The Human Resource Information Systems

Published Date: 02 Nov 2017

The Human Resource Information Systems is introduced by presenting the various definitions, development, costs and benefits, as well as their functions and relationship with HRM. Furthermore, different software providers and their solutions is presented.

HRIS shape an integration between human resource management (HRM) and Information Technology. Even though these systems may rely on centralized hardware resources operationally, a small group of IS specialists residing within the personnel department increasingly manage, support, and maintain them. HRIS support planning, administration, decision-making, and control. The system supports applications such as employee selection and placement, payroll, pension and benefits management, intake and training projections, career-pathing, equity monitoring, and productivity evaluation. These information systems increase administrative efficiency and produce reports capable of improving decision-making

Tannenbaum (1990) defines HRIS as a technology-based system used to acquire, store, manipulate, analyze, retrieve, and distribute pertinent information regarding an organization’s human resources. Kovach et al., (1999) defined HRIS as a systematic procedure for collecting, storing, maintaining, retrieving, and validating data needed by organization about its human resources, personnel activities, and organization unit characteristics. Furthermore, HRIS shape an integration between human resource

management (HRM) and Information Technology. It merges HRM as a discipline and in particular basic HR activities and processes with the information technology field (Gerardine DeSanctis, 1986: 15). As is the case with any complex organizational information system, an HRIS is not limited to the computer hardware and software applications that comprise the technical part of the system it also includes the people, policies, procedures, and data required to manage the HR function (Hendrickson, 2003).

Components of an HRIS

Kovach et al., (1999) presented the three major functional components in any HRIS by

giving the model below:

Input Data Maintenance Output

The Input function enters personnel information into the HRIS. Data entry in the past had been one way, but today, scanning technology permits scanning and storage of actual image off an original document, including signatures and handwritten notes. The maintenance function updates and adds new data to the database after data have been entered into the information system. Moreover, the most visible function of an HRIS is the output generated. According to Kovach et al., (1999), to generate valuable output for computer users, the HRIS have to process that output, make the necessary calculations,

and then format the presentation in a way that could be understood. However, the note of caution is that, while it is easy to think of HR information systems in terms of the hardware and software packages used to implement them and to measure them by the number of workstations, applications or users who log onto the system, the mostimportant elements of HRIS are not the computers, rather, the information. The bottom line of any comprehensive HRIS have to be the information validity, reliability and utility first and the automation of the process second

WIPRO- HUMAN RESOURCE analysis in detail

cmm

Wipro is the first People Capability Maturity Model (PCMM) Level 5, SEI Capability Maturity Model (CMM) Level 5 and version 1.1 of CMMi certified IT Services Company globally. Wipro’s people processes are based on the current best practices in human resources, knowledge management and organization development.

Wipro is the first Indian company to adopt Six Sigma. It has expertise in Six-Sigma methodologies, which have been put in use to streamline and enhance existing people processes in organizations,enabling decision making based on metrics and measurements, ensuring that 91% of the projects are completed on schedule, mush above the industry average of 55%.

Human Resource Policies

Manpower Planning

Recruitment & Selection

Training & Development

Performance Appraisal

Promotion, Transfer, & Demotion

Administration Section

Grievance Handling

Welfare Activities

We are already aware of the above policies, detailing of important features is as under

Recruitment- refers to the process of screening and selecting qualified people for a job at an organization or firm, or for a vacancy in a volunteer-based organization or community group. External recruitment is the process of attracting and selecting employees from outside the organization.

Internal Sources :-

Promotions and Transfer

Job postings

Employee Referrals

External Sources :-

Advertisement

Employment Agencies

On campus Recruitment

Employment exchanges

Education and training institute

WIPRO recruitment process consists of three rounds.

Round 1 : Written test

1. Verbal: English grammar test

2. Aptitude: consisting of mathematical problems and logical reasoning

3. Technical: related to basic technical concepts from C, C++, Java, Linux, UNIX, DBMS, SQL ,Programming fundamentals, Hardware, Software Engineering, Microprocessors etc.

Round 2: Technical Interview This is a major elimination round.

Round 3: HR interview

Training- refers to the acquisition of knowledge,skills. Training & Development of individuals is a key focus area at Wipro. For those with less than one year of experience, a well-structured induction training program is conducted. This will cover all aspects of software development skills that are required. As a PCMM Level 5 organization, there is also high focus on Competency Development.

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Wipro also has an HRIS (Human Resources Information Systems), which is an integration of HRM and Information Systems (IS). HRIS or Human resource Information system helps HR managers perform HR functions in a more effective and systematic way using technology. It is the system used to acquire, store, manipulate,analyze, retrieve, and distribute pertinent information regarding an organization's human resources.

