add to it process intelligence and I can add new tools from an artificial intelligence, I can now do it more efficiently and effectively, and I can show proof of concept. I could show some what-ifs in there too. What if I do this change in the process? What's that do down range? I don't have to try it over three years to find out it doesn't work.

Rob Strechay

>> Right. It gives you that ability to go beyond do more of the predictive aspect where you were talking before, getting beyond analytics and BI and just pretty dashboards and stuff like that, real actionable data. I think one of the things, I'll start with you, Bob, is that really, when you look at these initiatives across just thousands of peoples and program, from your perspective, when you look at process intelligence, how do you get to that scale? Because I think that to me is just mind-boggling with the Department of War and even just the US Army portion of it is massive.

Robert M. Speer

>> Yeah. Again, another great question is part of the challenge we've had in Department of Defense, War, and now the Army is we call them the ends to end. You've probably heard, the ends end, where it's hire to retire, it's procure to pay. A lot of those go across the multifunctional. It goes from acquisition to personnel to pay to logistics. And when you now across, I can show the process end to end, I can make things happen better. I can get it on a common language. I can show somebody in the acquisition world, when you do this this way, it impacts me on the logistical side this way, and it produces this financial data. Now I've got a little clarity of speaking and understanding from different functional areas, and then it lets things happen more transparently and more quickly across what you want the desired outcome to be.

Rob Strechay

>> Yeah. I was going to say the same thing, because you have to deal with even just more than just the army. You're looking at it with the other branches as well.

Tom Steffens

>> One of the challenges that we have with financial management is dependencies we have on other service providers, whether it be, we work very closely with the Defense Finance Accounting Service, who supports us from the financial and accounting support of us and logistics. And so those dependencies are very important for those services, and it's key for them to have visibility, shared visibility, right? We call the term common operating picture. Well, really, this is really a common process analytics picture, so to speak, that we would have. Wow, I didn't realize that my actions in logistics are impacting your actions here. And so again, not just for accounting, but just overall business process to again, improve readiness.

Rob Strechay

>> Yeah. Again, I look at it and just there's so many learnings that have gone on this week from customers and people who really just love process and love making it easier. And I think making it an enabler, not an inhibitor. I'll go to both of you. We'll start with you, Bob. What's a piece of advice that you would give to any other public sector about, hey, how do you go get started? Because you got to, I call it crawl, walk, run, right? I mean, try to keep it simple.

Robert M. Speer

>> That's very good. Matter of fact, it's funny. We talked about crawl, walk, run, or just begin. I hate to use even the Nike, just do it. You've got to start. What I like right now is Department of Navy's starting to try some of this stuff. The Department of Defense Logistics Agency is doing some with Celonis. And so you got to go at it first and gain, if you will, trust. So let me show you that I can truly show where your process intelligence and what's happening. And so begin. You've got to begin and do it and then show success, and as you get success, it breeds upon itself and it will expand.

Tom Steffens

>> So he said, "Just do it. " And I say, "Do something." All right? Let's take an incremental approach, get started. Convince your leadership that going this route is important. Start to incrementally change the culture to accept this.

Rob Strechay

>> Yeah. I agree. I couldn't agree more. I think doing nothing is not, and hope is not a strategy.

Robert M. Speer

>> There you go.

Rob Strechay

>> I totally agree. Thank you, sirs, for coming on board, and thank you for your service. Really appreciate it and hope to see you back here next year.

Robert M. Speer

>> Ken, we look forward to it. Thanks.

Tom Steffens

>> Pleasure. Thanks, Rob.

Rob Strechay

>> And thank you for watching this episode of Celosphere by Celonis, here live from Munich. We'll be back with a little bit more and wrap things up. See you soon.