Not just another cog in the wheel

Candice Hartley, KPMG

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The relationship between employer and employee is always in flux. Changing technologies, rights, perspectives and expectations have seen dramatic changes in how companies manage and reward their people. It wasn’t that long ago that hiring children was considered best practice for certain professions, and women were not allowed to be hired at all.

In the 1970s, staying with a company for life was standard practice, but the recession of the 1980s saw layoffs of well-trained professionals and laid the foundations for the gig economy. While the freelance model wasn’t new, it gained traction. Then the demand in the ‘90s on profit over people drove a wedge between the trust engendered between the employer and the employee – one that remains very much in place today. The 2020 pandemic brought about perhaps the most significant change in the dynamic. A few weeks out of the office turned into months, in some cases years, and employees discovered they liked having a work/ life balance.

When companies pushed for people to come back, people left. In the Great Resignation, employees decided they wanted to be treated with respect and get paid at the same time. The new generations also played a role – millennials and up-and-coming Gen Z are less likely to fall under the ‘80s work hard, work harder cosh.

“We share the results publicly, but participation is anonymous. We then build trust by changing the areas where our people have concerns.”

Ghouwah Emandien, iOCO

There’s a lot of talk about how employees are the lifeblood of the business and it’s important to build a culture that fosters wellness and inclusion. But workplace wellness aside, ultimately, companies want employees to come to work, do their best and produce results. Employees want to work for a company that lets them get the job done without draconian controls or Orwellian monitoring of their behaviour in hybrid or remote environments.

Human capital management (HCM) can be used to achieve a happy middle ground for companies wanting to balance culture with a strong work ethic. Of course, it can also be used to handhold and monitor employees excessively. The use case comes down to the company.

Edward Snell & Co, an independent spirits group in South Africa, is using Payspace to improve its payroll processes. Juliette Bourne, head of human resources at Edward Snell & Co, explains: “We wanted user-friendly, with some light and fluff. It was non-negotiable that our user experience was improved. It also had to be cloud-based, meet our ISO 27001 IT security standards and be accessible across multiple channels. Our office, field, production and warehousing staff had to access and interact with the solution.”

The platform is used to manage monthly payroll, provide employees with selfservice tools, and support HR by reducing the burden of day-to-day queries. The goal, says Bourne, is to improve employee interactivity in a system that’s easy to use.

It’s a similar metric that drives the use of HCM at KPMG. The company has a mix of platforms designed to manage local and international employees and process employee data, payroll, leave applications, and performance. Candice Hartley, chief people officer, says it uses Oracle eBusiness Suite for processing payroll and SAP modules to manage performance, learning and development. “Our business is centred around continued professional development so we have controls around risk management, indemnities and independent training managed within the SAP success factors,” she says.

Also offering self-service tools, the KPMG platform is designed to increase collaboration between staff and the company. It provides a level of autonomy but balances this, says Hartley, with ensuring the right controls are in place to ensure the company is meeting global and local regulatory requirements around processing employee data and implementing qualitative and quantitative metrics.

“We use the data provided by our HCM platform to measure factors such as turnover, attrition, and extended absenteeism,” she says. “These are important for data analysis as we can use the information to make informed management decisions.”

At iOCO, the HCM platform is used to support the company with wellness and enablement, and uses data to support the business and employee performance. Ghouwah Emandien, manager: people and culture, says it captures KPIs in the employee performance management system and the information is used to help managers have conversations with their staff. “We also focus on upskilling and reskilling as well as on inclusion and diversity within our platform,” she says. The system is designed to help everyone work towards a common goal.

These metrics are great for the business, but how do they affect employee trust? Do the self-service tools and system visibility make the granular visibility into employee data an easier pill to swallow? HCM systems can be used to build connections with employees and the data can benefit both sides of the coin, but often, HR systems are perceived as the enemy and more on the side of the company than the employee.

Hartley says monitoring staff is the purpose of these solutions. “The question is whether or not these solutions are enabling them to deliver what they were employed to do. We live in a world where everything is digitised and, in the workplace, you want that seamless digital experience. Employees need to trust that the organisation has selected the right technology that ensures they are rewarded for doing their job.”

“Employees need to trust that the organisation has selected the right technology that ensures they are rewarded for doing their job.”

Candice Hartley, KPMG

She adds that trust isn’t just in how an employee’s data is used, but in how it is protected. “When you trust a company with your data, ID, banking details, and home address, you want to know it has the right controls in place to safeguard that data.”

This is echoed by Bourne, who says it was important that its solution was developed with the security and privacy of employee information in mind.

At iOCO, Emandien believes that HCM needs to be structured in a way that avoids making people feel like just another number. “You have to take the time to sit down with people and have a conversation. One metric we use to measure our employee value proposition, or HCM solution, is through a survey we’ve been running for four years. We share the results publicly, but participation is anonymous. We then build trust by changing the areas where our people have concerns.”

Trust, metrics, management, visibility, and control: these are the foundations that an HCM platform should stand on if it wants to respect the needs of the business alongside the personal space of the employee. Nobody expects to walk into an office and avoid the admin, KPIs and performance assessments, but equally, they do expect these to be managed in a way that respects their autonomy. Finding this balance depends ultimately on leadership, not technology.