ebook hr automation: 5 ways to raise your game

Five ways to raise your HR game

E B O O K

HR automation: 5 ways to raise your game

Why automation is a gamechanger for HR and People teams

Five ways to raise your HR game 2

Why is automation a game-changer? With automation, HR and People teams can free up 30% of their teams’ time, allowing them to focus on what really matters: building great experience for their people.

Just as Personnel evolved to become HR in the 1980’s, so HR is now changing to become a ‘People’ function, an organisation in which people are the most valuable asset and company success is contingent upon a successful workforce. Forward-thinking leaders are embracing the changing face of HR and getting ahead by automating processes to free up their HR teams, enabling them to focus on their people.

In this eBook, we’ll explore how automation and technology play a vital role in transitioning a traditional HR function to a modern HR and People function, in support of the transformation to a People Company. We’ll explain the benefits of automation for your People function, workforce experiences and your business overall.

Moreover, we’ll break down the five key outcomes and ways you can raise your HR game by embracing an automation strategy in your team today.

Overview


Contents

Introduction 4

The benefits of HR automation 7

5 ways HR automation can raise your game 8

Futureproofing through automation 14

Some of the cost benefits of automation 15

Automation in action: What HR leaders say 16

Your next steps 17



The world of work continues to change Today’s workforce is more flexible, remote, mobile, and technology-enabled than ever. Everything is 24/7, on-demand and increasingly disparate. As a result, employee expectations are higher, and businesses need to be more responsive and adaptive than ever.

Five generations are now working together in the workplace, all with different skills and backgrounds. Alongside this is a growing contingent workforce, including freelancers, contractors, and gig workers. This presents new challenges for HR leaders, who must now manage a variety of expectations regarding how, when and where employees work in today’s shifting and complex work landscape.

Technology also continues to change its pace. We’ve become so accustomed to having everything at our fingertips, from switching on the heating using a smartphone to turning the lights on through voice recognition – and this expectation has reached the workplace as well. New technologies are also emerging, such as big data, machine learning and artificial intelligence, marking a distinct evolution in how we gather and interpret data, which in turn exposes us to meaning and patterns we couldn’t identify before. For HR, this evolution can completely transform a business’s understanding of its workforce and how it plans for the future.

Introduction


Introduction

Not only are workplace expectations changing, but so are the demands being placed on business leaders With a huge increase in, and demand for, remote, mobile, and flexible working, organisations have had to adapt – and fast. A global health pandemic acted as an unforeseen catalyst, accelerating digital transformation across the globe so that remote working is now the new normal for many.

New regulations, such as GDPR, are also impacting the way businesses manage the workforce data in their possession, thus driving new requirements and safeguards for employees. In addition, maximising employee output continues to be a challenge, with both productivity and engagement levels remaining stagnant.

With these rapidly shifting dynamics, businesses find themselves at a crossroad. The organisations that choose to embrace the changing nature of work and adapt have an opportunity to transform into a truly people-centric organisation, where employees are at the heart of what they do.

Many HR leaders are looking to modern HR technology to facilitate progress, and at the centre of this strategy lies automation. By applying automation throughout the employment life cycle, businesses can free up valuable HR time, deliver a much more engaging workforce experience and increase productivity across all functions.

If only this were as easy as giving voice-recognition home devices a spoken command. The reality is that most solutions struggle to keep up with the rapid pace of change in technology and digital processes and have become outdated and no longer adequate for today’s changing digital world of work. Leaders therefore must think carefully about the changes they wish to make and seek a solution that will not only solve their immediate problems but withstand the test of time as well.


Automation as a change agent in HR Automating HR processes is arguably one of the most beneficial investments a business can make. When you think about how time-consuming, repetitive, resource-intensive, and increasingly outdated transactional HR processes are, there is no denying that now is the time for change.

At the process level, automation streamlines many day-to-day manual administrative tasks, improving productivity and efficiency while reducing costs and the risk of human error. It frees up a significant amount of time for both HR teams and employees, empowering employees to focus on value-added tasks, and HR teams to be able to prioritise more strategic priorities for their people instead: things like building great workforce experiences.

