HR Functions Stuck? Break Loose With Custom Software Solutions
It takes time and effort to hire and manage employees. According to studies, HR spends over 25 hours per month recruiting one employee, while searching for a senior executive takes roughly 40 hours. Responding to staff inquiries and disputes can take all day.
An effective HR system is crucial to any organization’s success. Bottlenecks could lower productivity and morale. They may damage company culture and lower profits.
Custom software development is a viable solution to many of the department’s woes. It gives the team the agility and automation to thrive in the digital era. Learn how in this article, covering topics such as:
- Definition of HR stagnation and what it looks like
- How technology helps HR evolve and improve
- Comparison between custom and off-the-shelf solutions
- Reasons why bespoke software is a better option
- Key features of a good custom HR platform
- Tips to prepare HR’s digital transition
Read below to learn how customizing software improves HR performance and your team’s welfare. Let’s go!
Watch this video to learn how Digital Authority Partners designs software that works for your business!
What Is HR Stagnation?
Maria sighs as she clicks through yet another applicant’s resume. The startup HR manager has noticed that hiring has slowed. She lacks enough hours to process hundreds of applications or schedule endless interviews. She struggles to onboard new hires.
Making matters worse is the company’s outdated HR system. It takes twice as long as it should to do its work. Maria dreads the challenges as the business expands. She knows it is time for a change, but what options does she have?
Maria is a clear representation of HR stagnation. The department’s operations have become inefficient, inconsistent, or unable to meet organizational needs.
Stagnation manifests in many ways:
- Difficulty tracking basic HR metrics, such as turnover, time-to-hire, and training costs
- Manual and reactive reporting and compliance management
- No self-service options for basic HR transactions
- Fragmented, inconsistent onboarding and training processes
- Poor performance management workflow
- Lack of a centralized database with employee profiles, skills assessments, and training records
- Challenges in scaling the department
The consequences of HR stagnation are severe, including struggling to attract and keep top talent. Critical HR capabilities remain disconnected, opaque, and manual. Employee frustration grows as HR becomes less responsive. Non-compliance risks also increase.
Ultimately, poor HR execution disrupts an organization’s growth trajectory. It prevents the team from supporting business growth and nurturing talent.
The Digital Shift in HR
Digitizing HR systems is critical to avoid stagnation.
One of the groundbreaking software development trends is cloud migration. It provides easy mobile access, real-time data, and streamlined workflow. The team no longer waits for IT to run reports or sits at their desks to update a vacation request. They now handle these activities on the go.
Other business innovations shaping HR include the following:
- Artificial intelligence and people analytics let HR optimize compensation plans. Predictive algorithms and modeling help create targeted development programs.
- Digital innovations hasten and simplify onboarding. For instance, new employees receive a “starter pack” containing orientation videos, work tutorials, and dashboard access for timekeeping.
- Social collaboration platforms, such as Slack, connect teams across distributed workforces. HR professionals can use them to answer questions, share knowledge, and build culture. Some run chatbots to handle policy questions and schedule interviews 24/7.
Despite these advances, off-the-shelf solutions lack scalable features and benefits. They still hinder talent attraction, user experience, and long-term growth.
The solution: custom software development to future-proof the department’s function.
Strategic Benefits of Custom HR Software
Customizing HR platforms takes time and money. Why should businesses invest in them when they have off-the-shelf choices today?
Bespoke solutions provide critical benefits that existing off-the-shelf options often struggle to match:
- Streamlined workflow with interfaces that are consistent with actual roles and responsibilities. The department completes tasks more efficiently when interfaces meet the users’ needs. Bespoke software also encourages widespread adoption.
- Seamless integration of various HR capabilities. For example, candidate information entered during hiring populates payroll and compliance systems. This feature alone eliminates data silos, redundancy, and manual busywork.
- Custom analytics generate talent and strategic insights. Personalizing HR platforms means the end of generic reporting. Instead, the team creates tailored, comprehensive data views about workforce trends, turnover drivers, and recruitment effectiveness. More understandable, timely, and relevant information leads to more stable business decisions.
- Scalability to accommodate growth and more requirements over time. The best-tailored HR solutions have the business’s development in mind. For example, they prevent costly, complicated disruptions such as migrations later.
- Improved compliance. Built-in compliance tools, reminders, and reports reduce errors and oversights. Tight integration also introduces more reliable security controls. These include role-based permissions, audit trails, data encryption, and validation checks.
- Higher employee satisfaction through user-centric self-service options. Employees can access company information and complete tasks without burdening the HR team. User-friendly self-service also empowers people by giving them more autonomy over their data.
Thoughtful HR software releases the department from restrictive one-size-fits-all systems. It also removes efficiency roadblocks, improves data accuracy, and increases the user experience. All these influence long-term employee retention and the HR budget.
