What can North America learn from Asia and the Pacific? Perhaps contrary to the stereotypical image of countries like Singapore or China, or even the self-perception of North Americans themselves as the frontline of technological advancement, today’s guest on theCUBE, from the SiliconANGLE Media team, can attest to the advanced technology and availability of Wi-Fi in Asia and the Pacific, and how legacy companies including Oracle help its customers tune into local cultures.

“In North America we talk about ‘mobile first,’” said Yazad Dalal, senior director of HCM Transformation at Oracle. “In Asia-Pacific, that phrase doesn’t even exist because it’s a given; everything is already mobile first.” He spoke of an almost overnight shift from landlines to smartphones without a transitional period.

Dalal was interviewed by John Furrier (@furrier) and Peter Burris (@plburris), hosts of theCUBE, during Oracle OpenWorld. taking place at the Moscone Center in San Francisco, CA.

Happy employees = happy customers?

One lesson that companies in Asia and the Pacific are taking away from their North American counterparts is the importance of employee satisfaction. While companies often center their mantras around happy customers, many don’t realize or underestimate the impact a happy employee can have on customer relations. If your employees are happy, they’ll stay longer, work harder, perform better and increase customer satisfaction as much as 65 percent, Dalal stated.

Even companies that realize the importance of having happy employees may have a hard time actually implementing a new culture fostering such happy employees, noted Dalal. That’s where Oracle excels, he said, and this culture mindset comes into place. It’s important to design and sell technology not just for the tech department, but rather to management and the department impacted.

This is why Oracle works to hire people not necessarily with a technological background, but those who are leaders in the department, like Dalal is in Human Resources.

Technology updates

With technology ranging from apps that can take data off a photo of a receipt and upload it to expense reports to sharing solutions for problems worldwide, Oracle is working to keep up with customers’ demands, Dalal explained.

There are endless possibilities on the horizon, he shared, including an HR version of Pokemon Go for training at a new job. But the biggest “next thing” is companies caring about and checking in on their employees’ health and wellness, Dalal stated.

Watch the complete video interview below, and be sure to check out more of SiliconANGLE and theCUBE’s coverage of Oracle OpenWorld.

(* Disclosure: Oracle and other companies sponsor some OpenWorld segments on SiliconANGLE Media’s theCUBE. Neither Oracle nor other sponsors have editorial control over content on theCUBE or SiliconANGLE.)

Photo by SiliconANGLE