HR Digitisation - an Essential Driver to Improve Employee Experience

The digitisation of human resources activities refers to the use of the latest and most appropriate technology to transform traditional (often paper-driven) systems in order to improve employee experience. In practical terms, digitisation can be as simple as converting the performance records of employees into digital records or entail ambitious projects aimed at introducing artificial intelligence at employee interface points.

Growing Necessity to Improve Employee Experience

It is often stated that if a company wants to attract and retain the workforce of the future it needs to cater to a tech-savvy generation. The reality is that the existing employee base at many companies possesses adequate technological understanding to cope with digitisation exercises. In fact, for many employees, the introduction of digitisation in the human resources environment is seen as a powerful tool for career development and personal growth.

Successful Digital Adoption Key to Improve Employee Experience

For frontline employees to enjoy the benefits of human resources digitisation such as cloud-based paperless payslip systems or automated medical fund claims, the deployment of digitisation needs to be done in an optimal fashion. The following elements generally form part of a good digitisation adoption plan:

  • Start with a Pilot Program

Make use of a pilot program to uncover ‘unknown’ challenges. This is helpful for convincing sceptics within your organisation of the value of the digitisation process.

  • Clear Goals

Projects need a target to succeed. It’s no different when it comes to digitisation, there should be defined outcomes and action plans.

  • Employee buy-in

A well-thought-through rollout has the ability to improve employee experience, and therefore engagement, in the medium term. A good starting point is to get employees excited about the opportunity and find ways to partner with them in the transition process.

  • Core Skills

A digitisation process is not about software and equipment. It is first and foremost about your human resources department and its team members. It requires new skills and a new way of thinking and these team members are the first employees that need to be on board with the process if it is to be successful.

  • Culture is Critical

It is not enough to bring innovation to a company’s human resources; it must be part of the broader corporate culture at all levels. Attempting to digitise human resources in isolation to other company processes will yield very little positive results.

  • Be Creative

Fresh approaches and new ideas will be critical to capturing the attention of employees during a transition process. In work environments where new systems and ongoing improvement are commonplace, unique ideas will be needed to demonstrate the positive impact of the transition.

  • Measure Performance

Constant measuring of milestones and results assessment throughout the transition is absolutely critical to ensure you are on track and can take corrective action where needed.

  • Keep Evolving

The beauty (and challenge) of technology is that it keeps evolving. Don’t neglect what has been achieved via a successful digitisation process and ensure you keep pace with industry benchmarks in terms of digital transformation.

A smooth adoption of digitisation within an organisation can significantly positively impact all departments within a company.

Multiple Benefits

The benefits of digitisation are often felt at various levels in the organisation and more specifically it offers advantages to both frontline employees and the company as outlined below:

Employee Benefits

  • Digital solutions are user friendly and safe – most platforms that digitise human resources functions are intuitive and secure. This encourages employees to make use of the systems that are specifically designed to be user-friendly.
  • Contributing to business savings – frontline employees are often under pressure to contribute to an improvement to a company’s bottom line. Still, they lack the opportunity to influence the direction and outcome of large projects. In this instance, the successful adoption of a digitisation project can have a significant positive impact on cost management.
  • Assists with compliance – reporting on compliance issues to a variety of stakeholders is facilitated via easily accessible systems, which can be a significant benefit to frontline workers.
  • Less paper means fewer errors – paperwork mistakes are a significant source of complaint among businesses. For frontline employees, digitisation can alleviate a lot of pressure in this regard.
  • Improve Employee Engagement – digitisation can give freedom and mobility to frontline employees thereby leading to improved levels of employee engagement.

Business Benefits

  • Connecting people and strategy – data gathered via digitisation enables executives to learn everything they need to know about their company and direct efforts towards reaching business goals.
  • Effective management – assists in the development of employee potential with integrated technology that enables skill-based management, development, and deployment (all critical elements for frontline employees).
  • Improve employee experience – the use of automation, artificial intelligence and chatbots to provide real-time and simple user interface to human resources processes, policies and systems, improving the employee experience.
  • Improved data security – higher degree of compliance to data security and personal information handling can be achieved via digital platforms.
  • Transformation activity – the use of digital solutions in the human resources space can send an important signal with respect to the adoption of new workplace culture.

Let Digital Transformation Improve Employee Experience

Our human resources self-service solution allows you to digitise important operating activities, saving time and money while making employees’ life simpler. With the press of a button, you can offer employees access to new job openings, employee benefits, payslips and assist them in better managing their calendars. This is the starting point from which business leaders can gain further insight and the ability to adjust their organisation’s operational efficiencies.

Takeaways

The goal of human resources digitisation is to contribute to the creation of an agile company culture where technology is harnessed to improve the employee experience. Companies that put a strong plan in place to roll out the use of technology will reap numerous benefits including a higher level of employee engagement among frontline workforce. To learn more about how digitisation can be used as a tool to improve employee experience talk to an expert today.