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A director’s guideGaining efficiency through HR technologyAn information guide

2 ©Access 2010. E&OE. Version 1

IntroductionThe evolution of HR HR’s remit has changed a lot sinceyesteryear. While some HR managersare still expected to hire, fire, evenoffer tea and sympathy, most arepredominantly focused on becomingbusiness partners, pushing strategy,not paper.

As HR has evolved from satellitefunction to central hub, HR solutionshave evolved apace. The best HRsoftware no longer operates separatelyfrom the daily running of the businessbut is strategically aligned with it.

Greater visibilityToday’s solutions – often referred to asHRIS (Human Resources InformationSystems) are designed to give youvisibility of every area of yourorganisation. Utilising the latesttechnology, they provide you with theaccurate and timely information youneed to lower costs and improveemployee return on investment.

And while you may know a fair bitabout HRIS systems, it’s often astruggle to command stakeholderinterest. This paper is designed todemonstrate how you can do just that.

About this guideThis guide is split into four key areas:

1. Key functions p1

How today’s integrated solutions canhelp you better manage key areas ofyour organisation. Includes checkliststo help you identify the functions ofyour ideal system.

• Legislation & compliance p2

• Recruitment & selection p2

• Learning & development p3

• HR reporting p3

• Business intelligence p3

• Self-service p3

• Payroll p4

• Document management p4

• Health & safety p4

• Absence p4

2. Signs you’ve outgrown yourexisting software p2

• Identifying the factors p5

• Identifying the impact p5

3. How to select a new HR solution p6

• The research process p6

• Partnering p6

• Choose your project team p6

• Choosing the technology p6

• Requesting a demo p7

4. Implementation p7

• Key stages p7

1. Key functionsLegislation & complianceFrom the introduction of the ‘fit note’to the knock-on tax and salaryeffects of anticipated publicspending cuts, managing compliancein 2010 looks no less complex than inprevious years. Indeed, the riskassociated with managingincreasingly complex legislation is akey concern for many organisations.Most regulations involve significantreporting requirements – mistakescould lead to penalties, fines, and atworse, lawsuits – all of which havetime and cost implications.

The good news is that today’s HRsolutions are designed to make keepingon top of your company’s legalobligations as straightforward aspossible. Good vendors will keep youinformed of changes in tax andemployment law so you can determinewhat applies to your organisation.

Software releasesMore importantly, they will releaseversions of the software that enableyou to easily gather the informationrequired for reporting.

Most systems cover standardprocedures, so finding the functionalityyou need shouldn’t be too difficult – butmake sure that updates are supplied toyou regularly and in a straightforwardformat, for example, downloadable viathe internet or email.

While this list is not exhaustive, thefollowing gives you an idea ofimportant legislation that may berelevant to your organisation:

• ISA Registration (IndependentSafeguarding Authority – replacesCRM)

• Immigration and Asylum

• Fit Note

• Maternity

• Paternity

• SIR (Further Education sector)

Recruitment & selectionHiring is back on the agenda for mostorganisations. Yet as you’ve probablyexperienced yourself, the fiercecompetition for places doesn’t makerecruiting any easier. Compound thecurrent job market with thecomplexities of the recruitment process– typically involving many stakeholdersand far too much paperwork – and it’sno wonder that recruitment is often themost costly process within HR itself.

Workflow and automationBut it doesn’t have to be so. Today’s HRsystems optimise the end-to-endrecruitment procedure by automatingthe workflow around each stage ofthe process. By decreasing the timetaken to get positions ‘out there’, andby making it easier for applicants toapply and recruiters to respond, youget to focus on the key attributes ofthe applicants and which recruitmentmethods yield the best results.

A recruitment solution should fit withyour organisation, whetherresponsibility is largely HR-owned ordevolved to managers. In other words,it should enable all participants tointeract with the software at therelevant stages of the process – andthat goes for recruitment agenciesand applicants too.

Online recruitmentWhether using agencies or not, animportant consideration is the abilityto advertise (and accept CVs) online.This not only enables you to attractthe broadest audience, but reducesadmin, cuts paper waste and ensuresyou can provide the fastest possibleresponse to potential talent.

