Matching the HR system to your payroll processes

Does your HR system match your payroll processes? Are you in the market for a new HRMS to reflect your payroll needs? Here are a few key things to consider as you identify requirements for your future HR system and payroll process:

Does the system cover end-to-end processing?

A strong HRMS will cover the entire employee lifecycle from “hire to fire” and everything in between. Your system does not need to be one HRMS; many companies are able to gain the benefits of separate niche HRMS that perform as one via tight integration. As you chart your processes, they should run seamlessly between systems and flow onwards to support payroll data and processing needs.

Match the system functionality to your processing needs

On the surface, this may seem like a basic step, but in execution it needs to be absolutely rock solid. As you gather your requirements and payroll needs, it is especially relevant to highlight those that are particular to your company or industry, or ones that would be especially problematic to do manually. For example, I know of a manufacturing company that had a payroll requirement to pay a subset of their employees in Mexico on a daily basis, in cash. As this company looked at implementing various HRMS products on the market, they reviewed whether any would be a fit for this process or whether this entire payroll group should stay completely outside of its HRMS and remain a manual process.

Use this comprehensive guide to learn how to manage payroll effectively with HRMS

Consider all options

Payroll is often king, and “because that’s the way we’ve always done it” is a credible answer when it comes from a strong payroll manager. Many of the new HRMS on the market have a lot of flexibility, however. Your payroll process may require a second level of approval for a retro correction of a certain dollar amount that’s more than 30 days old; it’s worthwhile considering how various providers would allow this task to be accomplished. One may allow it to be done easily and securely via mobile technology, while another may require a customization to provide the same outcome. It’s important to state your need as the end result of the process, rather than the current process itself. If a manual report is run today and then reviewed by a user to flag anomalies, the end goal is to be able to identify the outliers; the method of doing so is irrelevant.