The digital work environment requires organisations to think differently about how they overcome business challenges. Ian McAlister, GM of CRS Technologies, believes integrating once disparate functions is a step in the right direction.
Technology innovations have already seen a shift taking place in the corporate environment where companies are becoming more willing to adapt quicker to changing customer behaviour. But while a lot of attention is placed on developing more customised solutions for external users, this often comes at the expense of internal stakeholders.

Take human resources (HR) and payroll as an example. For too long, companies have viewed these as separate entities. HR was all about finding the right staff while payroll was a function of finance and needed to make sure people get paid on time. However, consider the business impact of integrating these two elements.

Success in unity

Utilising a centralised database that links HR with payroll opens opportunities for growth. By being able to access information from one database, decision-makers can more effectively match performance metrics to job functions and measure how well individual employees are meeting them.

It also reduces the administrative burden on departments by automating many elements of those business processes. Employees can therefore be empowered to take charge of things that previously had to go through one department or the other. These can include making leave forms and applications available online with approval processes happening in real-time. This lets employees see how many days’ leave they have available and what days others in the department have leave. This results in improved productivity as once manual functions are now streamlined using centralised systems.

Having such a unified database therefore provides the opportunity for increased self-service across a host of areas. Suddenly HR and payroll employees are not bogged down in administrative-heavy functions but can add strategic value to the business.

Transforming software

For too long, technology has been blamed for failures in either HR or payroll. Addressing this with an integrated system enables the business to focus more on the human element. It is not all about technological change but about embracing a new way of thinking in managing employees.

By fully linking HR, recruitment, payroll, and even talent management in this way, the business can ensure that its most precious resource — its people — are taken care of without any communication errors between departments getting in the way.

This provides the business with the platform needed for growth across other digital transformation initiatives. After all, there is no need to use multiple HR systems if companies can benefit from one, integrated database solution. This enables the end-to-end lifecycle of each employee of the workforce without having to duplicate work or lose sight of essential information.