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Good HR software will enable you to:

• Create vacancies

• Manage the hire process

• Enable applicants to apply online

• Provide web access for agencies

• Monitor success, costs and equalopportunities

• Generate bulk correspondence bypost or email

• Advertise/retain details ofspeculative candidates

Learning & developmentEven in a period of economic recovery,there are compelling reasons toprovide quality staff training – notleast because your best talent willsteer you through times of difficulty.

If you are unable to provide the levelof training they expect, then they’relikely to look elsewhere – a factsupported by the 2009 NationalManagement Survey which foundthat 46% of staff blame a lack oftraining opportunities as a reason forleaving their organisation.1

Equally, you want to be sure that thetraining you’re providing youremployees is strategically alignedwith your business objectives. Someorganisations for example providefree training on the basis that themember of staff stays with thecompany for a specified time period.

Managing overlapThe key to managing this effectivelyis choosing a HR system that givesyou visibility of the linked areas oftraining, learning & developmentand performance management.

As these areas impact each other, youcan then see where the skills gaps are,closely monitor activities undertakenand maximise your knowledge of youremployees’ abilities. A good HR systemwill give you detailed analysis of costs,attendance and effectiveness, all ofwhich will help ensure you gainmaximum ROI per employee.

Some of the key learning &development functionality to look forincludes:

• Training course administration

• Online booking

• Ability to cater for CPD membership

• Integration with Microsoft Office(for diarising)

• Online appraisals (includingcompetency models)

• NVQs

• Skills search and management

HR reporting According to a survey by talentmanagement company Taleo, providingleadership with better managementinformation and reporting is one of thetop three-ranked challenges for HRprofessionals in 2010.2

The first step to efficient, pain-freereporting is having a system thatholds all employee information inone place. This not only savessignificant time pulling informationfrom separate sources but ensuresthe information you’re analysing isaccurate. Any system should give youcomplete visibility andstraightforward analysis of all thefollowing:

• Personnel details (includingdiversity, work permits andemployment checks)

• Job and salary history (includingmultiple jobs, salary scales andbands)

• Employment details (including exitinterviews and Ts & Cs)

• Disciplinary and grievance(including stage tracking anddocuments)

• Skills and competencies (linked totraining and appraisals)

• Absence and holidays (includingwork patterns, LOS, part-timecalculations)

• Health & safety (including accidentreporting and medicals)

• Benefits, pension, fleetmanagement, P11D

• Salary modelling

• Organisational structure (e.g. byemployee, department and division,headcounts and turnover).

Business intelligenceOne of the key drivers behind today’sgeneration of HR software is to delivertimely, accurate information when andwhere it’s needed. Closely related toreporting but going beyond it,Business intelligence takes manyforms including Excel based add-ins,user-friendly report writers and mostrecently, web-based dashboards.

Dashboards draw information held inyour wider HR system and presentspecific KPIs such as headcount,turnover, training needs andrecruitment analysis. The ability todrill-down into the source dataensures that decision-makers canquickly spot any issues and get to theroot of any problems quickly.

See what you need toThe power of this type of reportinglies in its configurability and ease ofuse. For example, a good systemwould have the ability to providedifferent dashboard views to you, yourHR team, your staff and management,all presented in graphical formats andupdated in real-time.

The following gives you an idea of thefunctionality to look out for:

• User-configurable views

• Real-time information

• Information delivered via a range ofgraphical formats (charts, gauges,listings, rolling presentations etc)

• Ability for dashboards toincorporate information fromexternal sources (e.g. RSS feeds)

Self-serviceOver the last few years, demand forself-service functionality has grownsignificantly – understandably, givenits ability to help organisations do farmore with less.

Self-service works primarily by savingtime. It takes information held in yourbusiness system and makes it easilyavailable, both to view or to edit –typically via a web browser foranytime access. Useful for both staffand managers, self-service can bedeployed across your organisation andcan be made to fit with your existingways of working, for example, as anextension of your company intranet.

