Workforce - September/October 2016

workforce.com

September/October 2016

Focus on HR Tech

TECH AND TALENT It’s a match made in the cloud.

INNOVATION

ROBO CONNECTION

HR, technology and Retirement benefits go robo those who make it work. through burgeoning technology.

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From Our Editors

CPS HR Consulting collected a record-setting 3,500 books during its 11th annual Children’s Book Drive benefiting the River Oak Center for Children in Sacramento, California. Since 2006, CPS has collected more than 30,500 books as donations to the children’s center.

Though some will contend my early days in the news business started with hammer and chisel on stone tablets a la Fred Flintstone, the tools of my trade way back when were much more progressive — pica poles, proportional wheels and non-Repro pens.

It’s quite likely that your HR practice has rapidly progressed from the prehistoric reams of printed forms documenting everything from benefits to performance evaluations toward a spiffy new era of cloud-based people management.

This issue of Workforce digs deep into the eye-popping evolution of HR technology. Dinosaurs no more, we now manage through dashboards and apps rather than personnel folders and time clocks.

What goes around comes around in my industry.

Like Fred and Barney, we again get our news on tablets.And now you can manage your people on one, too — sans mallet and chisel.

— Rick Bell, Editorial Director 4

Workƒorce | w o r k f o r c e . c o m

READER FEEDBACK Readers weren’t scared off by James Tehrani’s “Last Word” column titled “The Tired Scare Tactics on Retirement,” July 2016, p. 50. Said Mary Pat Higley: ‘It is true that you need to plan for retirement.

Start saving with your first job — hopefully in a 401(k). Even if it’s $50 a month.

Compound interest is the key to reaching your retirement goals and living within your means and paying off credit cards every month. No one ever says “I wish I hadn’t saved for retirement.” Read one of Suze Orman’s great finance books. It will motivate you. If you wait to think about retirement until your 40s and 50s it will be scary. Buy your cars, don’t lease and drive them for 20 years. Enjoy life but prepare for the future.Teach your children how to delay gratification and save.You won’t regret it. HR people are trying to help you.’

Online reader Karen Oakes wrote: ‘Great article; $2.2 million for retirement seems a bit excessive, but I guess it depends on what your income was while you were working.

Assuming retirement at age 67 and living until 90, that’s 23 years, so $2.2 million will get you around $95,000 a year. If your house is paid off then most people would probably only need about half that, or $1.1 million in retirement savings. Keeping in mind that expensive hobbies such as RV-ing, backpacking, volunteering with the Peace Corps, etc., are not going to be able to be done for the entire 23 years between 67 and 90. If you’re lucky,

you can do those things until 80. So a paid-off house, long-term-care insurance and enough money for a good Medicare supplement plan would eliminate the need for $95,000 a year in the later years. Or you could just live in low-income senior housing and use the bus. Better yet, live with your children and drive them crazy!’

Workforce.com/scaretactics

Rene Campbell offered a thought on the story, “Workplace Deaths Spike Despite Safety Upgrades,” July 2016, p. 15: ‘Another factor that may be contributing to this increase is the huge decline in unions; employees are more intimidated speaking up about safety concerns when they have less job protection.’

Workforce.com/WFdeaths

And Richard Davis commented on Kris Dunn’s column, “Who to Hire When Your Culture Sucks,” July 2016, p. 13: ‘And it is really that simple. People don’t quit jobs; they quit people.The sad thing is most companies know this, but ego, insecurity and incompetence get in the way of making substantive changes.’

Workforce.com/culturesucks We welcome your comments on these stories and others on our website.

Be sure to follow us and give us a shout on Twitter at @Workforcenews, too.

Hope to hear from you! september/october

2016

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A PUBLICATION OF September/October 2016 | Volume 95, Issue 9 PRESIDENT John R. Taggart jrtag@workforce.com

EDITORIAL ART DIRECTOR EVENTS MARKETING MANAGER Anna Jo Beck Anthony Zepeda abeck@workforce.com azepeda@workforce.com VICE PRESIDENT, CFO, COO EDITORIAL INTERNS WEBCAST COORDINATOR AnnMarie Kuzel Kevin A. Simpson akuzel@workforce.com Alec O’Dell ksimpson@workforce.com aodell@workforce.com Sarah Foster VICE PRESIDENT, sfoster@workforce.com EVENTS GRAPHIC GROUP PUBLISHER Clifford Capone DESIGNER VICE PRESIDENT, ccapone@workforce.com Tonya Harris RESEARCH AND lharris@workforce.com ADVISORY SERVICES VICE PRESIDENT, EDITOR IN CHIEF Sarah Kimmel BUSINESS MANAGER skimmel@workforce.com Mike Prokopeak Vince Czarnowski mikep@workforce.com vince@workforce.com RESEARCH MANAGER EDITORIAL DIRECTOR Rick Bell rbell@workforce.com GROUP EDITOR/ ASSOCIATE EDITORIAL DIRECTOR Kellye Whitney kwhitney@workforce.com MANAGING EDITOR James Tehrani jtehrani@workforce.com CONTRIBUTING EDITOR Frank Kalman fkalman@workforce.com ASSOCIATE EDITOR Andie Burjek aburjek@workforce.com ASSOCIATE EDITOR Lauren Dixon ldixon@workforce.com ASSOCIATE EDITOR Bravetta Hassell bhassell@workforce.com COPY EDITOR Christopher Magnus cmagnus@workforce.com

Tim Harnett tharnett@workforce.com RESEARCH ANALYST Grey Litaker clitaker@workforce.com RESEARCH ASSISTANT Kristen Britt kbirtt@workforce.com RESEARCH GRAPHIC DESIGNER Theresa Stoodley tstoodley@workforce.com MEDIA & PRODUCTION MANAGER Ashley Flora aflora@workforce.com PRODUCTION COORDINATOR Nina Howard nhoward@workforce.com

REGIONAL SALES MANAGERS Derek Graham dgraham@workforce.com Marc Katz mkatz@workforce.com Daniella Weinberg dweinberg@workforce.com ACCOUNT EXECUTIVE Brian Lorenz blorenz@workforce.com DIRECTOR OF BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT, EVENTS Kevin Fields kfields@workforce.com

LIST MANAGER Mike Rovello hcmlistrentals@infogroup.com BUSINESS ADMINISTRATIVE MANAGER Melanie Lee mlee@workforce.com LEAD GENERATION ADMINISTRATOR Nick Safir nsafir@workforce.com CONTRIBUTING WRITERS Maria-Paz Barrientos Jennifer Benz Marty Denis Kris Dunn Sarah Fister Gale Richard Hu Jon Hyman Mark T. Kobata Patty Kujawa Eric Lesser Rita Pyrillis Michelle V. Rafter Sonya Rosenberg

AUDIENCE DEVELOPMENT DIRECTOR Cindy Cardinal ccardinal@workforce.com

VICE PRESIDENT, EVENTS DIGITAL MANAGER Trey Smith Lauren Lynch tsmith@workforce.com llynch@workforce.com EVENT CONTENT DIGITAL COORDINATOR MANAGER Mannat Mahtani Ashley Collins acollins@workforce.com mmahtani@workforce.com

WORKFORCE EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD Arie Ball, Vice President, Sourcing and Talent Acquisition, Sodexo Angela Bailey, Associate Director and Chief Human Capital Officer, U.S. Office of Personnel Management Kris Dunn, Chief Human Resources Officer, Kinetix, and Founder, Fistful of Talent and HR Capitalist Curtis Gray, Senior Vice President, Human Resources and Administration, BAE Systems Jil Greene, Vice President, Human Resources and Community Relations, Harrah’s New Orleans Ted Hoff, Human Resources Vice President, Global Sales and Sales Incentives, IBM Tracy Kofski, Vice President, Compensation and Benefits, General Mills Jon Hyman, Partner, Meyers, Roman, Friedberg & Lewis Jim McDermid, Vice President, Human Resources, Cardiac and Vascular Group, Medtronic Randall Moon, Vice President, International HR, Benefits and HRIS, Lowe’s Cos. Dan Satterthwaite, Head of Human Resources, DreamWorks Dave Ulrich, Professor, Ross School of Business, University of Michigan Workforce, ISSN 2331-2793, is published monthly by MediaTec Publishing Inc., 318 Harrison Street, Suite 301, Oakland, CA 94607. Periodicals Class Postage paid at Oakland, CA and additional mailing offices. POSTMASTER: Please send address changes to: Workforce magazine, P.O. Box 8712, Lowell, MA 01853. Subscriptions are free to qualified professionals within the U.S. and Canada. Nonqualified paid subscriptions are available at the subscription price of $199 for 12 issues. All countries outside the U.S. and Canada must be prepaid in U.S. funds with an additional $33 postage surcharge. Single copy price is $29.99.

Workforce and Workforce.com are the trademarks of MediaTec Publishing Inc. Copyright © 2016, MediaTec Publishing Inc. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Reproduction of material published in Workforce is forbidden without permission.

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FREE LIVE

ONLINE EVENTS

CONTENTS

Focus on HR Tech

30 FOCUS ON HR TECHNOLOGY

HR technology has come a long way in a short amount of time.

30-51

32 LOST IN THE CLOUDS

40 THE ROBO CONNECTION

47 ROADMAPS

36 PROFILE

44 A PERSONALIZED TOUCH

48 SPECIAL REPORT: STAFFING IN

A platform’s woes can severely affect its customers. How can companies protect themselves?

These innovators are pushing HR technology forward and exploring the boundaries of what works for workers.

8

ON THE COVER

Workƒorce | w o r k f o r c e . c o m

Robo-advisers are helping workers manage their 401(k)s, but not everyone’s sold on the technology.

Organizations are reexamining their employee experience, and technology provides a personalized approach.

How to find your human resource management system soulmate.

THE CLOUD

Contract workers are changing how staffing engages with talent.

september/october

2016

ON THE WEB

40

SPEAK UP!

The Workforce online community provides you with virtual meeting places to chat about issues and trends affecting you and your workplace.

LIKE US: facebook.com/workforce.magazine

FOLLOW US:

44

twitter.com/workforcenews

JOIN THE GROUP: workforce.com/LinkedIn

WATCH US: workforce.com/youtube

FOR YOUR BENEFIT 14 SUPPORTING PARENTS

COLUMNS 4

YOUR FORCE

From chisel and hammer to dashboards and apps.

12 WORK IN PROGRESS

Blame the user, not the technology.

18 BENEFITS BEAT

Communicate like it’s 2016.

28 THE PRACTICAL EMPLOYER

Don’t confuse prejudice with racism.

54 THE LAST WORD

A farewell to Workforce.

september/october

2016

Organizations team up to offer companies an online resource for parents with special needs kids.

15 NO SMOKE SCREEN HERE

Advocates want smokers to face penalties for continuing to smoke and get incentives for quitting.

15 BREEDING PET-FRIENDLY BENEFITS

One company has some doggone good advice to help employers make their workers happy.

16 IRS AND THE ACA

With a key health care deadline past, experts say extensions in 2016 will be more lenient than 2017.

TRENDING 10 CANDIDATE EXPERIENCE

Automated recruiting tools could be slowly destroying your brand.

11 FROM THE WEB, PEOPLE MOVES AND BY THE NUMBERS

Who are you gonna call?; Laird to Newell Brands; teachers.

13 CLINICAL ADVICE

What employers can do to fight the flu season.

LEGAL 26 BYOD CONCERNS

Mobile devices provide easy access to confidential, sensitive information.

27 LEGAL BRIEFINGS

Overtime pay; EEOC fact sheets.

w o r k f o r c e . c o m | Workƒorce

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TRENDING

Candidate Experience Tech Is Ticking Them Off Automated recruiting tools could be slowly destroying your brand, survey finds.

By Sarah Fister Gale

J

ob candidates, like customers, expect a ture Workplace survey said certain level of service and courtesy they never or rarely receive when they engage with a company. Yet notice from employers when most companies aren’t even throwing ap- they submit applications. plicants a bone — and that’s not going Similarly, in CareerBuilder’s over well with their talent pool. report job seekers said their A recent study from Future Work- biggest frustration is when place and CareerArc found nearly 60 employers don’t respond to percent of job seekers have had a poor them.“Candidates invest a lot candidate experience, and of those, 72 of time preparing an applicapercent shared that experience on an tion, yet they feel like the employer review site, social network- company is investing nothing ing site or with colleagues and friends. in response,” Schawbel said.

This trend should be concerning to a “That sends a bad message lot of recruiters. about the company.”

When candidates post negative reviews So how do recruiters refor the world to see, it can potentially spond? With many job poison the talent pool, said Dan Schaw- postings receiving hundreds bel, Future Workplace research director. of applications, there isn’t Today’s job seekers are savvy researchers, time for recruiters to send a reviewing an average of 16 resources personal thank you note to when searching for a job, according to everyone who applied. But CareerBuilder’s 2016 “Candidate Behav- unless companies have a ior” study. Whether they hear negative system in place to at least acknowledge reviews from a colleague or read them these candidates, employers may be on LinkedIn or Glassdoor, it can deter damaging their reputation every time them from applying for a position that they post an opening. may otherwise be a great fit. “Those reEven Glassdoor, the company that views can shut off a lot of people who gives employees a platform to review could be good employees,” Schawbel said. current and future employers, has Recruiters may also be surprised to struggled to get this right. A few years hear what constitutes a negative experi- ago the site recognized that most of

said. Applicants who are clearly unqualified for the role receive an automated email thanking them for applying and letting them know they are not a good fit but to please stay in touch, while candidates who participate in further screenings and interviews receive more personalized notes with feedback on where they are in the application process and/or why they aren’t right for the job. Since implementing this response process, Glassdoor now has a 73 percent positive interview experience rating compared with the 54 percent average across the entire site.

Taking the time to respond to candidates isn’t just polite; it’s good for the company’s overall image as well, said — DAN SCHAWBEL, FUTURE WORKPLACE RESEARCH DIRECTOR Robin Richards, CEO of CareerArc. ence, said Kirsten Davidson, head of em- the negative reviews it received were “When you treat candidates well they ployer brand for Glassdoor, the employer because candidates got no response to become net promoters of the brand.” review site. It isn’t caused by aggressive their applications.

That’s marketing-speak for measuring interview tactics or frustrating backIn response, the company created a the loyalty of a firm’s customer relationground check processes. “Most negative checklist of ways to improve the candi- ships. When you consider how many reviews come from people who just date experience, which includes sending people apply for a given job, building never heard back,” she said. some level of response to every candidate loyalty through something as simple as a And it happens far too often. A whop- who applies. “It was important to find a thank you email can be a powerful marping 65 percent of job seekers in the Fu- process that we could scale,” Davidson keting tool, he said.

‘CANDIDATES INVEST A LOT OF TIME PREPARING AN APPLICATION, YET THEY FEEL LIKE THE COMPANY IS INVESTING NOTHING IN RESPONSE.’

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Workforce.com/ The1950s TALKIN’ CADDY TAX Benefitfocus’ Shandon Fowler spoke with James Tehrani about the ACA and the Cadillac tax at the 2016 SHRM conference in Washington, D.C., earlier this year. Check out the podcast as they also touch on Benefitfocus’ research on high-deductible health plans, private exchanges, and more.

