App Stack - Human Resources

Last week we spoke about the importance of having a sound document management system in place. This week we are going to talk about the often neglected but primary function of Human Resources (HR) and in particular how getting this right from the start can allow for a smooth on boarding and exiting of staff members and heaven forbid if there is a non compliance HR claim made against you!

Human Resources (HR)
HR is one of those topics that all businesses in our experience is neglected. Nearly all businesses that we deal with at Clarity Street either have a standard, out of date, employee contract or none at all. When we ask the business owners why they have neglected this crucial part of their business, they state that they do not have the time to set it up correctly and or, are not HR lawyers and struggle to understand the various awards etc and throw it into the “too hard” basket. Unfortunately, both Fair Work and state based Occupational Health & Safety organisations have big teeth and they are not afraid to use them when it comes to employees and their rights, health and safety. Penalties can include fines and in extreme cases jail time if the business has been criminally negligent.

Fortunately the area of Human Resources and Occupational Health and Safety has seen significant growth in the area of cloud based applications that help businesses owners not just become compliant with the law, but to effectively manage their teams with timesheeting, leave applications, career pathways, workplace incident prevention and reporting and disciplinary actions just to name a few of the functions these apps now provide.

It used to be that a business would contact a HR lawyer once and have them draft up a standard one size fits all contract and then put it into the standard employee file and leave it there to gather dust. Cloud based HR applications replace the once off lawyer visit with a virtual HR department that allow for quick changes to be made to standard contracts, or in depth HR advice to stay compliant with legislation, therefore keeping the business owner on the right side of the law for a fraction of the price a HR lawyer would charge.

Applications such as HappyHr and enableHR are designed to be end to end employee lifecycle applications, that take the heavy lifting away from the business owner, as both of these applications have dedicated templates and teams to help the business owner initially set up, and then maintain their HR documentation and portal.

Both applications run on any web browser, however enableHR has a point of difference with a native smartphone application, while HappyHr only has access via a web browser although it has been optimised for mobile viewing.

They both have an API which allows for other applications such as, Xero, Deputy, Tanda etc to sync real time data with them allowing for a more flexible and robust HR platform. These integrations allow for the elimination of information silos. Where this is most noticeable is with the on boarding of an employee and gathering of initial data such as Name, Address, TFN etc or timesheet entries which now only need to be done once in the relevant system. This is then sent across to the recipient platform such as Xero, eliminating double handling and the potential for human error.

You can find a full list of the features by clicking the links below:
HappyHr
enableHR

We don't really have a preference here, Clarity Street recommends both HR applications as they both have easy to use, clean user interfaces with good solid advice, tied into their employee management platforms. Both applications fit in with our core application Xero, which then allows for seamless integration and elimination of information silos and double handling of information. We recommend that you book a demo with both of the applications and compare the look, feel, features and price points so that you can start on your journey to HR compliance!

Want to know more? Get in touch with us!