McKinsey estimates that 60% of all job functions have 30% of activities that could be automated.2 Consider the impact your team could have if they had 30% more time to focus on employee experience, advance planning, and business success.


The benefits of HR automation

HR automation can transform how businesses operate and revolutionise workforce experiences for your people. The key to this success, though, lies in selecting a well-designed, innovative, and forward-looking solution that can evolve with you.Many older HCM solutions were designed simply to automate, whereas a more modern and comprehensive cloud HR and People solutions can do so much more.

Increase productivityStreamlined processes and automated workflows allow your HR team to spend less time on administrative tasks, reducing the risk of human error, and more time on high-value interactions, all the while improving productivity across the workforce with quicker and easier ways of working.

Deliver world-class workforce experiencesDeliver great experiences across the entire employment journey with intelligent automation during the on-boarding, operations, and off-boarding processes, all the while saving both time and money. HR and management can then focus on people, strategy, and innovation, resulting in greater engagement and business success.

Improve workforce visibilityWith automated reports and easy-to-consume dashboards from a single source of truth, you can streamline access to real-time people data. This in turn frees up HR staff to analyse the data, thus improving credibility with managers and the c-suite by providing actionable insights with more robust and pertinent recommendations.

Ensure both global and local compliance – and reduce human errorAutomation reduces the risk of human error, non-compliance, and penalties, with audit trails and workflows for the various types of legislation. Spend more time enforcing global policies and enabling managers to remain compliant.


Five outcomes you can expect from HR automation:

Five outcomes of HR automation

Great hiring

and onboarding experiences

Deliver a seamless and consistent hiring and onboarding journey, keeping new hires

engaged throughout, and reducing time to

competency.

1

An engaged and motivated

workforce Empower your

employees – as well as HR and People

teams – to do their best work.

3Empower

employees through

self-service Relieve your HR team

and managers of unnecessary

administration by giving employees ownership of their own information.

2Effective and

flexible performance management

Say goodbye to bulky time-consuming annual appraisals in favor of a more people-focused

approach.

4

Data-driven decision-making

Replace clunky board packs with accurate and

up-to-date interactive dashboards, offering

actionable insights at your fingertips.

5


1. Great hiring and onboarding experiences

Great hiring and onboarding experiences First impressions count. The hiring and onboarding journey is a perfect opportunity to make employees feel welcome, confident, and engaged. Moreover, great hiring, pre-boarding and onboarding experiences can significantly reduce the time required for employees to get up to speed with their role and begin adding value.

Not only that, but the onboarding process is also a significant and meaningful part of the employee journey, and one that can have serious consequences in terms of employee turnover if you get wrong. Employee turnover is highest in the first 45 days, and 69% of employees were found to be more likely to stay with an organisation for three years if they experienced a great hiring and onboarding experience.

Automated HR enables you to stay connected to employees from the point of application to their first few weeks, ensuring they’re engaged, excited and productive.

Deliver a seamless and consistent hiring and onboarding experience with automation: • Send personalised emails ahead of start dates, welcoming employees, directing them

to resources and getting them up-to-speed faster

• Obtain accurate employee details with no manual input from HR

• Streamline the hiring process with electronic signatures and automated reminders to complete tasks, without having to scramble

• Empower employees to understand policies and complete all mandatory training as early as possible

• Automate online forms, checklists, company videos and policies from an onboarding portal and track new employee progress

• Send timely surveys, helping you continually develop your on-boarding process in real-time


2. Empower employees through self-service

Empower employees through self-service Employees expect intuitive self-service technology in their everyday personal lives – such as online banking – why shouldn’t they have the same experience in their work lives too? Not only is it easier for employees and HR teams alike, freeing up time for the things that matter, but it empowers employees too.

Enabling your people to be self-sufficient with an automated, consumer-like, and intuitive system will help improve their workforce experience with simple-to-use technology, as well as lightening the administrative load for HR and People teams, ultimately boosting productivity.

