Technology has come on leaps and bounds over recent years and has enabled many industries to evolve and improve. One such industry is Human Resources (HR). In the HR industry it is becoming ever more important to ensure that you not only make the correct resourcing choices in the first place but that your employees have an enjoyable and satisfactory HR experience too.
Improvements in HR technology have significantly helped to streamline processes and in doing so, helped make HR divisions a lot more efficient and collaborative and, in addition, improved user (employee) experience.
There are many different HR tech options to choose from though so it can be very difficult to know what the best option for your organisation is. When choosing technology, it’s important to choose something that you and your team of HR professionals can easily understand and navigate effectively and, in turn, that the technology will be understood by employees and improve their HR experience.
So, what are the three key points to keep in mind when choosing HR tech?
1. Connect, connect and connect some more
The HR technology that you choose must be able to effectively connect your team and the organisation’s employees, as well as be understood by every single person within the organisation too. Obviously, first off, it is essential that you and your HR team understand the technology fully; this is then a good sign other members of staff will do so too.
Technology works best when it is intuitive; your choice of HR tech should therefore be engaging, predictive and smart as this will encourage users to interact with the technology often. Users will be a lot more positive about HR systems if they are connected to them properly and when they understand them fully.
2. High levels of service delivery
There’s no point investing in HR technology if it doesn’t come with high levels of service delivery since this will put you and your team on the back foot should something go wrong. This situation would also lead to a decrease in employee satisfaction, which is not something you want or need!
The partner providing your technology should be able to offer consistent support; support that is there when it is needed not in a week or so when it’s convenient to them! Before you make your final choice make sure you have a specific contact name; an account manager who is there to ensure you get the support you need, when it’s needed. Don’t ever sign a contract unless you have this information!
And finally…
3. Usability
It goes without saying that the HR tech you put in place needs to be usable and inclusive. Technology will be no good and will most certainly not simplify yours and the organisation’s employees’ lives if it is not usable.
The end user is incredibly important so before making your choice you need to ask yourself the following:
– Is the user interface easy to use?
– Will employees find it difficult to understand?
– Is the system intuitive? For instance does it anticipate a user’s movement when it’s being used so as to help direct the user to what they require?
– Does it offer the user hints and tips?
– Can users access the technology from their smartphones and mobile devices?
Making sure your tech positively answers all of the above will make sure your employees start to actively seek out the technology to use it and help them solve many HR problems that arise within your organisation, which, if left unsolved will quickly annoy and aggravate employees.
Summary
HR tech that is speedy, easy and flexible will be used time and time again by your employees and, crucially, greatly improve their user experience, which is, after all, what technology should do!
Technology needs to work specifically for your organisation so do not be tempted to implement tech that may look good on the outside but once implemented is too advanced for ‘normal’ users or choose something that looks too good to be true, since it often is!
Provided you ensure your tech is suitable for your organisation, your requirements and, of course, your employees, it should work out. By the end of the process of choosing your tech, you should be left with a system that is engaging, simple to use and understand, and something that employees are happy to use on a daily basis.
Improved, targeted technology within your organisation can only be a good thing, but you just need to make sure you take the time to choose wisely.