PeopleSoft - State of the Art Software - Thesis Example

PeopleSoft – of the Art Software A. Introduction PeopleSoft is an integrated software package which provides a number of applications for running the day to day activities of a business efficiently. It has a number of applications which are Financial, Human Resource management and Customer Relationship Management related (peoplesoft.planet.com) PeopleSoft Enterprise from Oracle is a group of applications designed to provide end to end Human Resource (HR) solutions for organizations. Through its various applications which are PeopleSoft Enterprise Human Capital Management (HCM) 9.1, PeopleSoft Enterprise PeopleTools 8.50 and PeopleSoft Enterprise Learning Management 9.1 and PeopleSoft Enterprise Portal 9.1, Oracle claims to offer the customers a platform to provide improved employee productivity and better performance. One of the differentiating features of this software is its Web 2 capabilities. Besides this enhanced ability, the software also has 300 new Web services and around 200 industry specific improvements (oracle.com). A summary of the various applications shows how these tools help in business improvement. A very interesting feature of HCM is that it facilitates the alignment of individual goals with those of the organization. This is achieved by ensuring that each business goal is extrapolated to the individual employee goal sheets. It even helps identify the succession plan for the organization by identifying the talent pool through the performance sheets and matching them with the key skill set at the various hierarchical levels. The Web 2.0 capabilities of PeopleSoft Enterprise help employees engage with each other through chats, wiki, social and knowledge networking forums. The software’s MIS generation features help analyze performance and productivity and thus enable leaders to chalk out future course of action. Its ability to talk to previously released versions of applications helps save its customer acquisition costs as there is no need to replace the previous applications to enable installation of the new ones. This helps save money on account of software acquisition and installation and training costs. With country specific HR and payroll programs the software is a global platform which can be used even in countries like China and Argentina. It also has educative and research oriented capabilities along with provisions for industries like retail, public sector and professional services. In the ensuing sections we will be discussing the various features that the software provides which enable a smooth running of the various HR functions in an organization. Some of the features we will be discussing are – job creation capabilities of PeopleSoft, its ability to provide an efficient recruitment functionality, database management (which is a very important and cumbersome task for HR managers), contract management capabilities (which again requires a lot of documentation), leave management and disciplinary procedure management, payroll management capabilities of the software, ability to help in improving the organization culture through its web capabilities, software’s capabilities of providing solutions for the procedures to redress grievances of employees in an organization, training and learning management solutions, providing various e-services that help in giving personal touch to the HR function and finally the software’s features that help with the organizational structure management of an organization. B. HR functionality So far we have seen a macro-level picture of the various HR functions that PeopleSoft perform for organizations. Now we will discuss these functions in more detail and see how PeopleSoft can help the organizations in achieving efficiencies in these functions. 1- Creating the Job Description A single source of job related data is created by this software. This includes the key competencies of the candidates and also the skill sets required for the various vacancies available. These are then matched through the various software applications and the best fit candidate for the particular profile is selected. The database also contains company level details of types of positions, titles of jobs, pay scales of various positions, job type (this can be company specific like revenue generating or administrative post), employment type (this could be permanent or contractual), no. of hours required per week, pay group (this could be monthly or weekly) and work type (which could be full time or part time) (bc.edu). The user can go to requisite page and enter the required information for the job he/she needs to post. Some of the information is compulsory input and the page automatically prompts the user to select fields from the existing database. Thus, fields like business unit, job title, job level and other employment related details are picked up from the main database. This standardization helps to eliminate variance within the basic payroll and position information for the Job description (JD) within the organization. For example, manual entries could cause errors in allocating the salary of an employee to an incorrect department. Many times, information like revenue-generating employee is missed out as the person filling the JD may not think that it is important at that point in time. However, a business might have revenue-generating v administrative employee ratio targets. Omission of such vital information could lead to problems at a later stage. Following these mandatory fields, the form has input fields where the profile of the job needs to be input. Here the complete details of the job need to be mentioned. Once all details are capture the form automatically flows to the next supervisory level for approval of the position. This is a way of keeping track of the authority and accountability of the jobs being floated. 