‘Simple, Easy-to-use HR Software’: A Vicious and Costly Cycle

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Like many, are you looking for HR software that is affordable, simple to use and doesn’t require any lengthy setup?

But how many of you will invest the time to properly investigate the full detail of your HR and operational needs?

What if, in a few months’ time, you realise that the software that you’d chosen to adopt can’t cater for your business requirements or perform the functions that you desperately need?

Make a wrong system choice and you may end up needing to switch HR software platforms, which will mean another lengthy, expensive and potentially stressful process – or indeed, an embarrassing situation.

Drawing upon our own experiences, the number of times that companies settle for what turns out to be an incompetent HR system (when basing their search entirely on price, or simplicity, or aesthetic appeal), instead of understanding what is really important in terms of functional and operational requirements, is massive.

Eventually, many companies come to the realisation that their ‘simple, easy-to-use and inexpensive’ software choice doesn’t have the capabilities they need to perform as they had thought or how they were ‘sold’ the system, and so either the buying process begins again, or you live with a very costly and aggravating mismatch.

A number of enquiries we receive day-to-day state, “I know what we want”, which often and bizarrely translates to, ‘I’ve been told what I can spend’.

We love a bargain just as much as anyone but we know that cheap doesn’t always mean good, and that’s why HR teams and owner managers ought to reassess the basis of their research criteria when evaluating HR software systems.

Recent surveys suggest that the main reason businesses choose to adopt HR software is to reduce administration costs. So why is it that prospective users say that they’re looking for inexpensive, simple to use software that is going to do very little to reduce the aforementioned costs?

It’s important to be aware that ‘simple to use’ can often translate as ‘lacking functionality’.

Taking the necessary time to research HR software thoroughly could leave you with a product with a breadth and depth of functionality that results in providing greater capability, far more process automation, and therefore less administration time being spent on additional processing, manipulating or correcting data, which means lower adoption and ownership costs. So, by definition, you may pay a few pounds more for the software that has those greater capabilities, but overall you will be saving your company more money.

Like any system, HR software is an investment and you want to see tangible results in lowering administration costs and an increase in user satisfaction and employee engagement over time.

If you’re looking for an HRIS that is going to perform all of the functions you require, as well as providing you with suitable pricing options based on selectable modules, then we’d welcome the opportunity to speak to you.

Did you find this article useful? Youmanage HR offers software to help you streamline your HR processes and ensure compliance within your company. We also write articles on HR, leadership, employee engagement, health & well-being and much more. Start a free trial of Youmanageget in touch to ask questions, or check out our blog to help you to deliver HR best practice in your business.