During recession kind of turbulent times, HRMS can help CEO, you know why?

t is true that recession had hampered our growth rate but we are not in a bad economic situation when compared to some of the developed countries. Positive signs are there in some of the industrial segments and IT. Unfortunately certain segments in our economy are very much affected, many people lost job and many investors faced bankruptcy. If we look back to our economic history, these are quite temporary and we can regain our growth rate very soon.

In US,whenever something happen to business front, investor will immediately go for bankruptcy suite or say goodbye to all employees. But here in India, our management style is quite different. Most of the organizations are not running on credit and investors used to save money during good times to manage unexpected ‘no sale/fall in businesses’. Survival rate of companies in India has been deep routed to excellent management expertise. Recently somebody in US commented that in the coming years, it would be very difficult to get skilled people in US for IT jobs because students are not opting IT (this can be in the outsourcing context).This can be a strategic mistake or a bottleneck in US in coming years.

Let’s come back to India.Except some of the MNC firms operating in India, layoffs are not common here.But we lost considerable number of jobs in garments and construction sector in selected geographical locations. This can be partly due to economic downtime or huge export loss to United States. In some segments, we can see substantial amount of correction. For example, a builder may find difficult to find a buyer for his deluxe apartment worth Rs.1.5 crores till the market regains its momentum.

HR Managers are facing unusual challenges in organizations which are not recession proof. There is pressure from investors to get more output to beat recession,where as employees are looking at increased benefits or pay hikes. Board will be requesting to come up with countless analytical reports with zero down time.Many are working on profile GAPA and realigning corporate goals and communicate across organization. HR folks managing scattered organizations and that too using paper office are facing many difficulties in delivering quick information as well as realistic inference to corporate management. Many used to work late nights at office or failing to manage personal life. This made CEO or HR Heads of the organizations to buy and install HRMS on a war foot basis. Even though advertisement budget across companies are reduced, market research and business intelligence expenses are not at all freezed and companies in that segment are getting more projects (this reveals that there is tremendous need towards inferences based on accurate information). Accuracy and relevance of any decision related to people and processes and certainly credibility of HR department itself is very much depends on quality of information available.

There can be a decline in sales of enterprise software license which cost more than Rs.25 lakhs but I think demand for Integrated HRMS suites [Employee Information, Leave Management, Attendance Tracking, Payroll, Exit Management etc] selling at Rs. 5-25 lakhs is still consistent. Small and Medium enterprises are moving towards subscription model and SAAS is getting its grip over there.

Today,Investors are not considering HR Department as luxury but as strategic business partner. HRMS is considered as an efficient tool to streamline processes, an inevitable decision support system and a cost effective tool to enable new age HR Road Show (online) and to boost employee motivation.

During recession kind of turbulent times, more proactive resource management, decision based on live data, employee self service, more transparency in terms of organizational, team and individual performance are so critical. HR Department can market Corporate as well as HR initiatives to employees through HRMS.

Payroll HRMS System Interfaces Defined

HRMS Payroll system interfaces Defined

During your search and evaluations of payroll HRIS Systems or HRMS payroll software applications, you will hear a great deal about interfaces. The purpose of this article is to explain in detail how they are typically used. If you are looking at purchasing payroll HRIS Systems, HRMS payroll systems or HR Software application and plan to tie it to an existing payroll application, this article will prove very helpful. The vast majority of HRMS payroll system applications will offer some type of capability for transferring HRIS data or payroll data from one system to another.

First, it’s important to point out the difference between HRMS payroll integration and an interface. With an integrated system, you have two products sharing the same HRIS data and payroll data or you have an automatic real time transfer and update of data from one system to another. With HR and Payroll software applications, this is rare unless you are working with the same company for both systems. If that’s not the case, then you are going to be dealing with interfaces.

With an interface you will have to either manually, or via an automated process, transfer HRIS data from either payroll to hr or vice versa. In many cases, this is a fairly manual process to setup but easy to maintain. If you want to transfer data from Payroll to HR, you will create a file from the payroll system and import this into the HR Software product using some type of software. The problems with this type of process are that if it’s not automated, you will have to frequently perform the transfer of data because, in this example, your data in HR is only as up to date as the last transfer of information from your payroll application. There is no reason to not accept using interfaces since it’s still the standard for getting two unique products to share data.

How a HRMS payroll system Interface works

If you are using a well known payroll product, such as ADP, almost all, if not all, HRIS Data systems will provide some type of interfacing capability between your HRIS system and your payroll product. If not, your payroll HRIS system will offer some type of import and export program.

System interfaces are also defined as data mapping. Once you determine which system will push the data, a report will be run from that system containing the data needed to import into your import application. Once the report is run, it is typically converted to either Excel or a text file for importing. Now you need to make sure both systems are speaking the same language. This is called data mapping. If in one system the field name for first name is “fnam”, and in the system you are mapping to the field name is “first name,” you simply direct the “fnam” data in product to populate the “first name” field. The same process is repeated for each and every field contained in both systems. The good news is that after you set up the data mapping, you won’t have to repeat this process. The next time you need to transfer data, you will spend only a few minutes to do so.