2. Recruitment Most of the companies find it more economical to look for candidates through the online services. Thus, it is important that the interface with the applicant is easy to maneuver and is descriptive enough to get the right candidate. To ensure this, site ids have been created for each site. These ids define the details of a recruiting solution’s online application site, including jobs that applicants can access through the site (sig.nfc.usda.gov). The program also has the capabilities of restricting the job openings to candidates. This means that by providing security permissions the company can limit the jobs that a candidate can access. There are also facilities to write extra material regarding company information, its work culture and so on. A number of job sites can be created based on the business unit and also catering to both internal as well as external candidates. The flexibility of adding text into the site pages can help in targeting candidate groups differently. For example the information for internal candidates can be different from that of the external candidates. Candidates can view the various job openings, number of applications for the jobs and even interview schedules and the status of their applications. They can even know the profiles of the other candidates who have applied to the job and asses their competition. By providing these facilities the software eases the hiring process and ensures best profile match for the job as the candidates have the choice of applying to the various jobs after analyzing all the accessible jobs. Another customer friendly feature of this software is its self service functionality. As multiple sites can be created business-wise there can be a complete decentralization of the hiring process. The new Talent Acquisition Manager provides employers with enhanced contact management tools, improved search capabilities, and new configuration options that allow hiring managers to better track top candidates (allbusiness.com). 3- Doing Contracts Of Employment. Unionization and employment contracts can be easily tracked through PeopleSoft. Modification of worker’s contracts to include tracking task orders or subcontracts is a useful feature of the software in this respect (cms.calstate.edu). There is an online system which keeps track of the expiration of the agreements and contracts. Thus it automatically notifies the users about expiration dates to ensure timely actions. Through job codes, the software links the job attributes, job classifications, bumping rights and wage plans (sig.nfc.usda.gov). These job codes can be assigned to a labor agreement or contract in a hierarchical order to ensure that workers covered under the agreement are assigned to one of the selected job codes. Wage plans can also be linked to these job codes. When an employee’s contract or labor agreement or the job code is updated, the wage plan automatically gets picked up from the database and gets linked to the respective employee’s job records. There are fields where the agreement commencement date and type of agreement are captured. Based on these seniority dates are also calculated. 4- Managing Employees Data and documents. Managing employee data and documents becomes very easy with PeopleSoft. All the data pertaining to an employee is kept in a central database which can be accessed and modified by authorized personnel. This data includes: Personal data - like name, employee id and date of birth etc. Educational records Job related data – hierarchy level i.e. immediate supervisor, designation, business unit in which the employee is working, type of employment and so on. Payroll data – Salary structure, other compensation and benefits the employee is eligible for etc. Historical records – This is generated on account of having worked in the organization over long period of time. These could be trainings attended, dates of promotions (if any), previous departments worked for, previous ratings, achievements like internal certifications or awards, record of disciplinary actions taken against the employee (if any) and so on. Record related to exit from the company – Reasons for leaving the organization (termination of employment, personal growth, financial etc.), full and final settlement records, employees experience of working in the organization etc. Thus with the creation of job ids and their linking to the various sub-processes like level in the hierarchy tree, payroll process and training process etc. all records of an employee can be automatically generated as he or she continues to work within the organization. There is manual interference only at certain points like initial record entry at the time of joining. 5- Absenteeism and leaves. PeopleSoft has a self service platform for absence and leave management. Through this interface, the employee can request for leave. The request automatically flows to the supervisor through the workflow process. The supervisor can then approve or reject the leave depending on the situation. The system also shows the leave balance of the employee. Both the supervisor and the employee can view this and take decisions accordingly. An important feature of this application is the ability to export the computed leaves to the payroll interface. Thus, based on the type of absence and leave status, if the employee becomes eligible for a deduction from the salary, the process gets automatically triggered. This helps in reducing errors and also ensuring that managers get time for more productive work than waste time in calculating leave balances and inform payroll in case an action is required. The system also monitors through complex logic whether the employee is eligible for the particular leave or not and prompts to the user