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Manager self-serviceManager self-service cuts down thetime taken to carry out administrationsuch as approving staff holiday,timesheets and training requests. Itcan also show this information viaeasy-grasp formats, enablingmanagers to view KPIs relating totheir department’s turnover, sickness,headcount or budget spend.

Self-service for staffFor employees, self-service reducesadministration within the HRdepartment, dispersing tasks outinto the wider organisation. Forexample, this would enable yourstaff to enter their own trainingrequests, self-certification forms andholiday bookings.

With the responsibility for enteringinformation into self-service lying withthe employee and not HR, it’s easy tosee how self-service can speed theflow of accurate information into thesystem. What’s more, the ability toaccess information that’s important tostaff such as payslips, P60s, holiday,training, and appraisals, is a powerfulway to improve communication andempower employees.

Good software providers will provide awide range of self-service specificprocesses. However, some of the mostcommon ones include:

• Holiday/planned absence requestsand authorisation

• Training requests and authorisation

• Online appraisals

• Sickness self-certification

• Vacancy requests and authorisation

• Timesheets

PayrollOne of the key drivers in HR softwareis the ability to share commoninformation with other departments– payroll in particular. Aligning thesetwo systems will smooth out spikesof work associated with, for example,the ‘onboarding’ of new starters andupdates to employee information,reducing duplication and improvingaccuracy.

Seamless data transferPayroll systems obviously vary but thegood HR providers will enable thisinformation to be transferredseamlessly between the two areas ofthe business. This stands whether thepayroll is held in a separate softwarepackage or via an electronic interfacewith a payroll bureau. Integrating witha payroll from the same productfamily as your HR solution has theadvantage of linking dynamically,including for example, a full workflowfor the authorisation and update ofHR information to the payroll.

For advice on selecting a payrollsolution, click here.

Just some of the information youshould be able to share with payrollinclude:

• New starter/leaver information

• Employee names and addresses

• Job/organisation details

• Bank and salary details

Document managementFrom training documents to CVs,spreadsheets to correspondence, HR ispacked with documents, paper-basedand otherwise. As your businessgrows, the ability to store thesedocuments centrally is therefore key tothe overall efficiency of your operation.This not only reduces paper and waste,but enables fast retrieval, howevermany employees you have.

Some of the functions to look forinclude:

• Ability to support all standard filetypes (e.g. PDF, Word, Excel andimage files, as well as scanned hardcopy documents)

• Ability to locate documents byindividual and content

• Search facilities by category, author,date range

• Search CVs by keywords (e.g.applicants and employees)

• Ability to hold non-employeespecific documents (e.g. policiesand job descriptions)

Health & safetyWhether you operate out of an officeor a factory, no business can affordnot to maintain up-to-date healthand safety records. But time-consuming, paper-basedadministration often meansinformation is recorded long afterthe event, leading to inaccurate orincomplete records.

A HR solution makes the processmuch simpler by providing you with aweb-based accident book. Via self-service, staff and managers can goonline to enter the informationrequired, capturing all the informationneeded in just a few minutes.

Health & safety reportingGood systems will enable you to sliceand dice this data any way you require,enabling you to report incidents by, forexample, type, employee, anddepartment as well as providingspecific Health and Safety analysis suchas Riddor reporting. This way, you havethe complete visibility of informationneeded to reduce and manage riskswithin your organisation.

AbsenceReducing the cost of absence isperhaps the key priority for anyorganisation investing in a new HRsolution. But before you can make adent in absence figures, you of courseneed an accurate way to record andmonitor absence-related information.

Key issuesResearch by IRS for XpertHR suggeststhat this is problematic for asubstantial amount of companies. Ina recent survey, 36% of respondentsexperiencing problems with absencerecords and of those, ‘inadequateabsence information recorded’ and‘inaccurate records’ came in top with74% and 66% of employersencountering problems respectively.3

Absence self-serviceThe priority of a good HR solutiontherefore is to make collecting thisinformation as easily and cost-effectively as possible. Self-service isideal for this.