Workforce.com/ ShandonFowler september/october

2016

ELLEN SHULTZ The New York Times Co. named Ellen Shultz as executive vice president of talent and inclusion. Shultz will assume leadership of the global human resources team and all aspects of its operation.

Schultz previously was vice president and head of HR at Media General.

To be considered for People Moves, email a brief announcement and a high-resolution color photo to editors@workforce.com. Include People Moves in the subject line.

OF PUBLIC SCHOOL TEACHERS...

% are

76

% are under

44

female

age 40 have a master’s 56% or higher degree

Source: National Center for Education Statistics (2011-12 school year)

Besides the Teacher’s Lounge

Here’s how teachers spend their workday:

7 hours, 20 minutes 1 hr. 42 minutes + 1 hr. 35 minutes.

(required school hours) (before-/after-school hours) (Working at home, library, etc.)

TOTAL: 10 hours, 40 minutes average; 53 hours/week Source: Scholastic/Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Primary Sources, 2012: America’s Teachers on the Teaching Profession

Who Is Making What?

PUBLIC SCHOOL ADMINISTRATOR SALARIES:

High school

An employee claims her supervisor advised her not to apply for an open position because “she is a single mother with kids and if [she] had to take time off work, it would jam [us] up for getting someone to cover the scheduling.” It’s not the 1950s anymore, writes blogger Jon Hyman, adding that “familial status discrimination is, and remains, illegal.”

MARGARET CALLIHAN SunTrust Banks Inc. named Margaret Callihan as chief human resources officer.

Callihan will oversee staffing and talent management, compensation, employee benefits, HR operations and compliance, training and development and more. She was chair, president and CEO of SunTrust in south Florida and is succeeding Kenneth J. Carrig, who is retiring as CHRO.

3.5 million

elementary and secondary school full-time equivalent teachers

Middle school

BACK TO THE 1950s

Summer is over but a teacher’s work is never done. Here’s a peek into the classroom.

Elementary school

Workforce.com/ LeslieJones

School’s Starting!

Superintendents

Blogger Kellye Whitney says that comedian and “Ghostbusters” actress Leslie Jones has been vocal about the racist filth she’s endured from online trolls. But,Whitney asks in her blog “At Whit’s End,” why is the actress exempt from protection under the law, but police officers aren’t?

FIONA LAIRD Newell Brands Inc. named Fiona Laird as executive vice president and chief human resources and communications officer. Laird brings extensive experience in organizational change, broad expertise in HR strategy development, talent management, organization design, and engaging employees through multiple communication channels. Laird is joining Newell after a 25-year career at Unilever.

compiled by Rick Bell

Principals

WHO YOU GONNA CALL?

moves

School nurses

FROM THE WEB

Librarians

PEOPLE

By the Numbers

Counselors

TRENDING

Note: Numbers have been rounded to the nearest thousand.

Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Outlook Handbook: 2014

Average Class Size

21.2 pupils, public elementary schools

Decline in the Union Percentage of teachers covered by a union

1984: %

64

Source: National Center for Education Statistics

Teachers spend their own money on classroom supplies and materials

$149 on school supplies 2014: + $198 on instructional materials $138 on other classroom materials 49% $485 Total

Source: USA Today, February 2015

Source: 2013 NSSEA Retail Market Awareness Study, National School Supply and Equipment Association

workforce.com | w Workƒorce orkforce.com 10| Workƒorce

11

TRENDING

Wo r k i n P r o g r e s s

BLAME THE USER, NOT THE TECHNOLOGY

By Kris Dunn

T

o put it mildly, HR technology is red hot these days. your recruiting/TA function.To truly unlock the potential And of all the human resources specialties, recruiting of recruiting analytics, talent pools and CRM, every action technology is most mature and truly on fire. From Micro- taken with a candidate has to be recorded in the ATS. soft’s acquisition of LinkedIn to the continuing build-out Only by all activity being recorded in the ATS can the of functionality included in applicant tracking systems, the technology — and the data/analysis it provides — emerge recruiting technology scene has never held more promise. as a strategic tool.

Look at any mature recruiting technology platform and Simply put, HR and talent acquisition leaders have to you’ll see things that would have scared recruiters 15 years ago. take the approach that if it’s not in the ATS, it didn’t hapAbility to run deep searches for candidates across the pen, and they have to measure their recruiters accordingly. internet and load them into your ATS? Check.

That’s confrontation, and it’s hard to tell a top-performing Ability to track candidate recruiter they must document activity via CRM functionand use the system. ality and create talent pools But if you want your reto develop relationships and cruiting practice to unlock all speak directly to specialties the bells and whistles that that present the most diffisalesperson sold you related to culty recruiting? We have your ATS, confront you must. that, too!

I’ll wrap up this reality check The list goes on related to on recruiting technology with what recruiting technology the playbook for HR and talcan provide. But there’s one ent acquisition leaders to get pretty important thing the the ATS adoption they need technology can’t do. from recruiters. It’s a simple Force your recruiters to use plan, but hard to accomplish. the technology.

First, design the workflow, It’s true; for the technology to work, HR and talent acqui- data entry and any implementation options you have related sition leaders have to force their teams to use it.Which sucks, to your ATS to match your recruiting process. If you don’t because it sets up incredibly talented HR/TA leaders for an have a documented process, you should get one. uncomfortable confrontation that doesn’t feel like leadership.

Many recruiting shops had poor project management I’ve been lucky enough to work with some great HR from an IT partner and didn’t customize the solution and talent acquisition leaders in the role of a consultant. fully for their needs. Also remember that sometimes adOne of the things I’ve learned is that our industry has justing your process to match what the ATS can do is in some incredibly talented people at all levels on recruiting your best interest as well. teams like the one at your company.

Next, make sure you’re maximizing how easy it is for Recruiters work hard to fill jobs with great candidates. HR recruiters to import profiles from sources like LinkedIn and talent acquisition leaders want to be the best.With that in into the ATS. Never compromise on this, because it’s the mind, leaders like you start digging in and asking questions primary thing that stops recruiters from using the system. If like,“How can we be the best recruiting shop in the industry?” they can’t load easily, they won’t use it.

One area that always comes up: “Do we have the right Finally, audit regularly and create a scorecard that clearly recruiting technology?”That question leads to deeper study. shows who is using your ATS at a high level and consider For most companies with a mature ATS, the answer is sim- changing incentive plans to make ATS use a priority. ple:Your technology is fine.

Assuming you have a strong team of recruiters, your reBut your recruiters don’t use it in their hour-by-hour cruiting technology isn’t the reason you can’t get your talworkflow. That’s called low user adoption, and it’s the real- ent acquisition practice to the next level. Lack of use of the ity for most leaders who are frustrated that they can’t take system by the people doing the work is your problem. their recruiting practice to the next level with the help of You’ve got too many spreadsheets on the laptops of your the technology they’ve already purchased. recruiters. Kill the spreadsheets to get to the next level.

Why is this important? Why can’t we just load the people we interviewed or hired into the ATS once we fill a job?

Kris Dunn, the chief human resources officer at Kinetix, is a Workforce More and more, the ATS has to be a system of record for contributing editor. To comment, email editors@workforce.com.

AUDIT REGULARLY AND CREATE A SCORECARD THAT CLEARLY SHOWS WHO IS USING YOUR ATS AT A HIGH LEVEL AND CONSIDER CHANGING INCENTIVE PLANS TO MAKE ATS USE A PRIORITY.

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TRENDING

Aiming for a Shot in the Arm to Fight Flu Season

By Andie Burjek

D

espite the health risks associated with the flu, only 31.2 percent organizations like hospitals and health care providers, but she of adults ages 18-50 and 45.5 percent of adults ages 50-64 re- expects this trend to expand to other industries as flu coverceive flu shots, according to the Centers for Disease Control and age becomes more prevalent during the fall and winter in Prevention 2014 National Health Interview Survey. mainstream media.

Along with the obvious health risks of the flu for sick employees, employers can see negative effects in their bottom line and in the productivity of the workforce. If an employee is out with the flu, they are typically out for three business days, according to Tina Coleman, director of sales and operations at Omaha, Nebraska-based wellness company Occuvax.

As a rule of thumb, if an employer can vaccinate 70 percent of its workforce, it typically sees zero incidences of the flu, she added. According to the CDC research, the only age group to actually accomplish this percentage is adults 65 and older, many of whom are retired.

One way companies can promote the same success rate for younger people still in the workforce is by setting up an on-site flu vaccination at the workplace.

Costs vary, depending on the size of the company and the region. Considering the loss in production from employees taking sick days, the cost of flu outbreaks to a company’s bottom line typically exceeds the cost of setting up an on-site clinic. “[A lot of medium and small-sized employer groups] are limiting more Think Pink for October! and more things due to cost, things like wellness programs or ability to have We have everything you need for coverage for certain health benefits,” your Breast Cancer Awareness, Coleman added. “This is one of the Education and Fundraising things that has very minimalist impact to their bottom line.” programs. Visit our website to get Some creative ideas for promoting your FREE 9-PIECE SAMPLE KIT. vaccinations include rewarding employees points in a wellness program, setting up a raffle or buying employees a nice breakfast.

“Another trend we’re seeing is an actual requirement for vaccination of employees,” she said. “It really depends on the values of the employer group.”

This requirement already exists in

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13

FOR YOUR BENEFIT

Working Parents Finding Support for Their Special Needs Children Mercer and Rethink are offering companies resources that feature video-based treatment programs and tools to help parents manage behavioral problems.

By Rita Pyrillis

T

he number of children with disabilities has been climbing for more than a decade and that means that a growing number of employees are struggling to care for a child with special health care needs.

About 6 million children in the United States are considered disabled, according to a 2014 study in the Journal of Pediatrics — a 16 percent jump from a decade earlier. And about 1 in 20 employees are caring for a child with a disability or chronic illness, according to Family Voices, a national nonprofit advocacy group for special needs children.

In an effort to alleviate some of their burden, consulting firm Mercer and Rethink, a health technology firm, teamed up earlier this year to offer companies an online resource that features video-based treatment programs, tools to help parents manage behavioral problems, communicate better with school districts, and provides access to remote clinical consultations in addition to other supports.

“The motivation behind this was seeing the explosion in the prevalence of autism and other developmental disabilities,” said Mike Civello, vice president of employee benefits at New York-based Rethink. “One hears from the families and from the clients of Mercer how hard it is to support this population, whether it revolves around finding services or other support for the family. Looking at this increase in prevalence and the

The program focuses on developmental disabilities, such as autism and Down syndrome, but Dr. David Kaplan, senior partner and leader of Mercer’s Health Innovation LABS, said that parents of children with any kind of physical or mental disabilities face similar challenges.

“Play dates become more complicated, there are issues with DAVID KAPLAN schools around accommodations, and there’s the need to take time off for treatments,” he said. “The general stress level for parents — whether a child has autism or another kind of disability — is the same.”

Kaplan said that these kinds of pressures often result in greater levels of anxiety and depression for parents, in addition to increased absenteeism and higher health care costs. Typically, employers rely on employee assistance providers to help parents, but according to Kaplan EAPs are not specifically trained to deal with issues surrounding disabled children.

According to the National Business Group on Health, nearly half of caregivers of children with special needs require more help managing stress and 40 percent of parents need help balancing work and family responsibilities. The NBGH found that parents of children with a disability lose around five hours of work weekly, totaling about 250 hours per year, which translates to an average of $3,000 to $5,000 per person in lost productivity for businesses.

In addition to making sure that benefit plans cover treatment for various disabilities, Kaplan said that employers could help alleviate some of the stress for parents of special needs children by creating a supportive workplace.

“It’s important to create an open and accepting atmosphere by talking about these issues so parents aren’t suffering in silence,” he said.“If you can create a situation where a parent can go to a doctor’s appointment without feeling condemned, that will make a huge difference for the family.”

“THE MOTIVATION BEHIND THIS WAS SEEING THE EXPLOSION IN THE PREVALENCE OF AUTISM AND OTHER DEVELOPMENTAL DISABILITIES.” — MIKE CIVELLO, RETHINK dearth of trained professionals to address these needs, whether in school, home or the health care arena, made it clear that something more was needed.”

While Rethink was launched in 2007 to help public school districts provide better support to students with developmental disabilities, awareness is growing among employers, in part because of recent state laws requiring insurers to cover certain autism therapies, he said.

“Employers are going to their benefits departments asking about this, so it’s really only in the last couple of years that we are seeing a desire on the part of employers to do something for employees with children that have special needs.”

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september/october

2016

FOR YOUR BENEFIT

No Smoke Screen Here

Breeding Pet-Friendly Benefits

Few wellness programs test for smoking, according to a recent survey.

One expert advocates for smokers to face penalties for continuing to smoke and receive incentives for quitting.

If you want to make your employees happy, a dog care franchise believes you should first start with their pets.

By Andie Burjek

S

moking is an expensive habit for both smokers and companies — yet many wellness programs do not test for smoking.

That’s what a recent survey from wellness technology company HealthMine Inc. found.

HealthMine surveyed 750 individuals enrolled in wellness programs, and discovered that 66 percent said their program did not include a medical test for nicotine use. Additionally, 57 percent said that their wellness plan did not offer a smoking cessation plan.

Smoking costs a company an average of $5,800 more to manage health care costs for a smoker than an average employee, said Bryce Williams, president and CEO of HealthMine, a company that uses clinical data to help close gaps in health care.

“Our advice to employers is, to quote Ronald Reagan, ‘Trust but verify,’ ” Williams said. “You can ask on forms, ‘Are you a smoker?’ but there’s also the opportunity to test if they are tobacco users” at a cost of about $4 per employee.

The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission’s final rule on employer wellness programs, issued May 17, took this issue into account, Williams said. Whereas before there was a lack of clarity on what employers could or could not do in terms of incentives, as of Jan. 1, 2017, they can look at the new EEOC regulations.

A good smoking cessation plan takes both rewards and punishments into account, Williams said.

“Carrots,” or rewards, are incentives such as going back to the original group premium or other financial rewards, and “sticks,” or punishments, include increased premiums for smokers to be allowed on the group plan. About half (48 percent) of the individuals in the survey supported a penalty or premium for colleagues who smoke.

“It’s going to require both carrot and stick to get meaningful change, and it’s also going to require patience and investment on the part of the employer,” Williams said. “Programs can take a number of years and a number of tries to work.” september/october

2016

By Sarah Foster

C

hristina Russell has noticed a growing trend among millennials: Many are picking pooches over parenthood.

“Younger people tend to be getting married later and defer having children,” said the president of pet care franchise Camp Bow Wow, which created a day camp for dogs. “A lot of times, people fill that gap with pets.”

But as the playgrounds get quiet and the dog parks grow populated, Russell has noticed that businesses and their benefits packages aren’t always keeping up with such trends.

“You have employees coming in from an urban area, where these younger people don’t necessarily have yards,” Russell said.“They’re having to figure out what to do with that pet during the day.The hard part is they can’t manage that.”

Some companies offer subsidies for day care, but that policy often only applies to children. Russell argues these benefits programs shouldn’t ignore pets.

“People think of them as family members in this day and age,” she said.