There are cetain innovative HR practices performed for better management of the company and make it more employee-friendly. Such as, Every four months they conduct an employee survey where all our employees provide inputs on the health of the workplace. This survey enables us to identify how strongly the person feels about the organization, and how strong is the person's clarity of his / her existence in the organization. They also have the HR review in the planning cycle, which is a rigorous process involving everyone, right upto the head of the organization. They do succession planning for individuals wherein they identify the best talents - the top ten people. They also identify our bottom ten people, who are asked to pull up their socks and improve, failing which they will have to leave. They carry out this exercise every quarter. They have a program, which is known as "wings within'- an internal job posting system. In this people can apply for jobs in other departments and they do not have to inform their supervisors about it. If selected they can move out and nobody can stop them. This gives people the feeling that they are not buttonholed into a particular type of job. Their CEO Mr. Azim Premji spends 3 to 4 hours with every new group of employees, briefing them about their promises, values and beliefs.

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THE IMPACT OF IMPLEMENTING AN HRIS

ARE YOU READY FOR A CHANGE Integrated HR Information Systems (HRIS) have a profound effect on firms that implement them. Most often these firms are replacing several related systems, such as a personnel database, payroll system and benefits system, with one HRIS that does it all. Many people focus on the improved reporting and processing that will be realized from the new system, and those are the reasons most firms choose to implement a new HRIS. But what many people don’t focus on is that the new HRIS will most likely affect the company much more deeply – it will challenge the operating structure and principles of all the HR-related departments. An integrated HRIS results is a drastically different environment than a cluster of related but separate systems. The core concept of a centralized data store inherent with an HRIS demands integrated work processes for consistently managing that store. The two attributes – centralized data storage and integrated work processes – will affect the company in ways most managers don’t expect.

