A shared-service model for HR will allow HR departments to provide their services to workers more quickly and efficiently. This can enable HR departments to distinguish the operational and strategic so that each component of the organization can be the most effective in delivering an enjoyable experience for employees. Let’s look at shared HR services, their benefits, and drawbacks, and HR shared services best practices.
What are HR shared services?
HR Shared Services is a central point of HR administration and operational tasks characterized by self-service by employees, automated using technology, and multiple levels of service and responses to service. This permits organizations to offer basic HR services most efficiently. The various levels of an HR Toolkit provide standard benefits like:
- Payroll
- Management of employee data
- Administration of leave and benefits
- Services for relocation (international and local)
HRIS
- Operations for recruiting
- Services for learning
- Analytics and reporting
- And HR Service Centre.
HR shared services are a component of the multi-tiered services delivery model. It allows the other departments that comprise HR to let the different parts of the HR department concentrate on strategic projects.
Benefits of shared HR services
The implementation of HR shared services offers many benefits for your company. This includes:
HR is now increasingly strategic. The division of responsibility allows HR professionals with more experience to concentrate on strategy. This gives HR greater opportunities to assess its performance using Human Capital metrics that align with the company’s reaching its strategic goals. It is crucial for HR to function as a true business partner, contributing to creating the business plan. It ensures that the organization’s business strategy is centered on managing people and providing a pleasant experience for employees.
Consistency and conformity. HR matters are always dealt with similarly and consistently, ensuring you comply with the rules and regulations. This results in a better employee experience and fewer risks within your company.
Excellence in operations. By clearly delegating responsibilities to administration, organizations can achieve operational excellence. This is achieved through efficient procedures and optimized workflows. Along with offering a superior HR service, Operational excellence results in a better employee experience and efficiency.
Improved experience for employees. Employees get their problems resolved and can access relevant information quickly and easily. This can have a positive effect on your digital and their overall satisfaction with their work. Employees now expect all systems to be fun and simple to use and meet their expectations and needs. This is true for systems that work within their job if there’s a gap between what they expect and the reality, which causes discontent.
Cost reduction. HR shared services can aid organizations in cutting expenses in many ways. For instance, you’ll require less experienced HR specialists to manage transactional HR functions, resulting in lower labour costs. Furthermore, the efficiency gained through simplifying and streamlining services will also reduce costs.
Problems with shared HR services
While shared HR services can aid employees in improving their operational efficiency and allow the department to be more strategic, implementing them is not always simple. There are a variety of challenges that organizations confront.
There is no digital roadmap for the vast majority of businesses. Automation is growing and requires a clear digital strategy and a plan for Human Resources to implement technology that can improve efficiency and employee customer experience. Examples of technologies include basic tools like live chat virtual agents, Service Now live chat, and Service Now, as well as more sophisticated applications like Robotic Process Automation (RPA), along with HR reporting and analytics tools. But, many companies implement digital technology tools only on a kind basis, not having a comprehensive plan for HR’s digital transformation strategy.
Inspiring urgency to invest in shared services as HR technologies. It isn’t easy to define the business benefits of shared HR services. Therefore, leaders of organizations might not be able to immediately grasp the benefits and why they should prioritize this type of investment. In this regard, you must focus on defining what value-sharing services bring to the company.
One size does not fit every. HR shared services might not be the best solution for every business unit. There are situations where HR shared services can aid and support the business unit; however, they could cause a problem for other teams. You must perform a cost-benefit study to determine what benefit it provides to business units, the entire structure, and the cost. A good example is working with a global partner for upskilling that can be very effective in developing abilities for general business areas but might not be able to upgrade their skills in highly-specialized business sectors.
Knowledge transfer. When transitioning to the HR shared services method, it’s essential to document the proper procedures and processes from SMEs to the new employees at the center of HR shared services. This is a task. There is the requirement to control the amount of time required to record and transfer the information and apply this knowledge to ensure HR shared services can reach an efficient level.
Collaboration within the HR team and across the entire organization may suffer. There might be some disconnection between the various areas within the HR group, specifically between shared services and the other more strategic or specializations that make up the group. This is why managers must make a conscious effort to improve the collective mentality of the team. Also, the HR shared service center doesn’t eliminate the need to connect and communicate with employees constantly. It is, therefore, crucial to build relationships constantly and interact with the important stakeholders within an organization’s business. Systems that are efficient support businesses. However, it is only because of strong relationships that systems can satisfy internal clients’ demands.
Shared services for HR maturity model
Model adapted from Scott Madden’s Shared Services Maturity Curve This model illustrates that HR shared services evolve and progress from the beginning of the process with improved efficiency and analytics capabilities to constant growth and enhancement.
