One of your employees asks if they can take a holiday another week than originally agreed. Another requests to have his next of kin changed in the event of accidents. But where is the list of dependents, the holiday overview, and what does the employment contract actually say about holiday? And isn't there something to the fact that one of the key employees has a birthday soon?
You may know the above situation or parts of it. Information can be hard to find when you need it most.
That's how it is when you run a business. But unlike so much other information, there are special rules for the information that concerns your employees and that falls under HR.
There are several pitfalls of manual HR administration:
The primary one is that you quickly lose control of your employees' master data. The information is scattered in many different places, tucked away in drawers and physical folders, or stored in various programs and email inboxes, where it is not updated nearly as often as it should be.
In addition, there is legislation, rules, and regulations in the area. The GDPR provisions protecting sensitive personal information must be complied with. Perhaps you also have an internal policy or other reasons why some information requires discretion and special handling, while others do not. Therefore, it is very important that one's data processing and storage is compliant with both GDPR and any internal policies.
However, as may be the case in small companies, there may not be an HR department or HR employee who handles this area. The responsibility thus falls to the boss, who hardly has time to take care of the time-consuming and heavy registration process, and therefore the ball is pushed on to individual department heads, who may interpret the rules differently or do not possess the necessary expertise.
This is how HR administration in practice can quickly end up being handled in different ways without a chrome-plated overview. And that without the practice being approved from above by a professional responsible.
This can all lead to problems in the long term, especially if the GDPR legislation is not complied with, but an unmanageable and uncertain practice can also lead to large amounts of wasted time and be a burden on employees. It can also lead to unwanted situations, such as an employee finding that their birthday or anniversary is not being marked for the simple reason that two calendars were not integrated into the same system. It's not a nice situation to be in.
"Poor data management can lead to dissatisfaction and, in the worst case, stress - for both managers and employees. Therefore, a good digital solution is preferable.”
The solution:
Having one place where all data is entered and can be searched is a smart and easy way to avoid the above problems and frustrations. Having a unified HR system will both simplify the process, facilitate administration, and make the collection of data more manageable. At the same time, it makes it easier for the employees, managers, and management to find relevant information, just as it will free up time from manual collection and entry.
Another positive consequence is that it also makes a good impression on the outside. For example, it will be a better experience for new employees that they do not have to go through numerous programs and documents to gather related knowledge but can use a single platform. And then it signals professionalism and profit on the part of the employer. Because even if you are a small company, you are expected to be in control of your HR administration.