EVALUATING AND PREPARING FOR A NEW HRIS

Many companies go through a process of comparing and evaluating several HRIS packages using a team of analysts or managers from the various departments affected – HR, Payroll, Benefits, Employee Relations, Training and so on. As this team prepares its evaluation criteria and reviews HRIS features, much is learned about the goals and values of the various departments. The HR department is looking for improved reporting of employee data, Payroll is concerned with the system’s paycheck calculations and regulatory reporting, while Benefits may be looking for a more streamlined enrollment process. As this team drives deeper into the selection criteria, the members learn more about each other and may start to see the emergence of some really messy business processes. It can be a bittersweet process. The hiring process is a good example. As a person is recruited, hired and paid each department may have its own specialized system and process for managing the employee data. As the HRIS evaluation team discovers redundant processing and data storage, its members start to see ways to make the process more efficient by aligning their part of the hiring process with the requirements of the other departments. The team members are excited to find a better way to get the work done, but scared by the ramifications of closer ties to other departments. They think: "If we improve the efficiency of the process (have HR enter the W-4 at the time of hire), we won’t need as many people in our department (we won’t need to key W-4s anymore), and we might lose control of some piece of data that is critical to our business function (how do we know that HR will key the W-4 correctly?)". As the team evaluates an HRIS software package, it begins to get a better grasp on what the entire company’s business processes are, and therefore what the company might require in an HRIS. The team will most likely find that none of the packages are an exact fit and that substantial effort is required to modify or integrate the chosen HRIS. Or if not enough due diligence and research have been done, the team may be facing this effort and not be aware of it. This gap in planning will show itself later in the implementation phase when the project team realizes there are not enough resources – time, people and money – to implement the HRIS. Perhaps the most critical results of the HRIS evaluation process are that the evaluation team set correct expectations for the project and gain executive management commitment. With correct, or at least realistic expectations and an executive management team that seriously supports the team’s efforts, an HRIS implementation project has a much greater chance to succeed. Most often the HRIS evaluation team members spend most of their efforts building selection criteria and choosing an HRIS, instead of setting expectations and building executive support. THE HRIS IMPLEMENTATION PROJECT Configuring the New HRIS There are three primary activities in an HRIS implementation – configuring the HRIS for the firm’s business processes and policies, interfacing data with other systems and converting historical data into the HRIS, and preparing the organization for the new HRIS. An HRIS comes with built-in processes for most HR activities, but firms will need to customize the system to process according to their specific needs. For example, every HRIS supports the process of benefits open enrollment, but the system does not come delivered with a firm’s specific benefit providers and eligibility rules. Customizing the HRIS for this typically does not involve programming; the common activity is to enter specific data into control tables that then direct how the HRIS operates. The customizing, or configuration tasks then become a process of understanding the firm’s business processes well enough to encode that logic into the HRIS. This mapping of business processes and policies into system control tables requires people who understand both the business process and the HRIS – typically the existing IT support and HR business analysts. Due to the large amount of work, the HRIS project team usually needs these analysts fully dedicated to the project, requiring the "home" departments to fill the gaps in their absence. Having partially dedicated team members may cause tension since the team members have to maintain responsibilities at the home department while also fulfilling responsibilities on the project team. Either way, back-filling resources becomes a big issue if not planned for during the evaluation stage. Firms may find that the internal resource people assigned to the project do not have the skills or capabilities needed for the job. Sometimes training can resolve this, but other times the people lack basic analytical skills required for the implementation. One of the key requirements for a person to be successful on an HRIS implementation project is that he/she have excellent analysis skills. The most analytical people in HR and IT should be assigned to the project, or else the company should rely on external resources (i.e. contractors or consultants). The project can get done this way – but the more an implementation team relies on external resources the more difficult it will be for the company to become self-sufficient in ongoing HRIS support, maintenance, and operations. Many HRIS implementations include, to one degree or another, business process reengineering. As a firm documents, investigates, and discovers its true business processes, it’s natural that the firm also take time to improve them, or at least integrate the processes across departments. The integrated nature of most HRIS packages drives this activity. When a process is reengineered or integrated, once-independent departments become much more dependent on each other. That dependency can increase tensions on the project team as representatives from those departments learn to trust others to do their part of the process. Or, once the project team members become comfortable with the new processes they have designed, they may have a hard time selling those changes back to their departments. Most HRIS packages don’t handle exception processing very well. As new business processes are designed, the project team customizes the HRIS around those new processes. Users will most likely find that exception cases require significant manual thought or labor to process – since the exception does not fit into the business process as implemented in the HRIS. HRIS project team analysts will walk a fine line between generalization of the process to fit exceptions vs. a more narrowed implementation of the process to enforce data integrity and accurate application of HR policy. This is a great time to enforce some standards and clean-up "special deals" – but HR managers and policymakers must be willing to support these efforts, and to help implement them. Finally, as the project team analysts dig into the current business processes, they may find that the HR users, and sometimes managers, don’t really understand or know the processes well. Users may know what is done, but not why it is done. Knowing the why part is critical to getting the most out of your HRIS implementation. In most every HRIS there are two or three technical methods of implementing any given requirement – knowing why something is done in a business process helps ensure the project team analysts select the best method of implementing it in the HRIS. Linking the New HRIS with Other Systems Most HRIS project teams have a number of people assigned to converting historical data from the existing HR databases into the new HRIS, as well as for interfacing the new HRIS with other systems that rely on HR data. As this group starts mapping historical data to the new system for conversion, most often group members will find (particularly when combining data from several existing systems to go into one HRIS) that the existing HR data contains a significant amount of invalid, incomplete, or contradictory data. As the new HRIS was configured for new, reengineered or streamlined business processes, the existing employee data may not fit well into the new system. The new HRIS will demand more complete and accurate employee data. Making sense of these data conversion problems is a skill that falls to HR analysts, not the programmers writing data-conversion routines. Conversion and interfacing are not solely technical activities – user consultation and input are required. Many HRIS project teams discover these requirements too late, thus increasing the demand for time from HR analysts on the project team – time that the analysts most likely do not have. If the firm has a data warehouse, the new HRIS data will need to be mapped to it. If the data model in the warehouse is based on the legacy HR database, the two data models may not be compatible. A lot of effort can be spent mapping the new HRIS to an existing data warehouse. Or if the HRIS vendor has its own data warehouse application, the project team might be tempted to use it, but they’ll still have to contend with converting existing historical HR data into the new warehouse. Either way, HRIS project teams spend more effort than planned on this issue – the details can get very tedious and time consuming. Replacing HR systems involves any area of the company that reads or relies on employee data. New system implementation may highlight employee data privacy issues, or increase the scope of interfacing once the project team realizes just how many systems read employee data from the current HR-related databases. Preparing the Organization Many times it is easier for project teams to focus on technical aspects of the implementation, which is ineffective. For example, configuring the HRIS to correctly assign resident tax codes based on the employee’s address is easier than getting HR, benefits, payroll, and recruiting to buy into and implement a reengineered hiring process. The HRIS project team must track progress not only on the technical aspects of implementing the HRIS, but also on the softer side of managing the organization as a whole to accept the new business processes that come with the HRIS. Companies typically underestimate this change-management effort. From the very beginning there must be a focus on preparing the organization and the employees for the new HRIS. A new HRIS, with more integrated work processes, tends to pull related departments together. Some firms recognize this as they go through the implementation process, and also implement a new organizational structure with the HRIS roll-out.