How to Unleash Your Strategic Payroll Potential - EmployeeConnect HRIS
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strategic payroll

How to Unleash Your Strategic Payroll Potential

Savvy business and thought leaders have begun to realise that payroll processing plays a greater role in achieving strategic business objectives than just providing transactional accuracy. Integrating and streamlining strategic payroll processes saves money, empowers employees and identifies areas where efficiencies of scale can be realised. Poorly designed systems, however, can generate an astonishing array of problems that include mistakes when reporting and filing taxes, difficulties in dealing with enhanced payment options like direct deposit, inefficient scheduling, weak human capital management (HCM) and poor management of human resources. No matter how advanced your HCM software might be, it won’t address your company’s strategic objectives unless the software links to various business processes through software integrations in your company’s API layer.

Leveraging Workflow Driven HCM Software to Transform Payroll Process

Unfortunately, most managers spend an overwhelming amount of their time with administrative tasks, hounding departments for payroll data and rushing to get pay checks out on time. That’s because antiquated software and decentralised information slow the process. Managers often need to reconcile their calculations manually, which generates big security risks and compliance issues related to privacy. Modern, workflow driven HCM software provides the tools that can personalise calculations, enable interdepartmental collaborations, generate custom reports, streamline efficiency and foster better communications throughout any organisation.

Putting People First with Employee Centric Payroll Features

Electronic support channels can provide seamless self-service capabilities that allow your staff to get answers to their pay and benefits questions. Employees don’t have to consult a staff member or manager just to get information. Payroll data routinely affect every employee, so investing in self-service automation just makes sound financial sense. It also improves the employee experience, which is critical in today’s competitive efforts to recruit and retain top talent. Self service allows employees to work more flexible schedules and check in or out while working away from their desks.

Employees can also lodge their own requests for annual leave, personal leave, benefits and other administrative requests like expenses. These self-service options increase employee engagement, speed decision-making and save time for managers who no longer need to handle routine requests for information.

Your company’s culture – together with the right HCM software – can encourage employees to go completely paperless. Employees might receive their money a day or two early with direct deposits  which reduces total administrative costs. Built-in reporting systems based on payroll data can help executives and managers make better decisions about authorising overtime, raising pay, awarding bonuses and identifying potential cost overruns in special projects. Strategic payroll can even be used to identify phantom employees and fraud.

Some of the strategic payroll benefits for business of fully integrating Payroll with HCM software include the following benchmarks:

  • Meet complex, confusing and evolving regulatory requirements.
  • Communicate with staff directly to foster workforce goals and allow each team member to check on his or her progress.
  • Reduce administrative burdens by outsourcing, automating and streamlining payroll processes.
  • Comply with mandatory health care guidelines.
  • Simplify on-boarding and off-boarding processes through employee self service applications.

 

Seven Steps to Build a More Strategic Payroll Process

Strategic payroll promises greater organisational efficiency, lower costs and reduced headaches when reporting taxes and employee-related work activities. You can customise pay calculations for different departments, offices and employee segments while reducing administrative costs due to HR management of work-related information issues.

Seven steps involved in building a more strategic payroll process include:

  1. Aligning Strategic Payroll with Your Company’s Vision.
  2. Unifying Payroll with Core Capital Management Processes
  3. Utilising the Cloud for Payroll Processes
  4. Eliminating Repetitive Steps
  5. Empowering Staff with User-Friendly Access and Features
  6. Ensuring Full Integration Among HCM Processes Such as Payroll, Finance, Performance, Remuneration, Timekeeping and Attendance
  7. Optimising Performance with Real-Time Reports and Analytics

 

Using HCM software helps, but it’s critical to integrate your business applications to get the best results. Strategic payroll can anticipate many situations such as accommodating growth projections, analysing how growth might affect payroll and providing early warning when increased hiring becomes necessary. Strategic payroll isn’t static; it adapts based on legislative changes, new industry regulations and the corporate imperative to make continuous improvements to attract and retain top talent.

For more detailed read, download the Free White Paper

Unleashing Your Strategic Payroll Potential 

Leveraging Workflow Driven HCM to Transform your Payroll Process

Ari Kopoulos
ari@employeeconnect.com

CEO at EmployeeConnect