This is exactly the type of problem the “401 K-9” program offered at Camp Bow Wow’s franchise location in Oak Park, Illinois, hopes to solve.

A play on 401(k) retirement programs, the 401 K-9 is a voluntary employee benefits program that provides daycare services at a discounted rate to employees of companies near a local Camp Bow Wow franchise.

The idea originated from a brainstorming meeting in 2008, where the Camp Bow Wow team devised new ways for franchise owners to grow their businesses. Nearly 60 franchises are involved in promoting this program to businesses in their area.

But even though companies who offer pet care subsidies are rare, they do exist.

Genentech Inc., a South San Francisco, California-based biotechnology giant, is also known for its pet-friendly policies.

Emmy Wang, a member of Genentech’s media team, said in an email that Genentech subsidizes “doggy daycares” at pet resorts near its corporate office.

Named as one of the top pet-friendly companies in the country by Fortune magazine, Genentech also offers other programs for pet owners, like pet insurance and pet meetups.

“Genentech provides a group discount on pet insurance that protects employee pets if they are injured or become ill.The insurance plan covers dogs, cats, birds and exotic pets,” Wang said. “Genentech also has employee resource groups, called ‘gDOGs,’ where employees can schedule meetups after hours and on the weekend to network, share advice and socialize their dogs.”

Microsoft Corp. also provides discounted pet care, said Molly Terrell, a member of the technology company’s media relations team.

Millennial workers are different than baby boomers.They aren’t just looking at salary anymore, according to Russell.

“Employees are coming from a new generation with new expectations.

The things that they’re more attracted to in an employer are cultural — things that make a difference in how they feel in that nine-to-five period they’re there,” Russell said. “Money matters, but these intangibles can make the difference between employer A and employer B in terms of retention.”

Russell believes a pet-friendly company breeds a happy, healthy environment.

“It’s a warmth that it creates; it’s a calm that it creates,” she said. “When your pet is happy, you’re happy, too.” w o r k f o r c e . c o m | Workƒorce

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FOR YOUR BENEFIT

IRS Offers a Little Breathing Room on Data Transmittal Businesses faced a major deadline to transmit health insurance data to the IRS. However, after some technical problems and an extension, penalties in 2016 will likely be much more lenient than 2017.

By Andie Burjek

T

he time to transmit your health insurance data has passed, but don’t freak out just yet.

June 30 marked a very important deadline for employers in regards to the Affordable Care Act. If employers did not get a response back from the IRS about their transmittals of health insurance data by that date, they faced the possibility of large fines and penalties. This is applicable to U.S. employers with more than 50 full-time employees.

However, the IRS has been very lenient this year, said Mark Holloway, senior vice president and director of compliance services at Lockton Cos.The IRS extended the deadline once from March 31 to June 30, but it hasn’t articulated when it will begin collecting fines. It remains to be seen how lenient it will be in 2017, but 2016, a “best efforts” year, allowed for some leeway and extensions, he said.

“The problem this year was that it was the initial year of reporting,” Holloway said. “A lot of vendors and a lot of companies were learning as they went along.”

This transmittal process is what the IRS uses to ensure eligible employees are receiving the affordable medical plans that they’re entitled to under the act. Companies track employees’ hours, and employees are eligible for benefits if they work more than 30 hours a week.

Companies report that information to the employees themselves and then 16

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transmit the data to the IRS, which checks for errors. At some point, companies will be penalized for each employee they should have offered an affordable health plan to but did not.

The IRS’ perceived leniency can also be attributed to technical difficulties and a week in May when the transmission site shut down, said Jon Shanahan president and CEO of Businessolver Inc., a company whose core business is to man-

or if it hired an outside vendor and the vendor pulled out, the company could file for a short extension with the IRS, said Angel Hower, the ACA product owner at Businessolver.

For companies that did not get an extension, the solution is simple.

“If someone doesn’t make this deadline, they still need to file, and they need to file as soon as possible,” Hower said.“The longer you wait, the bigger red flag that will raise with the IRS.” The deadline in 2017 will be what 2016’s deadline was before the extension: March 31. And in future years, both Holloway and Shanahan predict the process will be more smooth sailing.

Shanahan said one problem this year was that many companies would have one vendor doing the tracking, another doing the reporting and another doing the transmitting.

“Hopefully, at some point technology and knowledge will catch up with this,

“IF SOMEONE DOESN’T MAKE THIS DEADLINE, THEY STILL NEED TO FILE, AND THEY NEED TO FILE AS SOON AS POSSIBLE. THE LONGER YOU WAIT, THE BIGGER RED FLAG THAT WILL RAISE WITH THE IRS.” —ANGEL HOWER, ACA PRODUCT OWNER, BUSINESSOLVER age eligibility data. Finally, because this was the initial year, awareness was low in some companies, he added. Many did not know this was coming or they weren’t prepared for the complexity of the process.

Many businesses were eligible for an extension — as long as they made their best efforts to clean up data sent to the IRS. Companies got 30 days to correct any errors. If the IRS rejected data files completely, companies got 60 days to scrub the data and refile.

Finally, if a company could prove it had been looking for an outside vendor

and — if we’re having this same conversation in another five years — filling out the 1095 [ACA] form will be [a push of the button], and vendors will have it down cold,” Holloway said.

Finally, he noted, we’ll get a better flavor for what reporting will look like next year when the updated instructions to the tax forms are released. Last year, the instructions came in September, and he doesn’t predict that to be any different this year.

To learn more about the transmittal process, go to tinyurl.com/ACA-Transmittal. september/october

2016

september/october

2016

w o r k f o r c e . c o m | WorkĆ’orce

17

FOR YOUR BENEFIT

Benefits Beat

THE FUTURE OF HR COMMUNICATIONS

By Jennifer Benz

T

his year marks the 10th anniversary of my company, Benz Communications, and I’ve spent a lot of time with my team reflecting on the past decade.

We’ve been thinking about how HR and employee benefits communications has evolved during that time.

And, in some cases, how much it hasn’t. A lot of companies still communicate like it’s 2006 — before the iPhone existed, when social media was in its infancy, and a significant portion of Americans still lacked easy Internet access.

With each year, we have more tools and technology.

Yet, moving forward and evolving the way we communicate internally continues to be a struggle.

Organizations are often challenged because so much has changed and so much is new. You might worry you’ll invest in a new tool that will be out of vogue next year. That’s why we collaborated with Preston Lewis, founder and CEO of Intactic, to document the guiding principles of modern internal communication.

As HR continues to be asked to play a bigger and more strategic role, modern communication strategies and tactics can help you succeed.

Companies that are investing in and using more modern communications are driving better business results. These five factors will help you focus on areas to modernize and invest in.

1. Data. Successful internal communication strategies are supported by real-time data about employees’ behaviors and preferences. What do they need more of?

What do they want less of? How do they prefer to receive information?

Data can also help you breach the divides between recruiting, IT, HRIS, internal communications and HR. Many departments within your organization may have a shared interest in the data so you may be able to realize economies of scale. Start any new strategy by digging into your data.

2. Experience. Designing for user experience isn’t a new concept. Marketers have been doing it for ages.

Simply put, an experience is a collection of touch points that invokes a response. When designing experiences, every touch point, and its purpose, should be intentional. This is a principle that will guide the future of internal communications.

Creating the best possible employee experience is about getting the right message in the right media to the right person at the right time.

3. Personalization. Modern communication uses technology to create consumerlike experiences at work. Internal channels will start to include the same robust personalization as consumer tools, including personalized email salutations; messages that direct employees to information that fits their specific needs, financial situation, and lifestyle; and information that’s delivered via their preferred communication channels.

4. Emotion. Connecting employees to a bigger sense of purpose will be a vital part of the future of work. This is especially important to millennials, who will total up to two-thirds of the workforce in the next five years.

Companies that understand their audiences and the concerns that keep them up at night are able to develop deeper and more meaningful connections with employees.

One of the reasons I love benefits communication is its ability to connect with and engage employees on an emotional level.

5. Mobile. A critical factor in shaping a modern communication strategy is pervasive mobile technology. The number of apps supporting HR is already overwhelming, and it is tempting to think that eventually one app will solve all communications and engagement challenges. Instead, we should be thinking about and planning for the company app store where a suite of apps will work together. According to the 2016 Executive Enterprise Mobility report from Apperian, more than one-third of companies have an app store today, up from 23 percent in 2015. HR pros can be partnering with IT and internal communications to articulate the vision for mobile in their organizations.

It’s an exciting time to be in HR and to be a communications professional. Employees need your help now more than ever to improve their health, finances and futures. Leveraging modern communication strategies and tactics, we can inspire employees and grow thriving businesses.

THE BEST EMPLOYEE EXPERIENCE IS GETTING THE RIGHT MESSAGE IN THE RIGHT MEDIA TO THE RIGHT PERSON AT THE RIGHT TIME.

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Jennifer Benz is CEO and founder of Benz Communications, a San Francisco-based employee benefits communications agency.

She was honored as one of Workforce’s Game Changers in 2013.

To comment, email editors@workforce.com.

september/october

2016

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Imagine a full suite of automated tools that integrates HR, time and attendance, payroll, and more so you can manage and nurture all of your people in ways that inspire them to succeed — from pre-hire to retire.

At the core of Workforce Ready is a single employee record shared across all applications and updated in real time to help managers drive productivity, increase employee engagement, and make more informed business decisions.

See what Kronos Workforce Ready can do for you. Learn more at kronos.com/workforceready.

s e p© t e2016 m b eKronos r / o cIncorporated. tober 2016

w o r k f o r c e . c o m | Workƒorce

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a d v e r t i s e m e n t

BEST PRACTICES IN HR ONBOARDING

The Ins and Outs of Onboarding How today’s onboarding processes affect everyone in the organization

BY TIM HARNETT

An employee’s first few days are critically important for evaluating the fit of the new position. Many employees decide whether to stay with the job within their first six months of employment1. On the company side, time to competency is essential, and organizations need to get their new hire up to speed as soon as possible. However, with internal promotions on the rise, organizations also need to ensure their existing workforce members have the tools they need to succeed. As such, onboarding forms an integral part of an organization’s retention strategy.

Recently, SilkRoad surveyed nearly 400 organizations about their onboarding practices to discover how they were training their new hires. The research found that many organizations are extending their onboarding programs and broadening their scope to include more employees than just new hires. Today’s onboarding requires soliciting participation from senior leaders, incorporating the latest technology and designing programs to engage employees.

Successful onboarding practices will have a positive effect on the organization’s bottom line.

Goals Among survey respondents, the top three goals for their onboarding process all relate to their new hires: increasing time to competency, employee engagement and retention. Beyond the top three goals, however, organizations include other team members in the onboarding process. Goals beyond helping new hires include improving organizational culture and providing support to employees transitioning among career levels. Culture in particular is critical, as 68 percent of

organizations say integrating workplace culture is very important to their onboarding process.

While filling out compliance paperwork may take up a day or more, other onboarding programs will take longer to achieve. As such, the process is getting longer at many organizations. Only 12 percent of organizations say their onboarding process lasts a single day. Nearly half onboard new hires beyond their first month of employment, while a quarter take onboarding to the first three months and beyond.

Stakeholders For new hires, the onboarding process gets them introduced to many members of the organization, as senior leaders, managers and other employees all lend a hand to make new employees feel welcome and bring them up to speed. For many organizations, the process starts with human resources and a centralized onboarding process. Others decentralize the process either by business unit (28 percent), geographic region (25 percent) or employee career level (14 percent). A centralized onboarding process makes sense for many organizations, as the HR team typically conducts first-day new hire onboarding and is most likely to own the onboarding process.

Senior executives can assist in onboarding efforts, as executive commitment and leadership visibility go a long way to making new hires feel valued. The top ways senior leaders contribute to the onboarding process show commitment not only to the new hires themselves, but

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BEST PRACTICES IN HR ONBOARDING

“By using a variety of learning methods and technology, organizations will be well-positioned to reap positive outcomes from their onboarding efforts.” also to the overall strategy of improving workplace culture, engagement and retention.

Processes Compliance takes up a large part of any first day; the average organization spends 3.8 hours per employee on required paperwork. However, 37 percent of organizations front-load compliance paperwork to the preboarding process via online portals. In fact, preboarding as a whole is becoming more common: 55 percent of organizations employ preboarding either during the recruitment process or after offer acceptance. Common preboarding activities include providing a prehire welcome packet, setting up a phone call meeting with a direct supervisor or directing the new hire online to company videos that give a more formal introduction to the company.

Technology plays a large part in the onboarding process for many organizations, assisting traditional classroombased learning to reach large new hire segments in many different places, often on-demand. Classroom-based instructor-led training is used by nearly three-quarters of 1

organizations as an onboarding learning method. Newer learning techniques are widely used as well: 62 percent of organizations use self-paced e-learning in their onboarding process, while video is used by 46 percent of respondent organizations. Mobile devices and gamification are also used by organizations, as they allow employees to interact with their onboarding information. The top technologies being used in onboarding are video, webinars and online onboarding portals. By using a variety of learning methods and technology, organizations will be well-positioned to reap positive outcomes from their onboarding efforts.

Outcomes Many organizations report success at their stated goals of increasing culture, retention and engagement. More than half have seen an increase in employee engagement, 44 percent have seen workplace culture improvements and 35 percent report increased retention. With nearly three-quarters of organizations spending as much as half of the onboarding process instilling workplace culture, they expect to see a return on investment for those efforts, which is playing out for 44 percent of organizations.

Today’s onboarding lasts longer than the first day and goes beyond required paperwork, introducing employees to workplace culture and giving them the tools they need to succeed. By exposing new hires to the company culture from day one, employees will be better positioned to succeed within their roles.

To learn more about how SilkRoad can assist your onboarding efforts, visit www.silkroad.com. To view the full results of SilkRoad’s onboarding research, visit hr1.silkroad.com/ onboarding-who-how-why.

Maurer, R. (2015). Onboarding Key to Retaining, Engaging Talent. SHRM.

COMPANY PROFILE SilkRoad is a leading global provider of cloud-based, talent management solutions that enable customers to find, attract, develop, and retain the best talent. SilkRoad solutions includes Talent Acquisition, Talent Development, and HRMS solutions that are delivered through a tablet-friendly Talent Portal. They are easy to deploy and use — a single platform to rapidly boost employee engagement and business performance. Visit www. silkroad.com, follow on Twitter @SilkRoadTweets or call 866–329–3363 (U.S. toll free) or +1–312–574–3700.

a d v e r t i s e m e n t

BEST PRACTICES IN HR MANAGEMENT

Driving the future of performance management B Y HA LOG E N S O FT WA R E

Have you heard? The traditional one-and-done annual employee evaluation is over. The current trend has many organizations trying to adopt next-generation – or ongoing – performance management practices by dropping annual reviews, scrapping competencies and switching to informal check-ins.

While these changes may work for some companies, don’t get caught up in the excitement of letting go of year-end reviews until you think carefully about your manageremployee relationships. People are still a company’s largest expense and biggest competitive advantage. Rather than blindly following trends, you need to consider what works best for your workforce.