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Via a web-based interface, thistechnology enables staff to requestabsence of any conceivable type (e.g.holidays, doctor’s appointments,hospital visits) and for managers toquickly record sickness and otherunplanned absences. Being web-based, staff and managers alike canaccess the system easily, at any time,helping speed the flow of informationinto the central system.

AuthorisationAll good systems will provide anauthorisation workflow to ensure thatall absence requests are approvedprior to updating your HR solution.Requests should be able to passthrough as many levels as requiredand take a precise route around yourcompany – even if an approver if onholiday themselves! (see below formore about workflow).

Analysing absenceThe ability to view this informationvisually (for example, as a calendar) isanother highly useful feature. Seeingat-a-glance who is in the office for thedays and weeks ahead is invaluablewhen planning workloads, and duringthe absence authorisation process.

Ultimately you need this information asa report and a good vendor will be ableto accommodate what you need to seeand how you need to see it. For example,if Bradford Factor analysis is importantto your HR strategy, you should be ableto get this data on-demand, whether viastandard reports or user-friendlyBusiness intelligence tools.

WorkflowAs we’ve seen with self-service, today’sHR software enables us to re-engineerour existing processes and make themwork how we want them to – not howthey’ve always been. Workflowtechnology plays a key part in this.

For example, using workflow tools,you could create a series of steps toensure company-specific processesalways take place in a certain way.Appraisals, for example, mightinvolve the HR manager, a linemanager and the employee.

Workflow would allow for therequired information to be captured,authorised and followed-upaccording to your organisation’sspecific policies and schedule.

FlexibilityGood systems enable you toincorporate any number of steps andfor processes to take place in parallel.This last point is particularly usefulduring the authorisation process, sinceit will automatically divertresponsibility for approvals to anotherperson in the chain – for example, ifthe main approver is on holiday.

When choosing a HR system, ensurethat it gives you the freedom todesign workflows yourself withoutthe need for additional consultancy.A system based on the WindowsWorkflow Foundation (WWF) is ideal,since it lets you design processesusing Windows’ familiar and intuitive‘drag and drop’ tools.

2. Signs you’ve outgrownyour HR softwareIdentifying the factorsAll organisations, however small, relyon some form of system to managetheir HR operations. And as you mayhave discovered yourself, the timecomes when this existing system nolonger measures up. For somecompanies, it’s business growth thatdrives the change from a paper-based system to an electronic one.For others, it’s the lack offunctionality that’s the catalystbehind a new modern system.

The previous section should havegiven you some ideas about how amodern HR system can help youovercome any challenges that youcurrently face. But to help youfurther, we’ve summarised a list ofquestions to help you understandwhere your existing software may beholding you back:

• How much time is spentmaintaining personnel records,recording timesheets, runningpayroll, appraisals, maintaining acorporate training curriculum etc?

• Can your system deal with flexibleworking/part time staff (e.g.automatically calculating pro-ratedholiday)

• Are you relying onspreadsheets/pulling informationfrom multiple databases to run thereports that you need?

• Can you easily report on theinformation required to fulfill yourlegislative requirements?

• How much re-keying is being doneto maintain multiple systems (e.g.HR, payroll, recruitment andtraining databases?)

• What would the bottom linebenefits be if real-time data wasavailable throughout your entireorganisation?

Identifying the impactsOnce you’ve identified that yourexisting HR system is no longer fit forpurpose – the next step is to work outthe tangible impacts of not changing.To get you started, here are some youmay want to consider:

• Manual recruitment processes tieup key employees on recruitmenttasks, meaning a loss of efficiencyelsewhere, increased time to hire,greater internal resource andlimited visibility of recruitmenteffectiveness

• Poor systems to manage absencecan mean limited visibility onabsence days, leading to highernumber of lost days and no way ofspotting frequent offenders

• Insufficient process for employeetraining and development may leadto lower productivity, lower output,loss of skills and knowledge, higherstaff turnover and an increasedrequirement for recruitment

