Looking Ahead to Get Back

HR Employs the Latest Technology for a more Personal Touch

Have you noticed how as life progresses we often think back to another time – one that was maybe simpler, easier or less hectic? People always seem to talk about the ‘good old days’ when things seemed better. However, in today’s Digital Age with the modern conveniences brought on by ever-advancing technology – things are pretty good. Our productivity and standard of living have never been higher. And if correctly leveraged, maybe we can get back that ‘good old days’ feeling with today’s latest devices…

One of the many advances of technology is the ability to communicate in an instant via the Internet using email, chat, texting, social media and more. And one of the challenges that human resources organizations continue to address is how to harness the power of this technology to best communicate and engage employees in their organizations – to use a potentially impersonal medium to establish and maintain personal relationships.

Last year, the HR technology buyer began to really get in touch with their end users and look for technology designed to support people, not just processes, says Steve Parker, head of business transformation at Achievers. “This meant moving away from the outdated but consolidated offerings that employees, managers, and executives used only when they had to such as HR “self-service” to providing tools that people used because they want to – technology designed to engage and help people be more productive.”

HR professionals know that they must take into account two types of communications within their organizations – messaging that requires immediate delivery and response – and employee communications such as newsletters and email which may be read off hours. So the technology chosen must have the abilities to alert for instant notification as well as be read via mobile devices and accessed from virtually anywhere. The more flexible the solution – the better able it is to meet the needs of a diverse workforce.

Parker continues, “Technology will finally help us do something about this disengagement problem. Disengaged employees cost the US economy $500 billion per year in lost productivity. And let’s face it; we spend more effort and resources measuring engagement than we do doing something about it. That’s about to change. While the tools for measuring personal attributes or capabilities have been around for a while, solutions that help organizations create—not just measure—an amazing environment will come into their own in 2015. We’ve all seen awesome employees get swallowed up by bad companies or bad bosses, so organizations serious about increasing their performance will begin to focus more on taking action on employee engagement by providing people with tools to connect across functions, catch others in the act of doing things right, and stay aligned to what’s most important.”