By Carol Duman
Director of Human Resources

HR’s Wish List for Automation
Empowering employees would make my professional life easier and I think it’s safe to say it would make life easier for my peers as well. When asked for my wish list, I quickly said employee self-service.

Employee self-service (ESS) nearly eliminates the daily interactions with employees requesting time-off balances, submitting time-off requests, making changes to personal information like an address change, viewing benefits, selecting annual benefit elections, changing deductions, accessing schedules, requesting schedule preferences, and more. HR personnel spend a significant amount of time looking up employee information and making informational changes for employees. Today’s HR professional has a strategic role in the organization that can truly make an impact to the success and operations of the business. ESS automates the truly tactical tasks and allow HR to expand his/her role.

In the human capital management world (HCM), employee self-service is recognized as a best practice. ESS captures data at the source, by the source to ensure accuracy and eliminate redundancy. It also increases employee satisfaction, because employee can view and update their information anytime without having to contact HR or fill out additional paperwork.

The most common ESS features include:

• Time reporting – submit hours worked, PTO hours, work location, project information, etc.
• Personal information – change personal information such as address change, home/mobile phone, emergency contact information, etc.
• Payroll information – view or change payroll related information such as pay statements (view only), bank accounts, federal/state/local W-4 information, voluntary deductions, W-2 information, etc.
• Change requests – submit requests or changes to expense reimbursements, benefit plan enrollment/changes, vacation and leave requests, travel authorization requests, etc.
• Information gathering – access to employee handbook, benefit plans, what-if scenarios, annual reports, etc.
• Scheduling functions –view schedules, swap shifts, and bid on shifts or vacation time, etc.
• Personnel actions – view and submit requests for overtime, job changes, etc.

By automating these manual processes, as an HR director I would be able to spend more time on employee retention programs, talent management, compliance with employee leave regulations, and other projects that make a difference in productivity as well as a significant cost savings.