• Lack of integration between HRand payroll means time is tied upin duplicate tasks e.g. processingemployee information such aspersonnel updates, new startersand leavers. Information is neverin sync, leading to inaccuratereporting

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• Personnel information e.g.appraisals, learning anddevelopment documentation isheld separately to personnelrecords, meaning lack of visibility,communications and reportingacross all areas of the organisation

• Days (and costs) are consumed inHR as staff spend their timeperforming mundane, manual taskssuch as entering personal detailsand recording sickness, when theycould be adding value to thebusiness

• Too many manual processes,duplication and re-keying of datawhich is costly from a processperspective, causes errors, andmeans there is no “single view ofthe truth”

• Bottlenecks in the HR process causedelays in workflow, e.g. holidayrequests, impacting staffengagement

• Risk is increased without an easyway to collect all the relevantinformation required for legislativereporting and compliance

Conduct a cost analysisBased on the inefficiencies identifiedabove, you can begin a cost analysis ofcurrent processes. This will help todetermine time intensive activitiesbuilt into the current HR system andweigh these against the bottom-linebenefits of a new system.

While many time-savings are usuallythe easiest (and most compelling)benefits to clarify, your case should alsoinclude an assessment of intangiblebenefits. In fact, most of these may turnout to convert to the bottom line – forexample, an increase in staff retentionthrough the provision of stimulatingand targeted training.

Your cost analysis can also be used tobenchmark the success of your new HRsystem – an exercise that you’ll need toundertake on a regular basis as yoursystem and needs grow and evolve.

3. How to select a new HRsolutionThe research processWith many suppliers offeringseemingly similar functionality, it canbe difficult to know where to start.

To help you in your search, we’ve comeup with a list of questions to ask. Itshould give you a good idea of whichvendors should be on your shortlist –and those that definitely shouldn’t!

• How long have you been inbusiness? Check that you aredealing with an established vendor

• How many HR installs have youcompleted? A greater number ofinstalls means a higher likelihoodof encountering and fixing a broadrange of customer issues

• Do you develop your own softwareor resell on behalf of a softwareauthor? The former has theadvantage of a ‘straight through’ lineto the software developer but checkhow this support will be provided

• Do you serve other organisations inmy industry? Any provider worthconsidering will be able to provide arange of customer casestudies/testimonials

• Do you have a reference site in mysector? The ability to ask existingclients about their experiences withboth the system and provider mayprove decisive in the final stages ofnegotiation. Some of the questionsto ask include:

• Was the implementation completed on time and within budget?

• Would you recommend the product?

• How was the vendor at explaining technical issues?

• Were you delivered what was promised?

• What do your users like most/least about the software?

• What training do you offer?However well-designed, there willbe an inevitable learning curve asnew users get to grips with thesoftware. Satisfactory answers tothe following will ensure that thisprocess is as pain-free as possible:

• Does you offer full product training?

• Would you be able to provide training at our site?

• Can you tailor the training to meet different end user requirements? How would you go about that?

• What support methods do youoffer? A hotline is the veryminimum you should expect. Askabout opening hours and responsetimes as well as the ability toprovide remote (internet based)support and on-site consultancy forthose more complex issues.

• What’s covered in the cost of myannual licence? How are updatescharged for?

• How do I ensure my software stayscompliant? All suppliers shouldcomply with the legislationavailable at the time of release, butit’s important to check that theseupdates are made regularly, and inan accessible format.

The importance of partneringPartnering with the right vendor is keyto ensuring that your HRimplementation is a success.Understanding the limitations of yourexisting system – and quantifyingwhat you want to achieve – is a greatstep in the right direction.

A good vendor will not object to beingthoroughly interviewed about howtheir proposed solution can effectivelyreach your company’s expectations.Include HR administrators andmanagers in the process to increasebuy-in and personal responsibility forthe overall decision. This process willmake it easy to see if there are anygaps between the expected benefitsand actual software capabilities.

Choose your project teamInvolving a cross-section of people is keyto the success of your implementation.After all, your aim is to implement asolution that benefits your entirebusiness – not just the chosen few! Thismeans involving a mix of primary users- that’s you, your HR team (if you haveone), finance and IT, as well as secondaryusers (management and staff).

