When it comes to choosing workforce management system software, seamless integration with HR and payroll is the most important component, according to a report seen exclusively by HR magazine.
Software vendor WorkForce Software conducted a survey of 55 European respondents in HR, operations and IT management roles across industry sectors and in organisations with between 1,000 and 10,000 employees for its Workforce Management Systems for Today… and Tomorrow survey. The research found that 55% of those polled needed seamless integration with HR and payroll from their software, 53% required a secure and accurate means of time entry, and 49% wanted incorporation of regional wage and hour regulations. A third (33%) cited a product that was easy to use, while 29% rated the ability to configure the program as a highly important factor.
Only 4% of respondents said the option to modify the software to fit their specific needs was not very important, compared to a third (33%) who said it was important, and 63% who said it was very important.
Kim Lewin, European VP of sales and operations for WorkForce Software, told HR magazine that these results matched what the company expected. “The problem is there is a lot of legacy software in place,” he said. “Often companies believe that their legacy system should be fixed, rather than having a whole new system.”
However, when asked what business problems they needed to answer with a new system, respondents had a long list of challenges. Almost half (47%) said running applications in the cloud would be an obstacle, while 16% had concerns over poor application performance. More than two in five (44%) were worried about support on mobile applications.
“One customer had 19 different time systems,” Lewin said. “With one system senior leaders can look into it in real time and get consistent answers about absence.”