Best practices for sharing HR services
Based on the shared HR service model of maturity, what can you do to help your HR department keep up with and run an innovative and high-value shared HR service centre?
Find out which tasks will be covered under the shared HR service. It could be HR shared service centre-related if it involves significant amounts of administrative or transactional tasks. Additionally, it would help if you looked at HR tasks with an excellent chance of standardization as they can be repeated and easy to perform. We’ve discussed this before. The typical HR service activities include benefits administration, payroll recruitment operations, managing employee and organizational data, and some aspects of development and learning.
Define the roles and responsibilities. You need to identify who will be accountable for what in the Shared Services team for HR. For instance, which employees will be responsible for which services for employees? This is particularly important when creating HR shared services for an international organization that will centralize the employee’s services across several locations.
Select the best technology that will benefit you and your employees. HR shared service tools must allow your business to deliver services efficiently and efficiently. A few of the features you need to be looking for when selecting an HR technology provider include:
- Ticketing
- Knowledge management and policy
- Incident and its routing
- SLA monitoring
- Self-service for employees.
Additionally, it would help if you considered that these programs typically manage sensitive employee information, for instance, medical or contact details. This is why you should search for HR software that offers the highest data security levels. It is ideal for installing a cloud-based, mobile-friendly solution right from the beginning. It must also integrate with your HRIS core.
Maximize the capabilities of your computer
In the next phase of maturity, HR Shared Services should be in a position to:
Provide new or enhanced services. The variety of services provided by HR shared services is expanding. HR shared Services Company is growing. This could include expanding the services to other geographical areas. GBS companies typically have more practical activities and, in general, they are offered to a worldwide customer group.” In this scenario, your customers are your employees, naturally.
Increase automated abilities. Since processes handled by shared HR services can be replicated and standardized, They have a great chance of being automated. Consider which methods require minimum or no human involvement and implement automated processes. Some examples of automated HR processes include:
- Assessments for pre-employment
- The automated flow of emails
- Automatically creating official PDF documents at the time of hiring new employees.
- Disabling access to applications after you have finished off boarding an employee
Cost claims
Make the most of analytics and reporting. HR has gained the reputation for making use of metrics to evaluate the effectiveness of HR Toolkit India report on and track initiatives and programs. It is a good thing and will remain so. However, there’s recently been a greater concentration on analytics, which extends beyond monitoring, measuring, and reporting to predict prescribing and diagnosing. It is the reason why using different kinds of HR analytics has become increasingly crucial: _
Predictive analytics uses current and previous HR information to predict future outcomes.
Predictive analytics offers possibilities for actions that companies can take based on information and trends that emerge from predictive analytics.
Analytics for diagnostics indicates the root of the issue, and it can be targeted and dealt with accordingly.
Integration of social networks. The most progressive companies understand the importance of their presence on social media. Essential for engaging their employees and customers. The most effective HR departments aren’t only making use of LinkedIn to advertise their company and recruit new talent and utilizing various other social networking platforms. However, applicants are more likely to look up open positions on Facebook. Sixty-seven percent of those who used social media to search for their most recent job were on Facebook.
Enhance
Modern HR shared service centres use analytics and automation and continuously strive to improve their workflows.
Automating processes. Popularized as Robotic Process Automation, process automation lets the integration of various HR functions using a completely automated method. Examples include automatic reminders if someone hasn’t yet activated their account. This helps prevent being spammed and results in more targeted communications. Another example is creating flow among HR departments. If a job candidate lacks a crucial capability but is nevertheless hired, it could prompt an education system to suggest this particular skill to the candidate to be trained. These systems integrations are the result of effective and efficient automation.
Improved continuously. Collect employee feedback on the shared HR service center and find ways to improve your workflow. This can be accomplished by conducting periodic surveys. Also, please note the company’s evolving demands, such as when the company is growing rapidly or changing its policy. Be responsive, and as a result, you’ll create an environment of constant improvement.
Create an electronic road map. A key challenge in todays shared service departments in the absence of a cohesive digital strategy. Through the implementation of a technology roadmap and a clear and ambitious purpose (e.g., “Any process or activity that could be automatized, will be automated”), the shared service centre is transformed to become an administrator into an efficient and technologically advanced centre.
Make sure you invest in employees’ ongoing growth in shared HR service. A common difficulty is a lack of advancement opportunities for employees who work within shared service. That is why a digital plan and vision allow an organization to understand better the positions required in the coming years. This is a reference to the automation of other technology roles and efficient project management and data entry roles. Continuously educating your HR shared service workers will allow your business to ensure the efficiency of your employees as complexity increases.