In particular, a lot of research has shown that engaging talent can improve business outcomes. In the book, The Engagement Equation: Leadership Strategies for an Inspired Workforce, the authors found that true employee engagement represents an alignment of maximum satisfaction for the individual with maximum contribution for the organization.

So as you consider updating your performance management process, think about these five essentials for emphasizing increased engagement through employee satisfaction and contribution.

1

Develop great managers A 2015 Gallup poll found that up to 70 percent of employee engagement is impacted by the relationship between employees and their manager. Because your managers have such influence over how engaged their team members are, it’s essential that those managers have strong leadership skills.

In next-generation performance management, leadership is even more vital, as managers take on more of a coach and mentor role than a command and control position. Your managers must be able to motivate employees, assert themselves

to overcome obstacles, create a culture of accountability, build trusting relationships and make informed, unbiased decisions for the good of their team and company.

2

Set goals that drive outcomes When your employees know what is expected of them and clearly see the impact they have on the organization’s success, they are motivated to deliver results.

When making the shift to ongoing performance management, your company must implement more collaborative and simplified goal setting, tailor goals to an employee’s strengths, and ensure employees are accountable for their goals. Employees should also have a clear line of sight from their individual and shared goals to the organization’s overall objectives, so they can see their value to your company.

3

Build a feedback- and recognition-rich culture Organizations that nurture a feedback-rich culture and focus on building relationships between managers, employees and colleagues have more highly engaged workforces. Feedback and recognition comes in many forms – from a simple “thank you” to a spot award that acknowledges and celebrates an accomplishment.

Many managers mistakenly assume that feedback is given only if there’s a problem. It’s important to ensure that your managers understand that building a culture of feedback and recognition means your employees know what they’ve done well, in addition to areas where they need to improve.

4

Establish a culture of forward-focused growth and development Learning opportunities and employee development are top drivers of employee satisfaction, which means learning and development should no longer be just a once-in-a-while activity. It must be a business-critical priority for increasing

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skills, staying competitive and improving employee engagement.

Your employees expect your organization to invest in their development and provide them with the skills they need to succeed. Without a commitment to developing employees, your company risks losing key talent and not having the skills they need to compete. Managers can help prevent this by enabling employees to learn though stretch assignments, team collaboration, and regular coaching and feedback.

5

5 essentials for ongoing performance management Set goals that drive outcomes

Develop great managers

Goals

Managers Ongoing Performance Discussions

Conduct ongoing performance discussions Feedback & One way to improve the manager-employee Development Recognition relationship and establish the trust needed Build a culture of continuous growth for engagement is through consistent Foster a feedback- and and development recognition-rich culture communication and meaningful ongoing performance conversations. These conversations connect and drive your entire talent management strategy – from onboarding new hires, to A strategic shift in performance management takes planning, supporting a culture of learning and development, recognizing thoughtfulness and skillful change management. It’s not a oneand rewarding success, supporting career mobility and size-fits-all process; ongoing performance management should succession. These conversations should: fit your culture and business objectives. You must identify where you are now and what outcomes you want to achieve, • Focus on employee contributions align your core competencies to your organization’s value and • Clarify expectations and accountability around goals vision, and have the technology and support you need to help and development you achieve your goals.

• Discuss what motivates employees and what can drive greater job satisfaction To learn more about the future of performance management, • Provide opportunities for feedback, recognition and download the eBook “Driving the future of performance coaching management” at bit.ly/FuturePM.

COMPANY PROFILE At Halogen Software, we believe people matter most. They’re every company’s biggest investment and every company’s greatest competitive differentiator. Our talent management solutions help companies put next-generation performance management at the heart of their talent strategy. This ensures all talent programs – recruitment, learning, succession, and compensation – are connected to and reinforce improved, ongoing performance and brilliant business outcomes. To learn more about how to win with talent, visit www.halogensoftware.com

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a d v e r t i s e m e n t

BEST PRACTICES IN EMPLOYEE RECOGNITION

The Greatness Factor Based on experience with thousands of the world’s top organizations, plus 90 years of rigorous research, here are a few valuable insights to think about when deploying a recognition strategy.

Employee Recognition Is Not About Making People Happy Many international organizations view employee recognition as a perk to make employees feel good. While recognition may certainly accomplish that goal, recognizing employees purely for the feelgood effect dramatically undercuts the real reason for rewarding people who achieve—to influence personal and organizational greatness. In a recent O.C. Tanner Institute study, respondents said employee recognition was the number one thing that would cause them to perform great work (great work being defined as above-and-beyond or innovative work that delights customers and coworkers).

Creating a culture that encourages, achieves, and celebrates greatness is the real “why” of recognition. A culture of greatness not only helps individuals, teams, and organizations to be productive, it helps companies to attract, engage, and keep top talent. Gallup reports, “In their search for new ideas and approaches [to optimize the workplace], organizations could be overlooking one of the most easily executed strategies: employee recognition.”

Forget Everything You Thought You Knew About Employee Engagement Well, almost everything. The fact is many organizations think engagement will cause people to achieve great work. While that is in part true, groundbreaking research from the O.C. Tanner Institute indicates just the opposite: get people involved in doing something great, and engagement soars. Think about that for a second. Have you ever been disengaged when you had the opportunity to do something great? A 2015 study by the Aberdeen Group shows an inability for employees to see a future in the company second only to a poor relationship with their manager as the reason people leave.

Here’s a 3-step formula to turn disengaged employees around: 1) Provide them with the opportunity to do something important.

2) Offer resources and encouragement. 3) Celebrate like crazy when they achieve. This inside-out way of looking at employee engagement places opportunity, achievement, and reward in their proper and logical flow.

Effective Recognition Taps The Greatness In All Of Us How does your organization define greatness? Whether you cure diseases, deliver energy to people’s homes, or manufacture bicycles, you have a vision, a culture that believes you do whatever you do better than anyone else. A successful employee recognition program recognizes the essential role of people in that vision. When you acknowledge and respect the essential contribution of every individual, you set up a culture that invites, enables, and rewards greatness, not just in top performers, but in every performer.

That creates an upward spiral of accomplishment that impacts the bottom line.

Get The Why Right. Then Focus On The What As for recognition solutions, there are many ways to go. Whether you build your own programs, partner with a vendor, or a little bit of both, here are some important tips.

- Make it personal. Gallup reveals that “the most effective recognition is honest, authentic, and individualized to how each employee wants to be recognized.” This means you ideally need more than one way to recognize. A post to the social wall with points is great, but you may wish to add a variety of thank you notes, tangible buttons or badges, eCards, certificates, trophies, merchandise, and other vehicles to your recognition arsenal.

- Make it authentic. Some turn-key recognition software solutions can barely adapt at all to your unique culture, goals, and objectives.

Find a solution that can reflect you—not just in photography—but in rules, program types, corporate trophies and symbols, goals and values, presentation opportunities, and award variety.

- Enjoy the journey. No one gets recognition right overnight.

Consider finding a partner who provides measurement and assessment services, manager training, communication plans, and design services to increase the impact of recognition on your culture over time.

In conclusion, the end game of employee recognition is greatness— for individuals, teams, and organizations. Fostering a culture of achievement will make your organization a magnet for like-minded employees who come to learn, to grow, and to stay.

COMPANY PROFILE O.C. Tanner, the global leader in employee rewards and recognition, helps thousands of the world’s top companies to accomplish and appreciate great work. 30 of the 2016 Fortune 100 Best Companies To Work For® use an O.C. Tanner recognition solution (including us). Influence greatness in your organization. Info at octanner.com

Legal Bring Your Own Device? Make Sure to Cover Your Security and Liability Concerns, Too. Mobility is key when employing guidelines for workers bringing their own devices.

By Sonya Rosenberg

B

ring your own device has become the norm in the workplace.

While many employers now allow BYOD in one form or another, comparatively few have implemented measures to mitigate against the real security, productivity and liability-related concerns inherent in employees’ use of a personal devices for work purposes. Such measures are essential for a successful BYOD program, and effective risk management.

Security risks are front and center when it comes to BYOD. Without proper protections in place, employees’ mobile devices can provide easy access to employers’ confidential and sensitive information, including client files and/or trade secrets. Found in the wrong hands, such information may be compromised — and with it, so can the company’s entire business — within a matter of seconds.

Fortunately, effective BYOD programs are able to protect against major security concerns by requiring employees who wish to use their own device to present their phones at the front-end for the installation of mobile device management, or MDM, software.This kind of software typically ensures that the employer’s sensitive business information and files are stored in a secured location, and allows for the device to be remotely monitored and immediately wiped if it is lost or stolen. Installation of such software and express authorization for remote monitoring and wiping of the phone should be made a prerequisite of a BYOD program.

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it can be difficult to know if an employee tapping away on a phone is working or texting with friends.Thus it is no surprise that BYOD may pose a productivity challenge, particularly for certain kinds of employers.

While likely to be present at least to some extent for all employers that allow BYOD, the productivity concern is going to vary in intensity depending on the nature of workplace. For example, a production employee in a manufacturing plant probably should not bring their own device; at a minimum, a legitimate business reason for BYOD in such a context is not readily apparent. A marketing or professional services employee on the go, however, may be able to add substantial value to the employer through a BYOD capability.The first step in deciding whether to BYOD or not to BYOD should be to weigh the potential productivity concerns against the potential productivity benefits and determine which one comes out on top.

Assuming the benefits outweigh the risks, a good BYOD policy should clearly define parameters for appropriate use.

Consider stating that employees should keep use of personal devices to a minimum while they are at work and have access to the employers’ systems through desktops and work phones.

You should also make sure your business’ mandatory time tracking procedures are clarified to extend to BYOD. This is particularly applicable to employees who are not exempt from overtime under the Fair Labor Standards Act, as BYOD can lead to some thorny questions about compensable time in the september/october

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case of log-ins or emails sent outside of normal scheduled working hours. As use of BYOD continues to become more widespread, the exposure in this area can be substantial and create an attractive target for plaintiffs’ lawyers. Employers should think twice before allowing non-exempt employees to bring their own device and clearly define the parameters and requirements for time-management in cases of such use.

Legal exposure is another top concern that can lead many employers to pause implementation of a BYOD program or to say no altogether. In addition to time tracking and management issues that can raise exposure under the FLSA, BYOD can exacerbate other legal risks, including claims alleging harassment, discrimination and various other employment torts.

And here, the culprit is the technology itself.

Combine the capacity for our communications to become increasingly easier and, at the same time, more impersonal through technological advancements, with the ongoing advancement of forensic specialists, and it is not difficult to see how BYOD may give cause for concern to an employer.

All that said, it is important to recognize that technological advancements bring with them, at least initially, some increased exposure. And to some extent, both are inevitable. Given this, employers should accept the reality of BYOD and be sure to implement smart, working strategies to mitigate its risks.

A good BYOD policy will not only allot for monitoring capabilities in cases of concern, but will also expressly remind employees that the company’s other policies — including policies prohibiting discrimination, harassment, and confidentiality obligations — apply with full force to BYOD use. In addition, a good BYOD policy will expressly remind employees about the safe use of personal devices, to minimize exposure for any driving or other safety violations or accidents involving the use of an employee’s personal phone.

BYOD comes with real risks that require proactive, smart planning on the part of employers. Fortunately, there are proven ways to mitigate the negative aspects, while capitalizing on the attractive aspects, including increased flexibility and productivity for many kinds of employees. Consider whether BYOD makes sense for the nature and unique needs of your workplace. If yes, think through and implement smart strategies to make your program a successful one.

Sonya Rosenberg is a partner at Chicago-based law firm Neal, Gerber & Eisenberg. To comment, email editors@workforce.com.

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Legal Legal Briefings SCOTUS DRIVES ENTITLEMENT TO OT PAY Following a split in the law regarding whether auto service advisers should be exempted from Fair Labor Standards Act overtime provisions, the U.S. Supreme Court considered the issue. The split was created after service advisers sued a dealership in September 2012, saying their job descriptions required them to greet and meet with car owners while always attempting to sell additional services beyond what prompted the customer’s visit, but asserted that they did not sell cars or perform repairs. Although the case was dismissed by the trial court, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals concluded that the service advisers should not be exempted from FLSA overtime requirements because language in the Department of Labor interpretive regulation only excludes salespeople and mechanics from overtime compensation, not service advisers. The U.S. Supreme Court ordered that the 9th Circuit must reconsider the issue without placing any controlling weight on regulations issued by the DOL in 2011. “Requiring dealerships to adapt to the [DOL]’s new position could necessitate systemic, significant changes to the dealerships’ compensation arrangements. … In light of this background, the department needed a more reasoned explanation for its decision to depart from its existing enforcement policy.” Encino Motorcars LLC v. Hector Navarro, et al, Case No. 15-415, June 20, 2016.

IMPACT: Although challenging agency determinations can be costly and time-consuming for employers, long-standing DOL interpretations and policies can only be changed when the agency provides substantive reasons for departing from established definitions.

EEOC OFFERS EQUAL PAY, PREGNANCY BIAS OPINIONS The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has issued several new fact sheets addressing equal pay for women and pregnancy discrimination: Equal Pay and the EEOC’s Proposal to Collect Pay Data; Legal Rights for Pregnant Workers under Federal Law; and Helping Patients Deal with Pregnancy-Related Conditions and Restrictions at Work.

The EEOC has published a proposal to collect pay data so that employers can use the information to evaluate their pay practices to prevent wage discrimination and strengthen enforcement of anti-discrimination laws. In the document, the EEOC notes that equal pay refers to more than just wages, saying it also includes the right to overtime pay, bonuses and stock options.

The other two fact sheets address pregnancy-related issues, specifically including options for women who are having trouble doing their jobs because of pregnancy. The fact sheets are directed at both women and their employers, and medical providers and include options such as altered break and work schedules, permission to sit or stand, permission to work from home, and other work adjustments that allow a woman to remain employed without jeopardizing her health.

IMPACT: With recent developments in federal law regarding equal pay and pregnancy accommodations, the EEOC is focusing on those issues.

Mark T. Kobata and Marty Denis are partners at the law firm Barlow, Kobata and Denis, which has offices in Beverly Hills, California, and Chicago. To comment, email editors@workforce.com.

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Prejudice, Racism and Knowledge Jon Hyman |

I

The Practical Employer

recently drove with the family to Toronto for the weekend for the purpose of picking up some German friends from the airport and for a visit.

Because they originally cleared customs in Canada, we couldn’t just drive through the border checkpoint upon entering the United States. Instead, we were directed to the U.S. Customs and Border Protection building so that the German third of our party could legally enter the U.S. The process, I’m happy to report, was seamless and easy. It added about an hour to our trip, but minus the hassle of having to answer a few extra questions and fill out a few forms, it was a simple exercise.

Simple for us, that is. The family of nine that preceded us in line would likely tell you a very different story.

They appeared to be of Middle Eastern descent and of the Muslim faith.

Their skin was of a darker complexion, the women wore hijabs and the men kufis.

They did not breeze across the border with a few questions and the signature on a form. The customs agents gave them the third degree.

They answered question upon question upon question about why they had left the U.S. and why there were re-entering and what they were bringing back, which ended with a demand for the keys to their American-plated minivan. Following CBP’s search, they were finally permitted to enter the United States.