Your aim is to find willingrepresentatives from each divisionwho will become product champions,playing an active role in shaping thesolution as your organisation evolves.

Choose the technologyChoosing the right platform for yournew solution will depend on manyfactors, not least your size, your businessprocesses, your users and your budget.

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Simply, you have the choice betweenserver-based solutions (where thesoftware is installed and maintainedon your site) or hosted (softwareaccessed and maintained via theinternet).

Depending on the functionality youchoose, you may require a mix of thetwo. Both have their pros and cons; agood vendor will talk you throughwhat’s right for you.

Whichever option you go for, ensurethat the system is easy to maintain,since this will reduce your ongoingcost of ownership. For example, aweb-based, .NET solution gives yousignificant flexibility, allowing you toshape your solution in-housewithout extended consultancy.

Request a demoBy now, you should have a good ideaabout which vendors to shortlist. Thenext step is to schedule ademonstration of the software so thatyou can see it in action!

Asking vendors to demonstrateexamples of your more pressing issueswill help you compare systems side-by-side; the best suppliers will recreatethese scenarios so that you get a realfeel for how it’ll work in real life.

4. ImplementationHaving chosen a vendor and signedthat all-important contract, the nextstage is to get the implementationunderway. While software is obviouslya vital tool for your business, ensuringthat the project is delivered on timeand to budget requires professionalproject management.

The following covers the key stagesof a typical implementation plan soyou know what to expect; a goodvendor will be able to scale this up ordown according to the size and scaleof your project.

Phase 1 – pre-project planningEnsures stakeholders and projectteam know exactly what’s requiredand when.

• Assign consultant

• Establish deadlines andrequirements

• Determine approach

Phase 2 – configure & installThe system is configured to matchyour required business processes.

• Install software

• Map data

• Identify reporting & securityrequirements

• Cleanse data and convert

Phase 3 – trainingExposes key users to the software andensures requirements listed in theselection process are met.

• On-site user training

• Supply support documents &workbooks

• Go live

Phase 4 – supportWays to ensure you continue to gain areturn on your HR investment.

• Account management

• Personal helpdesk support

• Remote support

• Ongoing consultancy

• Optional user groups and training

• Regular correspondence e.g.newsletters

About usAccess will give you the advice, toolsand clarity you need to make effectivedecisions, quickly and with certainty.As both a business-focusedconsultancy and a specialist softwaredeveloper, we combine our innovativesoftware with practical experience todeliver a solution that’s exactly rightfor you and your business.

You can rely on us to provide you witha solution that’s simple, proven andrelevant to your company. We haveover fifteen years’ experience ofdeveloping software here in the UKand our regional consultants havetailored and implemented thissoftware all over the UK and in Ireland.The expertise we’ve gained gives us anunbeatable ability to accurately assessyour needs and deliver maximumimpact with ease and confidence.

We believe your solution must beready for the future, as well as rightfor today. Because your business willconstantly evolve, we provide asoftware solution that grows withyou. Our modular software covers acomplete range of business, financialand administration processes andcan be flexed to give you the preciseview of your business that you needat any time.

Our supportive consultants combinetheir first-class software expertisewith in-depth industry knowledge toconstantly improve and simplify yourbusiness processes so that yoursolution delivers maximum value anda continual return on investment. With Access, you can be sure you’vegot the clarity you need to reach yourbusiness goals.

We hope you have found this guide ofuse. You can find out more about ourHR and payroll solutions atwww.selecthr.co.uk. For further detailson Access, please contact MattNewman on 0845 345 3300 or keepup-to-date by following Access ontwitter:www.twitter.com/theaccessgroup.

References1 Spellman, R. Carry on training. The HRDirector. Issue 64. p16.

2 Woods, D. Challenge of doing more withless. Human Resources. February 2010. p12

3 Personnel Today. 16 February 2010. p23

consulting | software | solutions www.theaccessgroup.com