Key Features That Power an Effective HR Platform
An expert custom software development team spends time learning about your business. Who are the users and customers? What does each of the groups need from the software? Who are the competitors? What tools are they using? What is the organizational culture? Where does the business see itself in the next five years?
Every custom solution is different. However, certain features are vital to delivering maximum value. This table shows essential HR platform functions and their benefits:
Function | Benefit |
---|---|
Customizable dashboards | Provide data visibility and insights to help HR make strategic decisions |
Automation | Streamline repetitive tasks, such as scheduling, data entry, and employee notifications, to let HR focus on high-level activities |
Centralized employee database | Maintain all employee information in a single, consistent system to avoid redundancy, share data with authorized parties, and enhance department collaboration |
Mobile access | Enable workflow approvals, document signing, etc., to support flexible work models |
Performance management | Set employee goals, provide feedback, and track progress. |
Security controls | Ensure employees only access authorized data and actions per their role |
Integration | Link workflow across talent acquisition, core HR, payroll, etc., for seamless end-to-end automation |
Recruiting and onboarding | Simplify and digitize hiring and onboarding processes to offer a satisfying candidate experience |
Compensation management | Manage and track compensation to aid budgeting and equity and support pay decisions |
The Case for Outsourcing Software Development
Custom HR platforms trump off-the-shelf choices in many ways. Once you have decided to build a perfect program for your business the next big question is: who should develop them?
Retaining complete control is ideal, especially in a highly regulated industry such as healthcare. However, most businesses lack specialized expertise in software engineering and development.
Partnering with an experienced custom software development firm brings key advantages:
- Expertise. Outsourced developers are proficient in best practices for design, testing, development operations, security, and scalability.
- Efficiency. Seasoned teams develop platforms more quickly and efficiently. They know how to avoid pitfalls and reuse components, accelerating timelines.
- Cost-effectiveness. Outsourcing reduces overhead costs, such as the need for more office space, equipment, and labor. Variable pricing models also align costs with the platform’s value.
- Focus. Hiring an external custom software development team frees internal HR tech from complex development. It lets them prioritize other vital activities that improve business value. These include evaluating workflow for optimal user experience and spearheading data migration from legacy systems.
- Talent access. Partners extend access to specialized experts. Examples are user experience designers, information architects, and quality and testing engineers. These roles are usually challenging to fill.
Relinquishing even minute control feels daunting. However, outsourcing advantages outweigh the risks. This decision also becomes a strategic investment that pays dividends when businesses can spend more time on core goals.
Planning Your HR Software Transformation
Customizing HR is the best organizational approach to remaining competitive. However, transitioning your existing system to the new system requires thoughtful planning and coordination to avoid project delays, cost overruns, and technology failure.
Set up the transformation for success with these tips:
- Document HR workflow, pain points, and desired capabilities. Conduct in-depth analysis of current HR processes through stakeholder interviews, observation, and data analysis. Identify friction points and needs across the employee lifecycle.
- Research potential vendors and their HR solution portfolios. Assess their technical capabilities across languages, frameworks, and integration methods. Review case studies and sample HR platforms delivered for other clients. Gauge their experience in developing solutions aligned to your requirements.
- Select two to three vendors and share requirement specifications for quotes and proposed solutions. Have them develop proposals detailing technical approach, pricing, timeline estimates, and project team. Require solution walkthroughs to visually demonstrate system concepts.
- Discuss safety, cultural fit, expertise, timeline, and budget. Select the partner that checks all boxes in capabilities, approach, interpersonal dynamics, and security protocols. All these are critical for a long-term partnership.
- Focus on user experience and adoption from the start. Conduct design workshops early to conceptualize workflow and interfaces. Develop interactive wireframes and prototypes for stakeholder feedback before writing the code. Iterate based on feedback to ensure optimal usability.
- Apply agile principles. Expect requirements to evolve rather than remain static through product delivery.
- Look to the partner as an expert advisor on technical and design considerations. Lean on their expertise while ensuring the end product aligns with your organization’s requirements and strategic priorities.
Summing Up
What could your HR department achieve if software limitations were no longer in your way? Quite a bit.
Custom software development paves a broader, clearer path that boosts productivity and performance. When explicitly built to address an organization's needs, it removes bottlenecks holding HR back, such as time-consuming and error-riddled processes.
Outsourcing this project gives you access to expertise and efficiency that are usually difficult and costly to match internally while allowing your team to focus on your core business. Contact Digital Authority Partners (DAP) today to schedule a free consultation. Learn more about how effective external teams build highly functional HR solutions from scratch.
Want To Meet Our Expert Team?
Book a meeting directly here