My emotions were torn. How humiliating, I thought to myself for these people, about whom agents could not confirm any illegalities, to be so clearly profiled because of the color of their skin and their religion.

Yet at the same time, I sighed a sigh of relief because authorities had taken the time to ensure that, with all that is going on in the world, our nation’s borders are as safe as possible. Like I said, I was and remain conflicted.

Some may accuse my sigh of relief as being pregnant with racism. I wholeheartedly disagree. Prejudice? Yes. Racism? Absolutely not. And there is a huge difference.

Prejudice is human nature; it’s not bigotry or racism.

We all hold prejudices. Bigotry and racism, however, imply intentional hatred. Crossing the street late at night because you see someone in a hoodie coming toward you does not mean you hate that person because you assume he’s black.

Instead, it means you’ve been influenced by what

you’ve seen, heard or experienced, and that influence is causing a reaction. Similarly, law enforcement’s racial profiling does not suggest hatred or even inherent distrust. Instead, it suggests the influence of the world in which we live. Splitting hairs? Maybe, but those hairs are significant.

For example, consider a recent study that examined the effect of ban-the-box laws.Those laws prohibit employers from asking on a job application whether the applicant has ever been convicted of a felony.

Proponents will tell you that their goal is to open job opportunities for former felons. The result, however, according to this study, is that black and Latino job applicants are significantly less likely to be hired in ban-the-box jurisdictions.

Why? The study concluded that when employers hire without knowledge of a criminal record, they still avoid people whom they think are likely to have criminal records.

As a result, racial discrimination against black and Latino job applicants supplants discrimination based on criminal record. These employers aren’t setting out to discriminate based on hatred or ill motive. But, they are permitting their unconscious biases to seep into the hiring process.

From a legal perspective, here’s the difference between prejudice and racism. If you learn of race-based comments or action in the workplace, you have an obligation to investigate and take appropriate corrective action reasonably to ensure that it doesn’t happen again.

If you are dealing with racism, no corrective action will halt the behavior, and the only likely response is termination. If, however, you are dealing with unconscious prejudices, you can use the incident as a learning tool to open a dialogue with your employees about race.

Do not ignore biases and prejudices.They exist in your workplace whether you like it or not. Ignoring them simply sweeps them into the dark corners of your workplace, left to grab the unsuspecting as they pass by. Instead, open a dialogue about these issues in your workplace. Embracing the prejudice is the only way to bring it into the open, hopefully to root it out and end it.

Do not ignore biases and prejudices. They exist in your workplace whether you like it or not.

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Jon Hyman is a partner at Meyers, Roman, Friedberg & Lewis in Cleveland. To comment, email editors@workforce.com. Follow Hyman’s blog at Workforce.com/PracticalEmployer.

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TECH & TALENT: A Match Made in the Cloud W

hile some would argue that the dawn of high-tech people management commenced once personnel managers realized that maintaining spreadsheets on a desktop computer made tracking employee records a whole lot simpler, most experts agree that human resources technology truly took off at the turn of the 21st century.

Computers had become key operational tools for businesses of all shapes and sizes, the internet had grown beyond a mere curiosity and by that time the trendier term “human resources” had relegated the stodgy personnel administration department to the organizational Dark Ages.

With the burgeoning choices of people management tools, HR departments could efficiently modernize traditional administrative functions while becoming a vital business partner to help push an organization forward.

The stories in this section illustrate the leaps HR has taken in the short time since people-management technology came into its own. Back then the cloud was where rain came from. Today more than 95 percent of talent management software is managed in the cloud, according to Michelle Rafter’s story about HR in the cloud. There are some caveats, she adds: When a vendor has problems, it becomes the customer’s issue, as well. This month’s Special Report on HR management systems also includes a list of current vendors.

HR technology is not merely for people management, either. If such technology has proliferated anywhere, it’s in the realm of benefits. Patty Kujawa takes an in-depth look at technology’s impact on retirement benefits in her piece on the rise of robo-advisers.

We also hold a virtual roundtable with three leading HR technology entrepreneurs.

Moritz Kothe of kununu US, Matt Straz of Namely and Danielle Weinblatt of Take The Interview offer keen insights into the current and future state of the industry.

While it’s a fact that HR hasn’t completely disposed of hard-copy files, it’s clearly evident that they’ve come a long way from the days of managing personnel via a spreadsheet.

—Rick Bell

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ART BY ANNA JO BECK

As Zenefits showed, a platform’s woes can affect its customers. How can companies protect themselves as they move HR processes to the cloud?

BY MICHELLE V. R AF TER

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A

my Evans knew things were not good at Zenefits months before news broke about problems at the high-profile cloud-based human resources tech startup.

Evans became an indirect Zenefits customer in 2015 when her husband’s Los Angeles area information technology consulting firm signed on with the industry-disrupting benefits and human resources management platform. Evans, a longtime benefits broker and adviser, said she welcomed the chance to go through open enrollment to learn more about Zenefits, which shook up the insurance industry by offering a free cloud-based human resources management platform to small and midsize businesses that agreed to use it as their benefits broker.

According to Evans, there were problems from the start.

Zenefits offered multiple plans, but the vendor’s website lacked sufficient information for employees to do side-by-side comparisons, she explained. There were no in-person benefits orientations and customer service was poor. On top of that, inaccurate rate information was posted on the site. As a result, Evans and her husband miscalculated the amount they needed to deduct from his paycheck for the portion of their medical insurance he paid, an error they had to correct retroactively, she related in a Workforce interview as well as in a much-commented-on post on LinkedIn titled “Why Zenefits Scares Me (It’s Not What You Think).”

“It was a disaster,” said Evans, founder of consulting firm Colibri Insurance Services in Sherman Oaks, California.“It was worse than I could have imagined it could be from a user perspective.”

Problems at Zenefits exposed earlier this year might be the most eye-opening example of what cloud-based HR tech vendors shouldn’t do, but it’s not the only one. HR professionals share tales of cloud-based payroll providers that botch payroll, account managers at HR tech companies who mismanage accounts and customer service agents who don’t serve their customers.

In the era of big data, cloud-based HR tech can solve a lot of problems for a lot of companies — chief among them eliminating the need for hardware and staff to maintain on-premise software. More companies are switching to cloud-based services for a variety of HR functions. Last year marked the first time more than half of core human resources management systems purchased were cloud-based, according to the Sierra-Cedar Inc.’s 2015-16 HR Systems Survey.Virtually all talent management software now in use is cloud-based (96 percent), along with more than half of HRMS (57 percent), 46 percent of workforce management september/october

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and 41 percent of payroll, according to the survey.

When cloud-based HR tech vendors run aground because of bad management, money troubles or other missteps, their problems become their customers’ problems.

HR departments might have to limp along with a system that doesn’t perform as intended or eat the cost of a bad investment and start over with a different vendor. At worst they could end up with a plethora of employee data trapped in a system that doesn’t work and with no way to retrieve it.

Low Barriers to Entry Part of the reason cloud-based HR tech suppliers run into trouble could be how low barriers to entry have dropped for startups looking to get into the business. Companies selling software-as-a-service, another name for cloud-based software, can operate on as little as a few thousand dollars a month. In a post titled “The Unbelievably Low Cost of Running a Software as a Service Business” on Medium’s “The Flux” tech blog, the co-founder of cloudbased scheduling software-maker ZoomShift said his two-person company spends about $2,450 a month, not including “payroll or coffee.”

Zenefits fueled the frenzy by raising close to $600 million in venture capital funding from Silicon Valley and financial services giants, including a $512.6 million Series C round in April 2015. Venture firms continue to pour money into cloud-based HR tech at near record levels.

They’re betting those tech companies can revolutionize people management the same way similar cloud-based services have transformed many other aspects of running a business. In the first quarter of this year, investors committed $591 million to 106 HR tech companies, an amount surpassed only by the $1.1 billion invested in the second quarter of 2015, which included the Zenefits funding, according to industry analyst CB Insights.

Startups scaling quickly to grab market share have to make tough choices about how to spend limited resources, which can at times force executives to cut back on product rollouts or cut corners on service.

That said, the problems Evans experienced with Zenefits were by no means unique. The startup’s golden days ended earlier this year after customers complained about fumbled benefits and customer service, and revenue fell short of projected milestones. Fidelity Investments subsequently downgraded the value of its interest in the business amid allegations — which Zenefits later admitted to — that its brokers lacked proper credentials and were using illegal computer programs to stay logged into the online courses they needed to get them. Zenefits Founder Parker Conrad resigned and Chief Operating Officer David Sacks took over. Soon after, Sacks cut staff and tamped down what had been a raucous workplace culture, including admonitions to employees to stop having sex in office stairwells. Zenefits’ troubles have seen the private company’s valuation drop by more than half w o r k f o r c e . c o m | Workƒorce

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Be a Smarter HR Tech Shopper

Beware of smooth-talking salespeople. It’s their job to make the software look and sound great. Ask for a demo and go into it knowing what you need a platform to do, both for HR staff and employees, said Michelle Simmonds, a Los Angeles-based human resources professional who has vetted a handful of cloudbased HR services providers during 10 years in the business.

to $2 billion from $4.5 billion.That said, the company still qualifies as a “unicorn,” a pre-initial public offering startup valued at more than $1 billion.

Michelle Simmonds signed on with Zenefits in 2014 while running HR for a previous employer. The startup ran at a frenetic pace that Simmonds said made her apprehensive as her first open-enrollment season with the vendor approached.“I could feel it in response times and how the left hand didn’t know what the right hand was doing,” said Simmonds, a 10-year HR management professional based in Los Angeles. Despite her fears, enrollment went off without a hitch. She said her former employer still uses the service and has nothing but great things to say about it.

Zenefits officials admit mistakes, but claim the company was acting to rectify problems even before Sacks took over as CEO. Last summer, around the time Evans wrote her blog post, Zenefits introduced a tool that made comparing plan benefits easier, which was one of her gripes.

Concurrent with Sacks moving into the top leadership position, Zenefits redirected some of its engineering manpower away from developing new features and toward fixing software glitches, which Zenefits largegroup benefits adviser Bud Bowlin admits were “fairly prevalent.” Between the fourth quarter of 2015 and July 2016, the company-nicknamed “war on errors” resulted in an 80 percent drop in software problems during onboarding new customers and other operations, according to Kevin Young, a Zenefits spokesperson.

Read the contract. Simmonds pays special attention to the indemnification clause so you know who’s responsible should problems arise, including who’s going to assume the associated financial costs.

‘I WAS TOO SMALL A FISH FOR THEM TO CARE ABOUT.’

Sometimes there’s no way of knowing the cloud-based service provider you rely on for payroll, benefits or other essential HR functions is in trouble. But by doing your homework before signing up for a service and keeping tabs on your account, you could detect warning signs of problems or avoid them altogether. Longtime HR industry professionals share some well-earned advice: Do due diligence on potential vendors. Ask to do a financial review under a nondisclosure agreement. Look at how long the company has been in business and what they’re working on, “whether it’s financials or operating model, whatever gives you more confidence,” said Sasha Poljak, CEO of Nimble Software Systems Inc. Dig into the software. Ask how many browsers the technology has been tested on, what quality assurance resources the company is putting into each software release, and how many programmers are working on future upgrades compared to current bug fixes.

Ask about credentials. In 2014 when Simmonds signed up with Zenefits on behalf of a previous employer, she didn’t think to ask whether the in-house broker she was dealing with had the necessary credentials to sell the products, credentials some Zenefits brokers lacked and one reason the company later ran into trouble.

Ask for references. Talk to organizations that are the same size, in the same industry or that share other similarities so you can compare how their experience might mirror yours. Don’t limit yourself to customers provided by the vendor. Find others on your own by asking references you talk to if they know other users or find them through your professional associations or online HR tech forums.

Keep lines of communication open. When problems occur, Simmonds would like to see more providers share information immediately, much like what Anthem Inc. did when the health care carrier was hit by a data breach that affected 80 million customers in 2015. “They sent out a barrage of emails and free credit checks,” she said.

—Michelle V. Rafter

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—GEORGE WEINER, WHOLE WHALE Also as of July, Zenefits had beefed up the licensed brokers on its staff to 250 despite job cuts in other areas. Earlier in the year, the company developed an internal licensing control application that blocks a customer account from being assigned to an employee without a broker’s license in the correct state, software the company plans to give away later this year. In late July, Zenefits reached an agreement with Tennessee regulators over its sales practices; investigations are continuing in several other states.

Young claims customers stuck with them through rocky times, though he declined to share specifics. “We haven’t seen a large percentage of customers leaving,” he said. “In fact, our customer base has held steady and is returning to growth now.”

Stumbling Blocks Sasha Poljak knows what can go wrong at HR tech companies because he’s been there. The longtime entrepreneur became CEO of Nimble Software Systems september/october

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Inc. in 2014. In the early stages of building out its cloudbased employee shift scheduling platform, Nimble Software had promised to develop modules for a couple of prospective customers’ very niche industry segment. After Poljak came onboard, he made the tough decision to delay that development and spend the company’s limited resources elsewhere. The change effectively killed the platform’s usefulness for the potential customers, who had been testing a beta version of the platform. They

form misallocated profit sharing funds based on erroneous W-2 wage information the payroll vendor provided.

“I was dumbfounded how they couldn’t get the right numbers,” he said.

On top of that,Weiner dealt with three separate account managers in nine months. “I was too small a fish for them to care about,” he said. He pulled the plug in the first quarter, shopped around and ended up picking a relative startup.

“They were younger and hungrier and cared about my

‘IT WAS WORSE THAN I COULD HAVE IMAGINED IT COULD BE FROM A USER PERSPECTIVE.’ —AMY EVANS, COLIBRI INSURANCE SERVICES left. The prospects incurred opportunity costs and deferred making other decisions, but otherwise weren’t out any money. Still, “It was a very uncomfortable situation,” Poljak said.

Startup tech vendors often must pick their battles so as to better compete in the long run. Unfortunately, Poljak said, customers or prospective customers can wind up as casualties.To guard against that, he recommends companies proceed with caution when teaming up with startups.

“Have a plan so you’re not risking all your operations at once on a small vendor,” he said. “Test their capabilities over a prolonged period before fully committing.” (See sidebar, “Be a Smarter HR Tech Shopper.”)

Startups aren’t the only HR tech vendors that stumble.

George Weiner, founder and CEO at Whole Whale, a digital marketing agency for nonprofits, was so infuriated by the fumbled services he got from a national payroll processer that he fired them. Weiner signed up with a cloud-based payroll provider last year specifically because he wanted a wellknown, professional payroll system for his staff of six full-time and six part-time employees. “I didn’t want someone who was going to go out of business,” he said. “I figured if they were this big, they must be doing something right.”

But problems with the provider, which he declined to name on the record, started almost immediately. The user interface was dated and required logging into different interfaces for different purposes. “I’d get an email alert saying I was getting a notification, and I had to log into a different notification system from the main system” to see it, Weiner said. Whole Whale used the vendor for payroll, workers’ compensation and 401(k) retirement saving accounts. Because of system notifications Weiner claims he didn’t see, he was three months late filing workers’ compensation payments, an oversight that could have cost him $3,000 in local government fines had he not been able to negotiate it down to $500. A third-party vendor the payroll provider used for the 401(k) piece of its platseptember/october

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business,” he said. The new system was slightly more expensive but had an updated, clean user interface, and covered part-time workers along with full-time employees.“In my mind, the difference was negligible, especially after knowing what happens when you go after” the cheapest solution, he said.