Automated self-service in HR is also business-critical for managing and engaging remote workforces effectively. Surprisingly, however, just 24% of HR leaders Sage People recently polled in the changing face of HR research report said their team is currently using self-service. With a further over 60% of HR teams planning to adopt it in the next two years, however, this is likely to accelerate – and quickly. 3

Give employees ownership of their personal information with automated self-service:• Reduce HR requests, freeing up time to focus on more valuable interactions and

strategic planning

• Empower employees to securely manage their personal information, book leave and access confidential data, such as their pay advice

• Maintain accurate and up-to-date employee details, stored in a single accessible and secure location

• Enable your workforce to access company communications and policies from any device at any time

• Equip managers to approve leave requests and manage absences efficiently, with approval workflows and policies applied automatically

• Provide quick identification and contact details of colleagues across the business and in other regions


3. An engaged and motivated workforce

An engaged and motivated workforce Employees who feel engaged and motivated do their best work. This, is turn, increases productivity and profitability whilst improving customer experiences. By automating HR tasks across the entire employment life cycle, HR and People teams can spend more time on valuable interactions, as well as on planning for their employees’ future.

There’s still a lot of progress to be made on engagement, though. A worrying 62% of organisations haven’t seen an improvement in engagement over the last two years, and in many organisations, its going down.4

This is where automation offers huge benefits. Build seamless and personal experiences over the end-to-end employment journey, promote clear and regular two-way communication between the business and the workforce, and truly understand what employees really think of their workplace and employer, enabling you to act on feedback and respond iteratively.

Use automation to spend more time connecting and engaging with your workforce:• Stay connected to your people when they’re on the go with secure access on

any device

• Send targeted pulse surveys to better understand your levels of engagement and drivers across different groups

• Enable employees to provide recognition for their peers

• Improve employee engagement, productivity and retention while reducing absenteeism

• Allow HR and Managers to focus more on strategising, coaching, and mentoring

• Design basic or complex automated workflows to minimise administration for HR

• Supports leaders to effectively communicate business priorities and objectives as they evolve


4. Effective and flexible performance management

Effective and flexible performance management Traditional approaches to performance management, such as annual appraisals, are time-consuming and fast becoming outdated in today’s digital world of work. In fact, just a staggering 8% of companies believe their performance management process is highly effective at driving business value, and 58% feel it isn’t an effective use of time.5

Organisations have come to realise that traditional performance management processes are no longer fit for purpose. Instead, they’re turning towards a more sustainable approach centred on continuous conversations that yield regular, iterative improvements, resulting in greater engagement, productivity and organisational success.

With 80% of executives rating effective performance management as a high priority6, its crucial HR and People teams adapt and raise their game in this area. This is where automation plays a critical role.

Reinvent your approach to performance management with automation:• Automate regular and ad hoc review processes to capture performance conversations

at any time

• Align and track performance to individual goals, linking them to company objectives and comprehensive succession and compensation planning tools

• Capture and share instant colleague recognition and feedback at any time

• Use configurable performance overviews to easily access key performance data and insights

• Send customised dashboards to management, communicating performance throughout the business

• Understand who your key talent is, as well as the risks to the business should these individuals leave


5. Data-driven decision-making

Data-driven decision-making Obtaining accurate and accessible people-related data has long been a challenge for HR, yet it remains critical to the future success of a business.

With a single source of truth that is both reliable and accessible, organisations can instantly get a better view of their workforce, allowing for much smarter and faster decision-making. Yet, although 83% of HR leaders believe people decisions should be based on data and analytics, just 37% are doing this today.7

Automated analytics ensures vital decision-makers are receiving real-time insights from a single reliable source of truth to inform business-planning in real-time. It means you can show and monitor business metrics for the entire workforce that enable swift decision-making, and obtain the necessary information instantly, without compromising accuracy.

Get accurate, actionable insights at the click of a button with automation: • Receive real-time insights in an easy-to-consume format, tailored to

different audiences

• Spot potential business problems before they occur with early warning systems reporting and predictive insights

• View multiple pre-built global reports and dashboards on demand with a one-click refresh, from any device at any time

• Keep management informed across the business with scheduled reports and dashboards

• Enable managers to subscribe to reports notifying them of exceptions or conditional circumstances, such as high rates of absenteeism

• Allow for the rapid identification of trends using charts, tables and other graphics with data visualisation tools

14Five ways to raise your HR game 14

How prepared has your organisation been for recent, and unexpected, changes in today’s world of work? How prepared is it today for future changes? Automation plays a critical role in futureproofing your organisation and being able to respond rapidly to change when required.

