HR deals with a long list of administrative tasks that stretch from payroll management to compliance maintenance. The long and tedious work eats up time, money, and energy which could have been put to better use elsewhere in the business. Although the HR department’s job is essential, there are ways to make HR more efficient and productive for the company though. Here are four ideas collected from industry leaders to explain exactly how to get more from the department.
Outsourcing HR Functions
If the company is small, it will benefit more from outsourcing its HR responsibilities than it would by keeping a full HR department on its payroll. As G&A Partners puts it, outsourcing HR functions immediately saves time, decreases expenses, and stimulates growth simultaneously. Try to find a comprehensive, experienced, and well-reputed HR service partner that can manage all necessary functions such as recruitment, payroll, benefits, employee performance, risk, and safety assessment, legal compliance, and company policy updates among others.
Updating the HR Software
If you wish to operate with an improved internal HR team, consider upgrading the company’s HR software first. Provided that it has not been upgraded to a new system in the last three to five years, this can make your HR department’s performance improve quite dramatically. The latest AI-assisted automation features can shave off hours from the team’s work every day by completing manual, repetitive admin work automatically (payroll processing, violation warnings, benefits disbursement, etc.). If you choose the right software, it can make a small HR team appear as if they just got a boost to their available manpower.
Forming a Small, Experienced, and Well-Trained HR Team
We just discussed how an intelligent HR software with advanced automation features can make even a small HR team become significantly more efficient than its size may suggest. Make that HR team a small unit of experienced, motivated, and well-trained employees to see what a smart combination of man and machine can do for any business today.
When it comes to small businesses with internal HR teams, it just makes a lot more sense to invest in hiring a small team of dedicated, trained, and motivated employees. They will know how to maximize the latest software tools for better productivity.
Creating a Guideline for New Recruits
New recruits without enough experience with real HR work may feel at sea without guidance. This interrupts the workflow, so take steps to help them. Senior employees should mentor the new recruits as a policy, while each of the recruits should be formally informed via email about the following:
- Their roles, responsibilities, and company expectations
- All necessary details about the specific HR procedures that concern them
- Clear instructions on who to contact and when, if they are confused
The HR department’s job has become increasingly complicated with time, but it isn’t something that most small companies are fully aware of at the time. By the time they do take notice, they could already be running behind on tax payroll tax filings and answering for safety or labor law violations. This is the reason why SMEs often find that outsourcing their entire or partial HR responsibilities to an external partner is a more convenient and cost-effective alternative.