A Bad Experience Doesn’t Mean the Concept is Faulty Cloud-based HR tech vendors like Zenefits wouldn’t be growing as quickly as they are if they weren’t tapping into unmet needs. Zenefits whetted companies’ appetite for easy-to-use software that manages benefits, employee records and payroll from a single database, said Michael Wolff, president of Dickerson Employee Benefits, a Los Angeles wholesale insurance broker.

Because of Zenefits, Wolff said the independent insurance agents Dickerson Employee Benefits works with are asking him to help them identify cloud-based benefits platforms they can recommend to their own customers, preferably something else that includes free HR management software or another incentive. To that end, Wolff and his staff spent time earlier this year researching a dozen HR tech vendors to put together a package of cloud-based services.

Wolff cautions HR professionals not to use problems like the kind Zenefits encountered as an excuse to avoid moving to the cloud. It’s still early days, and some hiccups along the way are to be expected. “In my opinion, if it’s running on your virtual desktop or managed by Amazon or another big server farm, it’s a side issue,” he said. “The real issue is: Are you allowing the [technology] to help you manage this data.The answer is:You have to.”

Michelle V. Rafter is a Workforce contributing editor. To comment, email editors@workforce.com.

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PROFILE

HR, Technology and Those Who Are Making It Work T

BY RITA PYRILLIS

These leaders continue to modernize the human resources innovation landscape.

Namely’s New York City offices, top and bottom, continue to grow as the tech company adds more clients.

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here is a constant stream of new players who enter the human resources technology arena every year. In addition to longtime players who are reinventing themselves and their offerings, others from outside the industry are making their debut in both HR and the U.S. market.These entrepreneurs offer fresh perspectives on the power of technology and big data to transform HR. Workforce spoke separately with three up-and-coming industry leaders in a sort of virtual roundtable. Everyone was asked the same questions and we’ve presented the most insightful answers.

One is an executive from an Austrian firm expanding in the U.S. with an employer rating site similar to Glassdoor; another is a former media and advertising entrepreneur making his mark in payroll processing; and our third “panelist” is a financial industry veteran who is shaking up the recruiting world with a video interviewing platform.

Moritz Kothe, 37, CEO of kununu US, is also senior vice president at XING, the German-language version of LinkedIn, which acquired kununu in 2013. Kununu is an employee rating site and the largest platform for employee reviews in German-speaking countries, claiming to feature more than 250,000 reviews. Kothe began taking the Vienna-based firm global a year ago.

Matt Straz, 49, is the founder and CEO of Namely, a New York City-based tech company that develops payroll processing and benefits software for midsized companies.

Straz founded Namely in 2012 after selling Pictela, a content marketing platform that he launched in 2009, to AOL. Namely works with about 500 companies and more than 100,000 employees globally, and is growing rapidly, adding 40-50 new clients each month, according to Straz.

Danielle Weinblatt, 32, founder and CEO of Take The Interview, began her career in investment banking where she worked in diversity recruitment. Later she worked in private equity where she was first exposed to how companies operate. Weinblatt, a 2013 Workforce Game Changers winner, credits both experiences with her decision to launch Take The Interview in 2012. The New York Cityseptember/october

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Fr o m t o p, M o r i t z K o t h e o f k u n u n u , M a t t S t r a z o f N a m e l y, a n d D a n i e l l e We i nb l a t t o f Ta ke T h e I n t e r v i e w a r e h e lp i n g t o push HR technolog y into new and unchar ted territories.

The three tech innovators of fer their thoughts and insights into the current and f u t u r e s t a t e o f H R t e c h n o l o g y.

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PROFILE based firm provides software designed to help companies interview candidates with a video platform.

Workforce: How is technology changing the role of HR and the workplace in general?

Matt Straz: “Technology is empowering employees to become consumers and that’s driving change throughout the HR organization. …We’re seeing technology migrating from being simply a web app to being wherever the consumer happens to be.That’s a huge change. HR is also being impacted by tremendous changes in legislation.

There have been more changes to HR and HR policy in the last two years than there have been in the last 10. It’s made it almost essential for small to midsize businesses to use technology in a platform to run their business.

Changes in the law around PTO, sick leave, the fact that a lot of it needs to be tracked completely, has made it virtually impossible to run a business without leveraging HR technology at this point.”

Moritz Kothe: “Years ago people were leading companies by keeping information as a scarce resource. Today, information is available to everybody. Everybody can work from everywhere and its important that you exchange knowledge with other people. … The fact that information is available on mobile devices is changing this world. What does it mean for HR? It’s about understanding that people work and collaborate in different ways. Also, how a candidate performs is getting easier to track and its easier to get information and feedback from candidates, from employees and also from employers.

Speed of information and access to information is changing the landscape dramatically.”

Danielle Weinblatt: “It’s only now or in the last few years that you start to see HR, and particularly talent acquisition, get on a C-level executive’s radar and be something that they need to invest in as a business decision,

versus being looked at as a cost center or an area just around compliance, benefits, payroll. Now when you ask a CEO what’s their greatest asset they say their people. Having only worked in service-based organizations where you’re competing for the best talent in investment banking across the top schools, I didn’t see technology really following suit with that shift. It makes perfect sense but very few people have decided to innovate in this area. Seeing this shift really excites me.”

Workforce: Big data has been around for a number of years, but what are companies able to do with it in 2016 that they weren’t in the past and what might be possible in the future?

Straz: “Larger companies have had access to big data and tools for quite a while but this is the first time we’re seeing small and midsize companies being able to do these things.

Midsize businesses are going from analog to digital, moving data offline in spreadsheets to a database.That’s step one.

“Point in time reporting, visualizations, that’ really the next step for the midmarket, that’s what’s happing right now.The third step, which is going to be the most exciting part, is going to be the predictive analytics — informing what’s going to happen in an organization before it actually happens. … What’s exciting about Namely is our ability to use all the data that’s in the system across thousands of companies and dozens of industries and start providing data and insights and predictive analytics about what might happen to a company that’s similar to ones in the database.”

Kothe: “Big data is this one thing that everybody talks about but no one really knows how to do. It would be good to start using the small data first. I think it’s important that companies start using bits and pieces of the information that is currently available to them. To be honest, I’m not so sure that HR is able to cope with big data problems right now. We should start learning how to walk and then

New York-based Take The Interview’s business development representative team meets up, left. Members of the company’s product team look on with their office dog, Tchotchke.

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ride our bicycles first. For example, in the recruiting world, use the data kununu provides to you as employer, like what do people think, what’s their opinion? Try to understand what channels lead to not only the lowest cost for hire, but look at who is staying the longest.

“It’s about understanding what problems you have, what you want to solve and then see how you can apply certain technical measures. Don’t try to fly to the moon if you can’t even walk.”

Weinblatt: “I think we’re just scratching the surface.

The issue with HR is that we have all these on-premise legacy systems where it’s really hard to get data out and data in to the newer technologies and crunch that data. I think the technology is there but I think that HR is behind the times. I’ve talked to so many people in the industry who want to leverage data a lot better but just can’t because of the archaic systems they were using. There’s a tremendous lack of integration between disparate systems.

While I think big data is a trend, a lot of people don’t know how to use it.

“Obviously, data in recruitment is important. I’ve definitely seen a trend toward ‘let’s map out these optimal employees and hire people who are like them.’ There is so much error in that assumption. All jobs we do today involve teams, collaboration, mentorship. It’s hard to map out one person and understand what makes them successful because there are so many factors that are difficult to measure that lead to that success. But if you can understand that and start to quantify some of those factors — is the size of the group optimal, is it 5, 6 or 7 people? — organizations can start to break that down. That can be really powerful.

You can understand why a project ended up being successful. I don’t think we have true access to this data. It will take companies that are way more sophisticated in data extraction and are solving the right problems in order to make big data useful.”

Workforce: What are investors saying about the HR market and what growth opportunities do you see for the market?

Kothe: “There are a variety of companies out there that are in the recruiting space. On one side you have a LinkedIn, you have a Glassdoor, you have a CareerBuilder on the job board side. On the other hand you have companies like The Muse, and a lot of small startups that are trying to get into this space.What’s happening to the HR world is that it’s being disrupted by solutions that are more performance oriented.

“The question to answer right now is what does the fact that Microsoft is buying LinkedIn do to the overall industry. I think that’s interesting. And also the fact that companies are sucking up more and more capital without making an exit. What does this do going forward for startups?

There is less and less capital available for startups.”

Weinblatt: The thing about investors is that they’re big into pattern recognition. They really need to understand the problem these companies are trying to solve, and the september/october

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Kununu provides authentic feedback on company experiences, exploring everything from company culture to responsibilities, benefits, work-life balance and office snacks. Bottom photo: The kununu team set sail to celebrate launch day in the U.S. on June 16.

beautiful thing about HR and about recruitment is that anyone that is an experienced investor has felt that pain.

They’ve hired people, they’ve been hired, they’ve been through the interview process, they’ve dealt with inefficient teams. I think there’s been a lot of interest in HR because these are big problems that people are trying to solve and HR is one of the last frontiers for innovation.

“That’s why I think there’s been a lot of money poured into the industry.

“When I started looking into this industry I was told I was crazy. I was told that HR is all about risk management and about compliance and people are going to be afraid of the rules and regulations that restrict us from innovating.

Companies are going to stick to on-premise solutions, they’re never moving to the cloud, there’s data security issues and privacy issues and none of that was true. So it’s interesting to go from when I first started and had a lot of naysayers, to now where there’s so much innovation, so much capital, so much opportunity, and we’re just in the first phase of where we can go with this technology. I think that big data is definitely the next phase of it if it can be figured out. I think the companies that can figure it out will do exceptionally well.”

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The Robo Connection

BY PATTY KUJAWA

Some companies are turning to robo-advisers to help workers manage their 401(k)s, but not everyone’s sold on the technology.

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oxed Wholesale, an online bulk grocery shopping company, aims to take the hassle out of going to warehouse stores like Costco and Sam’s Club for people to shop. All you do is click on products found on the website and the company delivers goodies to your door in about three days.

The company wanted the same online ease of use and experience with its 401(k) provider, so in January, Boxed became one of the first 50 companies to sign up with 401(k) robo-adviser Betterment.

Most Boxed employees were new to 401(k)s and wanted to learn online, said Elana Krieger, Boxed vice president of human resources. In addition, Boxed offered traditional 401(k)s and Roth versions that allow participants to pay taxes upfront so withdrawals at retirement are tax-free.

“Many employees hadn’t invested in a 401(k) plan before so they were nervous about making choices,” Krieger said.

The sign-up process was easy and intuitive, she said. Users answered a few financial ques-

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tions and within a short time had a 401(k) account. Although she isn’t directly responsible for the daily administration of the plan, Krieger said she hasn’t heard any complaints from her team.

“I could explain this system to my 13-year-old,” Krieger said, who has worked in human resources for several years, including at a Fortune 100 company. “It’s much easier than traditional investing.”

The time for robots to enter the 401(k) space is here, experts agree. It’s not exactly the “Shall … we … play … a … game” supercomputer from the movie “War Games,” but robo-advisers use advanced analytics. They make it simple for users to input data and other per-

the better the program works, experts say.

“The great need for robo-advice is through defined contribution plans,” said Jerry Bramlett, managing partner at Redstar Advisors. “Technology is improving, and people are becoming more comfortable in using it.”

Sign me up, said 29-year-old Amanda Oliver.

Oliver orders takeout online, she shops online, and she even works with a therapist online.

So it probably goes without saying that she would want financial advice for her 401(k) online as well.

A content and brand strategist at online advertising agency OrionCKB, Oliver will soon become eligible to participate in the company’s 401(k). Currently she has no

‘I’M ALL ABOUT WHEN IT IS CONVENIENT FOR ME, AND I’D MUCH RATHER BE ON THE COMPUTER.’ —AMANDA OLIVER, ORIONCKB sonal information into a sophisticated algorithm to come up with the appropriate balance of stocks, bonds and other investments.

Robo-advising is quickly becoming a new way to provide professional financial advice at a low cost for individual investors. The costs are lower — sometimes more than half as much as using a human adviser — because data are driven by computer programs, and investments are typically passive indexed funds that don’t require a human to pick the mix.

At the end of last year, the industry claimed about $12 billion in assets among the top dozen providers in the retail or individual user space, according to research consulting firm Aite Group. The company projects assets to reach $285 billion by the end of 2017, mostly because of existing investment companies rolling out new services.

But that’s on the individual side. So what about the rise of robo-advice on the $6.8 trillion currently in 401(k) plans?

Tell Me About Yourself In many ways, robo-advisers have been here for a while.

Companies like Financial Engines Inc. and Morningstar Inc. have been working with plan providers and plan sponsors for years, creating computer-based programs to offer personalized investment advice for 401(k) participants. Betterment crossed over from the individual side in January to offer a full-service 401(k) robo-platform.

The process is simple: Users answer a few questions including their financial information and risk tolerance and, boom, they get a financial plan. Some programs allow more information to be entered or a consultation with a human adviser; the more info a user gives about their financial life, 42

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money in retirement savings and said she needs as much help as she can get to make the right investment choices.

Oliver said she wants to use a computer-based program to help her figure out how to invest her retirement dollars.

The other options — traditional, sometimes face-to-face meetings with an adviser or attending sign-up seminars — don’t work for this millennial.

“I’m all about when it is convenient for me, and I’d much rather be on the computer when it’s on my time, than spending two hours with someone,” Oliver said. “A financial adviser sounds like something for someone with a million dollars.”

With the fast uptick of robo-usage on the individual side, some experts say the 401(k) robo-market is about to crunch a lot more numbers. Studies show participants want help, and those who get it wind up doing better growing their retirement accounts. A 2014 Financial Engines and Aon Hewitt joint study showed that participants getting professional investment help had a median 3.3 percent higher rate of return compared with others managing their own accounts.

“It’s a huge market, and there are a number of people who are vastly underserved,” said Chris Jones, Financial Engines’ executive vice president of investment management and chief investment officer. “We think that needs to change.”

Buts About the ’Bots But not everyone is thrilled with robo-advising. Some say it’s not sophisticated, there aren’t enough investment choices, and it can’t react to participant decisions such as taking loans in the way a real adviser would.

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ment. If this happens, then this is what you do,” said Steff Chalk, executive director for The Plan Sponsor University.

“I don’t see [human] advisers going away.”

Chalk said the robo-movement is here to stay in the 401(k) market, but his anecdotal evidence tells him it will develop slowly.

“Plan sponsors don’t have enough of a comfort level to say that they are going to turn” their plans over to a robot, he said.

Financial Engines agrees. Last year it acquired The Mutual Fund Store for $560 million to add more human advisers to its strategy. Financial Engines’ users can go to any of The Mutual Fund Store’s 125 locations to get the help they need.

“Different people need to receive advice in different ways,” Jones said.