Organisations must shift gears and respond to changes all the time – whether it’s a global health pandemic, shifting market conditions, or a changing economic climate – how companies prepare, respond, adapt and change course is key.

Automated technology is one of the ways organisations can be better prepared and resilient when faced with a range of unpredictable scenarios or changing situations. Cloud HR technology, specifically, provides businesses with an accessible and reliable way to continue managing, engaging and communicating with their workforce through any ongoing change or disruption, whilst also giving companies the ability to understand in real time what’s going on with their workforce through continuous feedback and up-to-the minute people analytics.

Futureproofing through automation


Some of the cost benefits of automation

30%

31%

<6months

90days

Free up 30% of your team’s time to reinvest in high-value and creative tasks, like creating great workforce experiences8.

Make your workforce 31% more productive using technology to enhance processes in a user-friendly way9.

Quickly generate ROI from an automation enabling HR system in less than six months10

Get set up and see the benefits of using a modern HR and People system in as little as 90 days11.


Automation in action: What HR leaders say

We immediately saw benefits, especially regarding efficiency and talent, with 20% initial reductions in administrative work.

Stacie AlexanderSenior Director, Human Resources,Worldwide Clinical Trials

Through the Sage People system, we’ve decreased the time needed to manage annual salary reviews by 50%.

Paula ParkerEhemals HR Director,AVEVA

Sage People gives us so much more value. Now we can easily find data, build reports, upload resources and generate real-time global visibility of our workforce.

Nicola ClarkHR Director,Ubisense

Using Sage People gives us the ability to do some of the hard work automatically and provide data to assist with decision-making in a timely manner.

Claire WebberHR Director,Lovehoney

Managers are saving time and effort, so they can focus on customers and their experience in our stores, and the need is gone for our people to call HR for things like address changes, benefit questions, review dates and more.

Cindy BurdtHR Director,Theisen’s

17Five ways to raise your HR game

Automation is a vital change agent in HR – at a time when the world of work is shifting more than ever, and organisations must be prepared to be resilient for the future. You know the benefits of automation, and how it can raise HR’s game, so what next?

Revolutionise, don’t evolve Automating processes is great – but the right technology doesn’t just enable you to automate existing processes, it can transform the value-add of HR by revolutionising how those processes work in the first place. Take advantage of that, so that you’re even better set up to get that 30% time-gain back.

Recognise it’s a journey Automation is part of a journey of transformation from HCM to People. Progressive, forward-thinking organisations understand automation is vital in this transition, but transformation doesn’t happen overnight. Identify your next steps and where you can use technology and automation to continue your journey from HR to People.

Leverage automation for change It’s vital to understand and communicate the importance of automation and cloud technology when considering the workforce experiences in today’s world of work. Not only is it virtually impossible to manage and engage a remote workforce without automation, it also boosts productivity with great intuitive experiences for employees.

Recognise, and adapt to, the changing face of HR Crucially, automation enables HR to make the change to People and become a different type of function. It’s the key you need, to liberate your teams from being an admin and process-focused, back office function, towards being strategic, employee-focused, and really driving the people agenda with force, powering change across the organisation.

Your next steps

Five ways to raise your HR game 18Five ways to raise your HR game

Sage People, as part of the Sage Business Cloud, improves how you attract, manage and retain your workforce.

Through smart and efficient automation, you can transform your entire workforce experience, improving productivity and freeing up your HR team to focus on growing your people and your business.

By automating the end-to-end people journey, Sage People provides the technology and services needed to embrace the new ways of working both today and into the future, in addition to growing as you do.

HR automation with Sage People


©️2020 Sage Global Services Limited or its licensors. All rights reserved. Sage, Sage logos, and Sage product and service names mentioned herein are the trademarks of Sage Global Services Limited or its licensors. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

1,2,8,9 McKinsey, Harnessing automation for a future that works3 Sage People, The changing face of HR research report4 HR.com, The state of employee engagement5 Deloitte,HumanCapitalTrendsreport6 HarvardBusinessReview,Theperformancemanagementrevolution7 SagePeople,BecomingaPeopleCompanyresearchreport10,11 Forrester, The total economic impact of Sage People

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