How to Choose an HR System in 2022

Recent events have massively shifted the HR landscape and agenda – and that’s probably an understatement.

According to Sage, 72% of HR leaders say the crisis has helped them demonstrate their value, and 57% of the c-suite now see HR as equal leadership partners.

However, HR’s newfound ownable space has come at the expense of a bigger workload, with 60% of HR leaders experiencing an increase in administrative and strategic tasks.

To meet the needs of tomorrow, HR leaders must look for newer, more agile ways of managing their people so that their workforce can flex and align to shifting priorities.

That’s where HR technology comes in. The right HR tech is vital in supporting HR’s new agenda, enabling HR leaders to deliver actionable insights, provide and utilize trusted up-to-the-minute data, reduce admin, and create great employee experiences that attract and retain the best talent.

If you’re also looking to invest more in HR tech and on the search for a new HR system, it’s important to find the right one that supports your HR team and employees, too.

There are 5 things HR leaders should look for in an HR system:

Focus on tech that supports great workforce experiences

Organizations thrive when employees are engaged.

To do this, you need to create the best possible experiences for them – keeping them connected, informed, and aligned. This is where tech can add real value.

Look for an HR system that puts your employees and their experiences first, so they can view and amend personal data, make requests for leave, and access company information through an employee self-service portal.

You’ll also want to find a system that supports your HR team with flexible pulse surveys and continuous conversation tools and provides you with data-driven insights to understand employee sentiments in real-time.

Consider how you can get the best workforce visibility

The days of spreadsheets and disparate systems should be far behind us, but unfortunately, many organizations still rely heavily on them to get glimpses into their workforces’ behavior.

It leaves HR leaders trying to pick numbers out of a sea of data making guesses about their workforce rather than making informed choices based on data.

The right HR tech means HR leaders can achieve a complete picture of their workforce through one system with up-to-the-minute, reliable data using built-in analytics.

It means HR leaders can understand what drives their workforce, who the top performers are, which teams struggle with productivity and how long it takes them to hire great talent. It means you can also take these insights straight to the c-suite, providing them with the top figures they want to see.

Find tech that benefits all

One of your measures of success from an HR system will be return on investment, which starts with user adoption.

In an ideal world, you’d want 100% of your workforce using your brand-new HR system so, to do that, you’ll need a user-friendly system that has a similar experience to apps they already use at home and outside of work.

Equally, for you as an HR leader, you don’t need a system that takes hours to figure out how to use and then more hours training everyone else, so finding tech that’s easy to use is key to success.

Boost business resilience with flexibility

Just 29% of HR leaders told Sage they were organized for speed, agility, and adaptability – and that was before the global pandemic. In reality, it means that just one in three HR leaders were well equipped to act when the pandemic hit.

Finding more agile ways of working is key in surviving and thriving in this new landscape of business. Look for a highly flexible system that will allow you to easily configure workflows, create custom fields, and tailor reports, communication, branding, and more, all managed by you through clicks, not code.

Create great experiences for all with HR tech

Ultimately, no matter what HR software you settle on, it should be there to support you as HR, but most importantly, your people. By recognizing what your people need from an HR system, it’ll help you choose the perfect solution for your organization, so you can deliver on all the points we’ve discussed and so much more.

Information used in this article was provided by our partners at Sage.