But there is another problem. Earlier this year, the U.S. Labor Department issued a rule that said providers giving advice to 401(k) plan participants have to act in the best interest of those people.The Labor Department added that providers can’t give advice that steers participants to their investment products to make gains that way.

It sounds straightforward, but it poses a lot of problems for robos in the individual space that might be thinking about crossing over to the 401(k) world, said Michael Kitces, financial blogger and director of wealth management at Pinnacle Advisory Group.

Companies such as Betterment and Financial Engines work well under the Labor Department’s rule because they base fees on total investment assets, not on a particular product, he said. The problem happens when investment management firms come in and try to use the robo-adviser as a way to deliver their products, Kitces said.

“ETF providers are buying robo-advisers so they can put their manufactured product into the robo as a distribution channel,” Kitces said in May blog post.With the new Labor Department rule, “they have to figure out how to level [fees] across the entire structure.”

One thing that certainly leans in favor of the robo-movement is fees. It can be hard to determine advisory fees in traditional 401(k) plans because oftentimes the fee for the service is paired or wrapped with other features offered by the provider. A typical advisory fee on the individual side is about 1 percent for large accounts.

Higher advisory fees can have an effect on account balances over time. The Labor Department uses an example of a 401(k) account balance of $25,000 having a 7 percent rate of return over 35 years (with no annual contributions). If fees were held to 0.5 percent over that time, the account balance would be $227,000. Paying 1.5 percent in fees would bring the account to $163,000, a 28 percent reduction because of a 1 percentage point change in fees over time.

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service (where it makes all the decisions on accounts), it charges between 0.15 percent and 0.6 percent annually, with an average advice fee being 0.4 percent, depending upon the size of the account.

Betterment is different from its predecessors because it is what CEO and co-founder Jon Stein calls full-stack service; the provider does everything — from giving advice, executing trades and providing statements, all at a lower cost.

“Our aim is to set up all employees for success,” said Cynthia Loh, Betterment for Business’ general manager.

Betterment uses exchange traded funds, or ETFs. These funds mirror existing indexes and are passively invested — meaning no human (including the participant) is actively picking the stocks. Its fee is also based on the size of the account and charges between 0.15 percent and 0.35 percent.

‘THE GREAT NEED FOR ROBOADVICE IS THROUGH DEFINED CONTRIBUTION PLANS.’ —JERRY BRAMLETT, REDSTAR ADVISORS The strategy works, Redstar Advisors’ Bramlett said, because just like traditional defined benefit plans, it does not allow the participant to make the heavy investment decisions. He noted the Financial Engines/Aon Hewitt study that found that 60 percent of people using professionally managed target-date funds also dabble in other available investments. Failing to exclusively stay in the target-date fund increases the risk of investing too much in certain sectors.

“They don’t understand that the target-date fund is already diversified,” Bramlett said. “Trying to educate employees on how to invest is a lost cause.”

Betterment’s Loh and Krieger from Boxed agree that the concept isn’t for every company. Users can’t invest in specific stocks, bonds or mutual funds — only ETFs. The strategy focuses on driving outcomes for people who historically want someone else to do the work.

“It’s hard to get employees to do this,” Loh said. “We help them get better outcomes.”

Krieger added that companies should at least consider Betterment’s concept when shopping for a provider. Betterment’s investment strategy is simple and may not appeal to every business, but she said she has let other HR execs know the robo-concept has worked well for her company.

“It’s been pretty seamless,” she said.

Patty Kujawa is a writer based in the Milwaukee area. To comment, email editors@workforce.com.

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The Reality of Individuality: Building Engagement Takes a Personalized Touch Much as designing customer experience has dominated the thinking of companies competing in today’s digital environment, organizations are now reexamining their employee experience.

Technology can help companies take a personalized approach.

BY ERIC LESSER AND MARIA-PAZ BARRIENTOS

T

he customer always comes first” has been a tried and true motto for generations, but what about focusing on what helps employees excel in the workplace?

Some organizations today are using the same principles they use to attract customers to help win the hearts and minds of employees through personalization, simplification, transparency and technology.

And improving the worker experience is good for business, too. Companies with employee engagement programs achieve a 26 percent greater year-overyear increase in annual company revenue compared with those that don’t have formal programs, according to a recent Aberdeen Group report.

The long-term goal? Find ways of designing employee experiences that not only attract and retain the skills they need to be successful, but also maximize the individual and collective potential in the work environment. The result will be a happier, healthier and more productive workplace.

However, work is rarely a one-size-fits-all proposition. A number of factors shape employee experience, including the formation and development of work-based connections and relationships, the design of employees’ physical work environments, and the tools and social platforms employees use to accomplish work-related activities.

In addition, the millennial mindset is permeating the workforce today. As this latest generation has established itself, the expectations for work flexibility, use of mobile tools and enhanced performance feedback have spread to other generations. People want the same experiences in the workplace that they have as consumers — simple, intuitive technology, the ability to rate and share opinions about products and services, and direct access to decision-makers.

The IBM Institute for Business Value found that the overall employee experience consists of three intertwined spheres: the social sphere, the physical sphere and the work sphere. (Editor’s note:The authors work for the institute.)

From a Social Perspective Virtually all of us depend to some degree on interaction with others. It’s not surprising that the 44

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relationships we create can influence our individual effectiveness and our perception of our organizations as a whole.

The goodwill that we generate through these relationships, often referred to as social capital, influences a number of important factors — from facilitating cross-organizational knowledge-sharing to boosting individual employee satis-

PEOPLE WANT THE SAME EXPERIENCES IN THE WORKPLACE THAT THEY HAVE AS CONSUMERS. faction. Social platforms enable individuals to develop personal profiles that identify their role in the organization, the topics they find of interest, the knowledge and skills they have acquired, and links to others within the organization.

The ability to create personal profiles helps individuals make connections to others and more easily locate individuals with common interests and needed expertise. Such profiles are usually a combination of three sources of information: data provided by the organization, data provided by the individual, and data obtained by observing the actions and interactions with others within the network.

From a Physical Perspective The physical work setting also has two different dimensions: environmental setup and environmental conditions.

The way the work environment is set up — such as office layout, public versus private spaces, etc. — can influence productivity and interaction with colleagues at work. Some employees are fine working in open, collaborative spaces; others are distracted. Giving employees options where they work, depending on the task, can affect short-term productivity and longer-term engagement. Also, environmental conditions can affect individuals as well. The level of light, heat, fresh air and noise can affect a variety of job-related tasks.

For example, researchers at Steelcase Inc., which designs office settings, are applying principles from neuroscience to determine how different physical layouts can affect mental states. They’ve identified three brain modes that require distinct behaviors and settings. In focus mode, distractions can be avoided through cocooning — separating oneself physically from others; in regenerate-plus-inspire mode, access to other people and nourishment allows employees to bond and the mind to rest; and in activation mode, workers can stretch and be physically active.

Also, environmental conditions can affect individuals as well. The level of light, heat, fresh air and noise can affect a variety of job-related tasks. IBM Research recently kicked off an IT initiative with Delft University of Technology 46

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called The Inclusive Enterprise.The team is looking at how cognitive computing can help predict optimal, environmental conditions based on personal preferences. They’re experimenting with cognitive and sensor-based systems that can recommend and even modify conditions, such as temperature and noise levels, to best suit individual employees. This research seeks to help retain employees by making them more comfortable at work.

For example, temperature often fluctuates within a room and certain areas of the building. Researchers are training systems to proactively predict how individuals will perceive the temperature, since some might feel hot and others cold in the same area. The next steps will explore user perception of various combinations of environmental measurements, and will look at different ways to derive measurements from existing devices such as smartphone sensors. Researchers are also looking at how they can make the system work in a real-world context.

From a Work Perspective Personalization can benefit employees through the ability to customize tools so that they can do their jobs more effectively. Given the number of individuals who have challenges with vision, hearing and motion — coupled with the aging workforce in many developing countries — employees have the ability to modify software tools to make them easier to use, which can greatly influence the overall work experience.

The employee experience is an important and complex issue, requiring companies to evaluate the close connection between employees’ physical, social and cultural environments, as well as the tools and relationships they need to accomplish work on a daily basis.The following questions can help shape the need to develop an employee experience strategy within your organization: • How does your current employee experience affect the attraction and retention of critical job roles?

• How could improving your employee experience increase productivity within your organization?

• To what extent does your employee experience influence your customer experience? Who has primary responsibility for designing the employee experience?

• How does a person or team bring others together to address employee experience issues?

• What types of analytics are you using to evaluate the effectiveness of your employee experience?

The most successful companies going forward will be those that recognize the importance of balancing the needs of the organization with the unique characteristics of individuals and work groups.

Eric Lesser is research director and North America leader at the IBM Institute for Business Value. Maria-Paz Barrientos is vice president and partner, Global Business Services Talent and Engagement at IBM Corp. To comment, email editors@ workforce.com.

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ROADMAPS Roadmaps is a practical guide for HR leaders on how to plan, implement and review key talent management programs. This Roadmap offers advice on how to plan and implement a successful HR technology plan. To learn more about this and other Roadmaps, visit Workforce.com/Roadmaps.

Finding Your HRMS ‘Soulmate’

By Sarah Foster

C

hoosing a human resource management system is a lot like picking a spouse — at least, that’s what John Hinojos believes.

“You need to make sure you are a good match,” said Hinojos, who is vice president of HRchitect, a consulting company that assists organizations in choosing the right human capital management software.

An HRMS sits at the intersection of information technology and human resource management, aiding companies in various HR responsibilities, like payroll, evaluations and attendance.

With numerous providers and even more users, there are plenty of fish in the HRMS sea to choose from. But Hinojos warns that every suitor is different. A system’s personality traits, or rather, its tools and functions, need to suit the company.

“It’s important to make sure the software fits your culture,” Hinojos said.

“Once you sign that lease and contract with the vendor, you just got married.”

Seek your HRMS marr iage counseling from this Workforce Roadmap, which offers guidance on how to choose the r ight HRMS for your company and how to prevent a divorce. september/october

2016

Plan, Do, Review Plan

• Determine your company’s needs, time and budget. Evaluation is key. Find out if you have enough resources to dedicate to the project. Determine what your company’s needs are today, and anticipate what they will be like tomorrow.

• Do some research. And then a little more. Explore various providers. Engage with consultants who can help you find a match. Now is also the time to create an RFP, or a request for proposal, where you can ask for demos or more information.

• Pay attention to vendor policies. What happens if the system has technical difficulties? Dave Rietsema, founder and CEO of HR Payroll Systems, an HRMS vendor match service, recommends understanding the ins and outs of each vendor’s support policies.

• Seek reviews from colleagues. After all, they’re the ones who will be using the system. What do they like about the desired HRMS? What do they not like about it? Can they see themselves using it every day?

Do

• Host a training session. It’s important to be knowledgeable about your new system. That’s where the training comes in. According to John Hinojos, companies should hold the session one week before going live.

• Hype it up. Get your company excited. “There’s always going to be resistance,” Hinojos said. “You may want to do a little change management to make sure people are happy.”

• Keep your eyes and your ears open. “Sometimes employees will have these discussions amongst individuals, but they don’t want to go to HR because there’s a stigma attached to it,” Rietsema said. “If you can have people act as eyes and ears on the ground, who can provide you feedback, that’s really helpful. You’re not going to think of everything. It will help you make changes.”

• Get your data ready, and get ready to go live. The process will go smoothly and quickly if you have all of your documents and data in place before the big move.

Review

• Communication with your vendor is key. “Meet with the vendor even if everything is going smooth and perfect,” Rietsema said. “It’s still good to touch bases.”

• Audit your data periodically. It’s important to make sure your data is still pure.

• Form a focus group. Rietsema recommends forming a focus group that reunites every six months to one year.

• Update and upgrade. Think it’s time for a new system? Before making the switch, be sure that it’s upgraded and updated.

• But sometimes, separation is necessary. “It was a good match in the beginning, but it may not be anymore,” Hinojos said. “Doesn’t mean it’s a bad system; it just means it’s time to get a divorce and find a new spouse.”

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SPECIAL REPORT

Human Resource Management System Providers

Welcome to the Human Cloud How the growing contract workforce is changing the way staffing agencies engage with talent.

By Sarah Fister Gale

F

orget software as a service; human capital as a service is able, including upwork.com, freelancer.com, and Proworkers, as the hottest trend in staffing today, with a vast segment of well as many industry-specific and specialty sites, such as Upthe workforce choosing work-on-demand options over full- Counsel for lawyers,Toptal for software developers and ShiftPixy time employment. for hospitality industry shift workers.

“It is the economy of the human cloud,” said Barry Asin, “The migration of this niche part of the industry to the president of Staffing Industry Analysts, a global advisory ser- internet has made it much easier for contingent workers to vice in Mountain View, California. participate in the gig economy,” said Teresa Carroll, senior vice Asin isn’t just talking about Uber and Lyft drivers, though president of talent solutions for KellyOCG, the outsourcing they are a part of this trend. The human cloud is also full of and consulting group of Kelly Services in Troy, Michigan. It contractors, consultants, freelancers and subject matter experts has also enabled more workers to make the transition from who are seeking new models of employment for a variety of full-time to freelance. reasons. Some do it to bolster their traditional income with These online matching sites are still a small trend in the after-hours gigs, while others do it full time because they can broader staffing economy, but the trend is growing. According earn more money or achieve to Staffing Industry Anagreater control over their lysts data, 4 percent of work life. Still, many conFortune 1000 companies tractors find themselves in used online platforms to these roles because it’s the hire contingent labor in best option they have, espe2014, but that rose to 11 cially as companies begin to percent in 2015 with ansee the value of bolstering other 5 percent considertheir full-time workforce ing the tools within the with contract staff. next two years.

Regardless of the reason, The most innovative their ranks are growing. staffing firms see this Contingent workers make growing trend as an opup 53 million people, or 34 portunity to find new percent of the American —RICHARD WAHLQUIST, CEO, AMERICAN STAFFING AGENCY ways to bring talent to workforce according to a their clients. For Kellysurvey commissioned by OCG, that means partnerFreelancers Union and Elance-oDesk. And as more profession- ing with a dozen online communities, including Upwork, als flock to contract positions, staffing industry companies are Work Market, and most recently Elevate Direct in the U.K. expanding their offerings to better meet the needs of clients.

Other staffing companies are acquiring innovative online startups to fill their contract labor gaps. Earlier this year Monster ONLINE PLATFORMS FILL THE GAP acquired the San Francisco based start-up Jobr, which offers a Responding to this shift, many traditional staffing agencies are job-finding app that the company described as “Tinder for building or partnering with online platforms that specifically jobs”; ManpowerGroup acquired Ciber Inc., the Dutch IT link companies with contractors to manage and complete con- solutions and staffing provider, to improve its global IT stafftingent work arrangements.This area of the staffing industry has ing capabilities; and Randstad acquired twago, a European grown rapidly in recently years, with dozens of sites now avail- freelance marketplace where companies can create cli-

‘THE IMPACT OF THE SKILL GAP AND DECLINING LABOR FORCE IS A CONSTANT BURDEN FOR RECRUITERS TRYING TO FILL TALENT NEEDS, WHETHER THEY ARE IN-HOUSE RECRUITERS OR OUTSIDE FIRMS.’

