Blog: Automation: A blessing for HR professionals

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Automation: A blessing for HR professionals

Technology today owns a pivotal role in majority of the HR activities and industry professionals need to have tech skills at the back of their hands to keep pace with the changing corporate ecosystem.
Automation: A blessing for HR professionals

The world that we live in today revolves around technology. Technology is disruptive - ever evolving and changing along with time. It has become an integral part of our routine. Every unit, every department, in the modern day, thrives on technology.

Amongst all this chaos, somewhere beneath a humongous pile of paperwork, sulking away is Human Resources. The way Human Resources has evolved and risen to give justification to the name rendered to it is commendable but today, it would be a lie to say that Human Resources is complete. HR sees to it that everything is hassle-free and is as smooth as it should be, but is that enough? Several organizations till date still believe in the conventional methods of performing tasks and by conventional I mean “manually through paperwork”. Right from documentation to filing; it’s just heaps of paperwork. 

A bit over a decade now, HR Automation has been in the limelight and many organizations are adapting to it. Now what exactly is HR Automation? ‘HR Automation is the process of transitioning your burdensome, time-consuming paper-based HR processes such as payroll processing and benefits administration to a streamlined, computer-based online system.’ You take all your data; give it to the system for safekeeping. Feed in that payroll data or let your employee keep track of his/her absences. Why boggle your memory and scratch your head unnecessarily for some data that can be accessed with a single click? Research shows that with the use of HR Automation people can save up to 50% of time that they spend on administrative work and cut down company costs by 60%. There are many softwares that are available on the market and work to support and enhance HRIS or HRMS as we know it. Many large organizations that have adapted to it have shown tremendous growth and performance ratings. 

On the other hand, startups are mushrooming everywhere these days but as a startup you can’t really afford a HRIS or even if you have good funding would you really waste that resource in implementing a HRIS where the HR also hasn’t been established properly or would you rather spend it on things that are more important like branding and promotions. So for startups and small organizations, HRIS or HR Automation is a no go because the viability of it in itself is a big question mark. 

As an organization what do we want? We want profit and where does that profit come from? Performance of the employees. It’s pretty simple math. You ease your employees’ workload on these things and in return they give you your desired ROI or even more than that. The time and energy saved will be put to a better use by the employees in the form of their tasks and let’s be honest; as HR we have an entire module dedicated to keeping employees motivated to perform well -   “Employee Engagement” so putting that energy into good use isn’t really an issue. Moreover, we have several motivational theories up our sleeves as well!

On a very serious note, this article might seem very light hearted and casual, but my only intention is to highlight the importance of HR Automation in today’s world and the kind of impact it has on any organization. Everyone today wants to be the next Apple or Amazon; no one wants to end up like Nokia or Kodak. Today it’s all about keeping oneself updated and gaining a sustainable competitive advantage because in this technological jungle only the fittest shall survive. 

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Topics: Technology, #ExpertViews

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