4 HRMS Software Selection Dilemmas of 2015

Choosing the right HRMS for your business and organisation is always a delicate balancing act. In one hand are your present requirements; what will help you function as you are. In the other hand, you have to bear the future in mind, what functionality will you need in a year’s time? In the third hand (three hands? Why not?) there are the marketing and sales departments of the HRMS vendors (and resellers) who are all too ready to tell you what you ‘ought’ to need. Add to this the ever-evolving nature of the HR technology market and you have to factor in whatever new issues have emerged most recently. If you’re looking to buy in 2015, here are four points that are particularly relevant this year.

HRMS Selection Dilemma #1 - Creating a Connection between HR and the Bottom Line

In one sense, this is an old goal but the very fact that HR generally fails to achieve it means that it’s becoming more and more pressing. The HR function should be aligned with your business strategic goals, be cost-efficient, and drive employee engagement. The results you’re looking for are: a highly qualified workforce in which you attract and retain top talent. The critical leap that is often not made is how to link that ‘people result’ to overall profitability, market share, customer satisfaction and competitive advantage. Whether it’s through setting up a talent pipeline linked to organisational strategy, fresher engagement and self-service functions, or the use of easy-to-use yet sophisticated analytics, any HRMS that can help towards this goal bears looking at.

HRMS Selection Dilemma #2 - Trying to Stay on-Premise

This is not to say that your HRMS should be on-site, far from it. Yet there are many who still retain a lingering distrust of all things cloud. Many HR applications (e.g. talent management) are predominantly cloud-based already, and other core functions are moving that way rapidly. It’s this that poses a problem for the anti-cloud purchaser. Gartner reckon that over 50% of all HR systems will be deployed in the cloud within the next couple of years (the current figure is 38% according to Sierra-Crestone), and as all the main vendors focus more and more on their cloud solutions, if you stay on-premise then sooner or later (probably sooner) that will mean settling for lesser functionality.

HRMS Selection Dilemma #3 - Managing the Security of Integrated Systems

It’s already well under way but 2015 is likely to be the year of HR integration. More and more, HR tech is being connected to wider business intelligence systems (social, enterprise workflow, CRM, ERP…) if only for the Big Data and more detailed analytical benefits. This is good for HR because it’s all part of incorporating HR into the workforce’s daily environment. Yet this creates additional security headaches as systems interact and employees and managers expect (demand!) mobile access and seamless interfacing.

HRMS Selection Dilemma #4 - HR Today or HR Tomorrow?

As with any other technology wave, HR tech is full of the ‘next big thing’… Big Data? Analytics? Social Collaboration? Gamification? Are you ready? Do you really need to be? Do you know what you’d do with any of these if you had them? Adoption for features such as social sharing tools and HR analytics are still relatively low (less than 30% across the board) and depending on your organisation’s circumstances, you may not need them yet. But. If you’re buy HRMS in 2015, can you afford to ignore them? You may not be ready now, but you might be ready sooner than you think…