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HOT LIST Human Resource Management System Providers Listed alphabetically; compiled by Sarah Foster; editors@workforce.com Company Name & Web Address

HRMS Product Names

Total Number of HRMS Clients

Key Clients

ACENDRE acendre.com

Acendre Integrated Talent Management (includes workforce planning, recruitment, onboarding, learning/development, people analytics)

200

ADP adp.com

ADP Enterprise HR; ADP GlobalView HCM; ADP Vantage HCM; ADP Workforce Now

66,000

ASURE SOFTWARE* asuresoftware.com

People Success Platform

200

Edelbrock; Derby Lane; KidsCare Therapy

EPICOR SOFTWARE CORP. epicor.com

Epicor HCM

40

Chatsworth Products, Inc.; LifeCare Assurance Companies; JJ Taylor Companies

Infor CloudSuite HCM; Infor Global HR; Infor Human Resource Management

1,000

Children’s Health System of Texas; Community Bank System, Inc.; state of South Dakota

Kronos Workforce Central; Kronos Workforce Ready

1,300

Puma North America; Henry Mayo Newhall Hospital; Cavendar’s Boot City; YMCA of Greater Boston; Salida Hospital District; Dora Hotel Co.; Mammoth Mountain Ski Resort

Oracle Global Human Resources Cloud; Oracle Talent Management Cloud; Oracle Workforce Rewards Cloud; Oracle Workforce Management Cloud; Oracle Social Cloud

18,000

Overhead Door; Pearson PLC; Siemens

SAP SuccessFactors Employee Central; SAP SuccessFactors Employee Central Payroll; SAP SuccessFactors Compensation; SAP SuccessFactors Workforce Analytics; SAP SuccessFactors Workforce Planning; SAP Jam Collaboration

4,800

Allstate; Brooks Brothers; Cirque du Soleil; San Francisco 49ers

SilkRoad HRMS

100

UltiPro

3,200

Bloomin’ Brands; Major League Baseball; Yamaha Corp.

Workday Human Capital Management (includes compensation, benefits, talent management); Workday Recruiting; Workday Payroll; Workday Time Tracking

1,100

Netflix; Bank of America; Hewlett Packard Enterprise

INFOR infor.com

KRONOS INC. kronos.com

ORACLE CORP. cloud.oracle.com/ hcm-cloud

SAP SUCCESSFACTORS successfactors.com SILKROAD silkroad.com ULTIMATE SOFTWARE ultimatesoftware.com WORKDAY INC. workday.com

U.S. Department of Agriculture; Australian Taxation Office; Glencore Would not disclose

Quality Health Strategies; Listrak Inc; Jasint Technology

Note: *Asure Software changed its name from Mangrove.

Ascentis, Ceridian, NuView Systems and Sage, which appeared on previous lists, either declined to participate or did not respond to requests for information.

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SPECIAL REPORT

Human Resource Management System Providers

ent-branded freelance recruitment platforms that can be integrated with their vendor management system.

LEGAL CONCERNS DRIVE CAUTION Staffing firms are also working more closely with clients in an advisory role to help them figure out how to best take advantage of contingent labor trends, and to make sure their choices align with business and legal goals. “Companies have all sorts of questions and concerns about compliance risk when using these platforms,” Asin said, noting that larger

DATA BANK Goal!

80% staffing and recruiting firms met or exceeded revenue goals in 2015

Source: Staffing Industry Analysts

Strong Growth The U.S. staffing market is projected to grow 6% in 2016 and 2017 to nearly $150 billion

Source: Staffing Industry Analysts

The New Gig 53 million Americans consider themselves contingent labor; that’s 34% of the workforce

Source: Freelance Union

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companies are especially cautious about working with contractors, and are turning to staffing firms for guidance.

It’s a smart move, especially as policymakers begin to explore what the gig economy means from a legal and economic standpoint, and how they may adapt statutes to create a social safety net for these workers, said Richard Wahlquist, CEO of the American Staffing Association. In a recent ASA survey, one of the leading issues keeping executives up at night is their concern about labor employment law and where their liability begins and ends when working with staffing firms. “People have a lot of questions about their legal obligations to temp workers,” he said.

And as they introduce more temporary and project labor into their workplace, they increase the risk of introducing non-compliant practices into the organization.

It isn’t always easy to decipher obligation, he said. For example, with the Affordable Care Act, the staffing firm is responsible for handling all employee insurance issues, but for laws related to Occupational Safety and Health Administration requirements and equal opportunity hiring, the client is responsible for providing a safe work environment that is free from discrimination.

“These rules all extend to a flexible labor force and you have to be aware of your obligation to these workers,” Wahlquist said. The Department of Labor is paying closer attention to compliance issues related to temp workers and recently released a series of guidance documents as part of its Temporary Worker Initiative, specifically focused on compliance with safety and health requirements when temporary workers are employed under the joint (or dual) employment of a staffing agency and a host employer.

“I think the majority of noncompliance that we see is people just not getting what the law is, and what their responsibilities are under it,” Department of Labor Wage and Hour Division Administrator David Weil said in an interview with The Washington Post.“We also find cases of people who are clearly playing games and clearly trying to shift out responsibility, and often have structured things in a way that lead toward more noncompliance.”

When companies fail to meet the needs of these contract workers it can backfire. In May of this year, for example, OSHA cited Cooper University Hospital in Camden, New Jersey, for failing to fit temporary workers with proper respirators or provide training on protocols related to exposures to blood and other potentially infectious materials. The hospital faces $55,000 in penalties.

Concerns about legal issues link to a broader shift in the staffing industry where larger companies are looking to their vendors for more than just workers. “They want advice and analytics that will help them better manage their overall talent equation,” said Carroll. This demand for consulting services is being driven by a number of trends, including interest in using more contingent labor, internal pressures to reduce the time and cost of hiring, and the inability of big companies to keep up with technology innovations used to find and track talent.

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turning to service providers to fill the gaps,” she said.

In response, staffing firms are working with clients much earlier in their decision-making process. In some cases, they are working with clients months in advance of a project to determine what types of talent they need, whether those hires should be full time or temporary, and how to manage the compliance issues related to these decisions, said Paul McDonald, senior executive director for Robert Half International in Los Angeles.

“They want us involved in these conversations from the planning stage to advise them on what choices will help them execute their plan.”

Many firms are also expanding their data mining and workforce analytics offerings to give companies greater insight into which types of talent deliver the greatest benefits for different types of projects or positions, and how to attract this talent to their brand. Some staffing companies are building out these services from within, while others are acquiring analytics expertise.

For example, Protiviti Inc., Robert Half International’s consulting division, recently acquired the assets of Decision First Technologies, a business intelligence and SAP solutions provider.

When Litigation Collides With Your HR Management System

By Richard Hu It’s among a human resources professional’s worst nightmare: being asked to open your HR management system in response to a discovery request for relevant documents in a lawsuit involving your company.

It’s not uncommon. On Oct. 19, 2015, a New Jersey federal magistrate judge in a $250 million class-action gender bias lawsuit ordered Merck & Co. to produce all employment and compensation data for all sales representatives the company employed from mid-2009, when it switched to its present HRMS, through Dec. 1, 2010. As an HR professional, what should you do and what should you be aware of?

Leveraging Analytics Module for the Litigation Hold You will initially receive a litigation hold from the party intending to file the lawsuit. A litigation hold requires your company to preserve all data that may be related to the lawsuit, including electronically stored information.

When it comes to an HRMS, you must disable automated removal,

SUPPLY STILL THE BIGGEST CHALLENGE

extension or verification of documents nearing the time for deletion

For all the hoopla around gig workers, most staffing agencies continue to say their biggest challenge is finding qualified talent to fill their pipeline. “The impact of the skill gap and declining labor force is a constant burden for recruiters trying to fill talent needs, whether they are in-house recruiters or outside firms,” Wahlquist said.

McDonald agrees. He noted that while overall unemployment is at a comfortable 4.7 percent rate, specific professional sectors, including finance, tech, legal and accounting are much lower.“For certain IT roles the unemployment rates are less than 1 percent,” he said. “Demand is dramatically outstripping supply.” Even though enrollment in engineering and related fields is rising, McDonald doesn’t expect to see much relief in the years to come. “The pace of technology and demand for talent is moving faster than these programs can deliver graduates.”

In response, companies like Robert Half are trying to ramp up the recruiting side of their services, and developing mobile applications that enable swift — but vetted — matches between candidates and clients. “Speed is critical in this field, though you can’t skip the thoroughness of the review process. That’s where misfires happen.”

The need for speed won’t go away any time soon, and staffing firms will continue to face pressures to expand their reach and make it easier for talented laborers to find work through their recruiting services and online platforms. That means offering transparent and efficient tools, like mobile sign up and interviews via Skype to make the process speedy and efficient, McDonald said. “It has to be quick and easy for candidates and clients, or they will go elsewhere.”

based on governmental employment policies that were put into place

Sarah Fister Gale is a writer based in the Chicago area. To comment, email editors@workforce.com.

Richard Hu is an associate attorney at Taft, Stettinius & Hollister in Chicago.

To comment, email editors@workforce.com.

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to enhance privacy and decrease the risk of unauthorized access and the operational expenses of storing information.

Narrowing the Scope of the Litigation Hold and Discovery Narrowing the scope to the litigation hold may jumpstart what would ultimately be narrowed anyway later in the litigation when the parties determine the scope of discovery. Equally applicable to narrowing the scope of the litigation hold, the narrowing of discovery during litigation requires you to provide information to your attorney on the layout of your HRMS, the nature of the data contained in the HRMS and the best methods to extract the data.

Failure to Preserve Relevant Information Failure to preserve relevant information can result in repercussions in court. No sanctions would be imposed unless the electronically stored information has been lost, you failed to take “reasonable steps” to preserve that information, there was prejudice to the other party, the information cannot be replaced by another source or restored and there was an intention on your part to deprive the other side of the information.

Producing Electronically Stored Information The biggest question that comes up at this point is how to produce the information. The original format of the information is normally the requested format, but when it comes to HRMS, the data can only be exported to the same HRMS, which the attorneys for the other party would not likely have. Instead, spreadsheets of the data are the most common format that data from HRMS is produced.

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ROUNDTABLE continued from page 39

Workforce: How and why did you enter the HR market and what excites you about HR? Straz: One the major reasons I founded Namely was that I noticed that the midsize companies all seemed to struggle when it came to accessing and managing people data. Small companies had PEOs to manage their HR benefits and payroll for them.

Large companies would have big enterprise software systems, like SAP, Oracle and Workday. But if you were somewhere in between you really didn’t have an all-inone core HR, payroll and benefits system.

So they might have a payroll system, a benefits administration system, an HR system or just spreadsheets and they really struggled getting the data that they needed to run their business.

Weinblatt: I was in investment banking

when I first started and was really active in diversity recruitment. … I was actively involved in interviewing. I created the first women’s banking forum for Cornell and Harvard and then moved on to private equity. We would invest in high growth businesses and I got to see what it was like to actually run a company, sit on the board, go through various challenges in sales, marketing, technology. I decided I no longer wanted to be on the investment side or on the finance side of things. I wanted to be an operator.At that point, I decided to go to business school. I went to Harvard for a year and then dropped out and started Take The Interview. Starting the company was definitely born out of my experiences in recruiting and interviewing.”

Rita Pyrillis is a writer based in the Chicago area.

To comment, email editors@workforce.com.

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LAST WORD

J a m e s Te h r a n i

THIS DOESN’T HAVE TO BE THE LAST WORD y the time you read this, I will have started a new B journey with a new company, but I’ll never forget the Workforce voyage. It’s a publication I’ve become

fond of, especially after spending countless hours researching, writing and editing it these past six years.

As the project manager of the Workforce 90th anniversary content in 2012, I looked through almost every issue of Workforce, Workforce Management, Personnel Journal and Journal of Personnel Research.

OVER THE PAST SIX YEARS, WORKFORCE, LIKE THE WORKFORCE ITSELF, HAS GONE THROUGH MANY CHANGES. The name has changed a number of times over the past 94 years, but the mission has remained the same: help companies become better employers.

During my six years, Workforce, like the workforce itself, has gone through many changes. When I joined as copy desk chief in 2010, the country was just emerging from the Great Recession, and I was jumping from one of Crain Communications’ larger magazines to Workforce, a smaller publication that was moving from Southern California to Chicago.

Getting the job wasn’t easy.

Ron Alsop, the publication’s new editor who was a good wordsmith in his own right, had me take two editing tests and multiple interviews with him as well as former publisher Todd Johnson. But I got the job and was excited to learn about the world of human resources — a term, by the way, that I’m not very fond of. I recently read a blog post from Cornerstone’s Charles Coy suggesting the term “people operations” as a replacement. I like it.

With the move from California came a lot of new faces.

There was art director Diana Groth Krasnansky, who started about the same time I did; Rita Pyrillis, who still writes amazing articles for us on a monthly basis as a freelancer; and then-Senior Ed54

Workƒorce | w o r k f o r c e . c o m

itor Ed Frauenheim, who is one of the most passionate editors I’ve met. In fact, when Ed gets rolling on a subject he cares about — namely why companies should treat workers better — he really gets rolling. His energy and enthusiasm about best practices in workforce management are infectious.

There have also been some surprises along the way. When Workforce hired former Mercer executive Andrea Whitney to come in to stir things up in 2012, the editorial staff was a wee bit nervous about having a nonjournalist as our leader. But we needn’t have worried. Andrea didn’t come in to change the editorial process; she came in to make it work better.

And it did. Her leadership skills and level of commitment to her staff made us all want to work that much harder for her. She even brought in a young, quiet, introverted intern named Max Mihelich to write for us.

I couldn’t have guessed then that Max would turn out to be one of the most authoritative young writers I’ve ever come across. He jumped into the complex legal HR beat without missing a beat.

I also couldn’t have guessed that when I phoned into a meeting on Jan. 7, 2013, that I would learn we’d been sold to a company called MediaTec Publishing.

The next day we all met at MediaTec’s offices to meet the staff.

I got to meet future talented colleagues like Kellye Whitney and Frank Kalman as well as our current editor-in-chief, Mike Prokopeak, who must have done his homework because he had some really nice things to say about me that day even though we hadn’t met yet.

There have been so many great people I’ve worked with here — and I’m sorry I can’t name everyone — but there’s one person I’d like to recognize most of all. For six years, Rick Bell has gone out of his way to mentor me, to listen to me and to keep me focused on the publication’s mission. I have learned a lot from him about this field, and I’m proud to call him my friend. Rick and sales rep Daniella Weinberg are the lone holdovers from Workforce’s move to Chicago.

But ultimately, thanks to you, the readers, who have supported Workforce for so many years.

I’ve learned so many things along the way, including this one: With social media omnipresent, there’s no reason this has to be the last word.

James Tehrani was Workforce’s managing editor. To comment, email editors@workforce.com.

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER

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ADP and the ADP logo are registered trademarks of ADP, LLC. ADP A more human resource. is a service mark of ADP, LLC. Copyright © 2016 ADP, LLC.

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