The challenge with the setup occurs when the fields are in different formats or lengths. In these cases, the data can be brought into Excel and any needed modifications can be made there before importing the data. In some cases, the actual interface software will provide the ability to alter the information.

Populating your HRMS payroll system database

Let’s say you have just purchased a new Payroll HRIS system. By some means or another you are going to want to easily pull as much information from other sources as possible into your new system. If you have another HR product, you may create a file from that system and transfer this data over to your new HRIS system. If you don’t, then most likely you will be pulling data from your payroll system to HR. It’s important to note that your payroll system will not contain all the information of your HRIS system. So there are only so many fields you will be able to update. Typically, this information is going to include demographic data and data related to pay that will be tracked in your HRIS system. I have seen what rarely transfers from one system to another are benefits data and history. Make sure to ask about the transfer of this data while you are reviewing systems.

Payroll to HRMS or HRMS to Payroll

Going forward, you will have to determine which direction you want to push data and in what system your core input for new hires, terminations, and employee changes will happen. Whichever direction you decide to go, payroll to HR or HR to payroll, it’s important to realize that whichever system is accepting the data will have the interface for that import of data. This is not always the case but in most circumstances it will be.

Remember the data in the system being updated is only as up to date as when the last interface data transfer was performed. This can create problems. Let’s say, for example, that you are pushing data from your payroll system to your HRIS product and the last time you performed an update was two weeks ago. If you run a termination or new hire log from your HRIS system, the data you are relying on is two weeks old. You may have to go through the process of updating your data before running the report. As you have seen, interfaces are not a perfect world but they are a necessity.

HR Payroll Software - Why It's So Hard To Get A Price

By Expert Author: Clay C. Scroggin

The topic of this article is to describe why getting a price for an HR Payroll software application is not as easy as getting a price on a house, a car, or a new pair of shoes. Think of all the decisions you would have to make, before getting an accurate price, if you were going to build your own home.

Using Google Adword’s keyword tool, I did a little research into how many people in an average month are searching for the price of HR Payroll Software. The resulting numbers are lower than I might have expected. Still, per month, just on Google it appears that at least hundreds of people are searching for the cost of HR and Payroll software based only on the keywords I uncovered below.

Keyword Average Searches Per Month
• HRIS Price 12
• Cost of HRIS 58
• HRIS Costs 170
• HR software pricing 36

HR Payroll software prices depend on too many variables to simply offer a quick quote

When I was selling HR Payroll Software systems, I worked with one HRIS product that offered 15 unique product options, two platform options, and two purchase options. The cost of that system for a 200 employee company varied tremendously. This price could have ranged from $3,000 to well over $40,000. So, if someone simply asked for a price, or even a ball park price, it was hard for me to present one without knowing exactly what options they were interested in and what their needs were. Often times the prospect did not know either until I performed a needs analysis and/or showed a demo.

HR and Payroll Software Salesmanship

As an HR and Payroll software sales person, if I was selling product X and knew my competition was product Y, which offered half the functionality and 30% less on cost, I would be hesitant to provide a prospect a price of my HRIS system until I was able to show the added value. This is not only salesmanship; it’s also good service. It’s important that you not base your decision for HR Payroll software only on price. The best value may not be the lowest price but may be found in the closest match to your company’s unique needs. You may be impatient to see the cost, but in the example above, the customer wins by waiting.

There are sales training courses which teach sales people to say in control of the sale by holding off on providing a price as long as possible. I am not one of those that agree with this strategy but you may very well see it.

The HR Payroll software companies want to keep the prices as secret as possible

We have asked all of our HR Payroll software participating vendors to include at least some type of price range for our site, but currently 8 of 13 have elected not to do so. Part of the reason is what I have laid out above but these companies are also very secretive about their prices. The least expensive systems on the market have no problem publishing their prices. The more expensive and comprehensive systems on the market are much less likely to do so.

I lost a vendor earlier in the year because they would not participate in our service unless every vendor on our site, not only showed their pricing, but showed it in exactly the same format as they offered theirs. I can’t say I disagree but I am not in a position to force our vendors to comply.

So can other websites actually provide quick quotes for multiple HR and Payroll software applications?

NO! For the exact same reasons I have laid out here, the HR Payroll software vendors aren’t going to provide the cost without understanding who the prospect is and what their needs are. So, the site I am referring to without mentioning them by name, simply distributes your information to a number of HRIS or HRMS vendors and then let’s those individual vendors contact you, and after a needs analysis and perhaps even a demo, the “free HRIS quotes” can be provided. There’s nothing quick about it; nor would you want it to be.

The funny thing is our keyword position for HRIS pricing is number nine on Google. And I’ll be the first to tell you that of 13 systems currently on the site, we only offer price ranges on 5 of those products.

Closing

There are valid industry reasons why you may find it difficult to quickly and easily receive prices on a number of HR Payroll software applications. I would recommend staying patient and realize a quick price may not be the most reliable or in your best interest.