Having an HR and payroll system undoubtedly helps to improve operational efficiency. But to ensure that cost savings and efficiencies are recognised from the outset, a smooth deployment and transition is critical.

Here are our top tips for making the process as trouble-free and effective as possible.

1. Identify manual processes

As important as your staff are to the operation of your business, they can also be the source of many inefficiencies. Processes that rely on intervention or paper-based form filling are open to user error or abuse, both of which are costly. Paper systems are inefficient, taking much longer than computer-equivalents to retrieve. Important information kept in paper files is costly to store and liable to loss.

It is therefore essential to identify manual processes that your new payroll system can automate. By identifying these processes in advance, your new payroll system can be configured prior immediately creating new time-savings for your staff.

2. Get staff involved

To ensure that staff willingly adopt the new payroll system, it is essential to involve them in the deployment process. This will mean asking managers to help define the system requirements needed for the HR/payroll package to meet their operational needs.

Once the package has been purchased, all HR and payroll staff will need a basic introduction to the system to help them understand its purpose. You should also look at starting full training as soon as possible so that staff are ready to perform at least the most basic operations from day one.

3. Identify key information in advance

You will undoubtedly have at least some payroll and HR records stored somewhere on your company server. Identifying this information will allow you to import it into your new system, ready for use when the software goes live. It is essential that you have your team verify that everything has been transferred successfully before shutting down your old system.

You may also use this exercise as an opportunity to archive or clear down information that is no longer required, helping to free up resources.

4. Check legal and regulatory compliance

Your new HR and payroll system should not only support legal and taxation requirements natively, it should also offer the facility to update automatically as regulations change. For the most seamless transition, make sure that the system has been updated with the latest tax codes, National Insurance bands and other statutory information in advance.

You should also take the opportunity to audit your data, verifying that existing data is accurate and up-to-date. Your business will then avoid costly payroll mistakes and the time wasted resolving these errors in future.

5. Test, test, test

Before rolling the software out to your HR and payroll departments, it is essential that you thoroughly test every aspect of the new system. You and your team need to know that the data is accurate, payroll runs complete successfully, and the system really does improve operational efficiency.

By testing the software in advance, you can identify and fix issues before they adversely affect your business. You can also raise staff confidence in the efficiency and benefits of the new platform. Testing at every stage of implementation also allows for issues to be resolved before they snowball, causing larger problems after roll-out.

Using these five tips, your business stands a far better chance of a smooth software deployment that actually delivers the efficiencies promised from day one.

 

Image credit – piles of paperwork by ryan.melissa on Flickr