as well as the supervisor (sig.nfc.usda.gov). Absence Management system can also be configured to the Oracle Workforce Scheduling. This helps in workforce management also. 6- Disciplinary Procedures. Disciplinary procedures could be corrective action plans where an employee is given chance to improve himself or herself with respect to either his behavior or performance. There is usually a set period within which the employee needs to show improvement which is monitored closely. If there is no improvement, it leads to termination of employment. Other disciplinary actions could be one time punitive steps like not giving increment or incentives, issuing warning letters etc. All this can be done with the help of PeopleSoft. The termination of employment is achieved by putting relevant code in the database against the employee’s personal record (ISACA 2006). Based on the termination code, relevant letters can be generated and payouts information is sent to the retirement benefits and payroll processes. Though the candidate is automatically removed from the various internal linkages, the records are still kept. 7- Motivation and incentive. e-Performance helps track the employee’s performance in a systematic way. Based on the evaluation schedules, the employee fills in his performance form which automatically flows to his immediate supervisor. The people involved discuss and accordingly close the discussion with the manager filling in his ratings and comments. An MIS can be obtained to view the ratings of all individuals under one supervisor. The hierarchy flows till the last person approves all ratings. All evaluation criteria are already available in the form and there are least chances of making incorrect ratings of recommendations as the manager can view other people’s ratings and comments for the individual who is being rated. With this automated rating process, the chances of errors and de-motivation of employees is reduced. It also avoids any delays in completing the evaluation procedure which can be a very big turn off for an employee as he may miss out on his incentives and promotions. Also the summarization tools of the software help in giving timely and appropriate feedback to the employ so that he or she can improve the performance. Based on the ratings the employee automatically becomes eligible for the requisite incentives (sig.nfc.usda.gov). 8- Grievance Procedures Grievance procedure is facilitated by PeopleSoft through its web capability. The users can log into the relevant site and log complaints. The PeopleSoft database also contains information regarding the contact persons and procedures for various grievances. All grievances are tracked through their unique id numbers and reach the relevant person who has been linked for this procedure in the workflow hierarchy. 9- Authority and accountability Authority and accountability is achieved by creating the hierarchy tree where employees are linked to their one up supervisors through their ids. The database contains information of supervisors of the particular employee and the various processes like leave management process or the training nomination process. Thus, when a leave request is generated by the employee, it automatically flows up to his supervisor for approval based on the hierarchy tree. Some exception rules are also inbuilt. For example, in case of absence of a manager, Human Resource personnel may be authorized to approve leave. Also, the approving authority for all transactions is predefined in the system. For example, for leaves, the approving authority might be the immediate supervisor but for a financial transaction there might be two authorities to whom the request will flow – the supervisor and an accounts manager or a business head. Thus, by creating this kind of approving network, the system ensures that adequate accountability is inbuilt. Any violations will prompt relevant messages to the people associated in the authority tree. Also, adequate security checks are kept in place. Audit trails can also be conducted to check for approvers as all data is maintained in the database. 10 - Health and Safety in work place. Legal compliance is one of the strongest drivers for accident prevention (Tyler). Thus a system which can ensure an efficient health and safety network is a requirement of all organizations. PeopleSoft helps the Human Resource function in ensuring safety procedures by providing a platform for such information. First step towards this is that a database of health issues and accidents of employees within the organization is kept in the centralized database of PeopleSoft. This database can be used for improvising the office environment by taking into account these accidents and ensuring such situations are not repeated. Besides this, the web platform of PeopleSoft allows to maintain information about various hazardous situations and relevant safety measures employees need to take. The workforce communications solution can be used to communicate the latest health and safety related information company-wide. 11 - Workplace Culture. Work culture is defined by the ideas and beliefs the leadership propagates within an organization. By following a participative culture an organization can increase ownership in the employees. If a cooperative culture and sense of ownership causes an employee-owned company to have fewer lay-offs and lower quit rates, it will cause the firm specific human capital to increase (Perotin and Robinson 2004). Thus, employee participation is an important tool to improve work culture. Employee participation can be increased by conducting company-wide surveys. PeopleSoft helps in conducting such online surveys, the results of which can then be utilized to form policies that improve work culture. Employee engagement and satisfaction surveys can be conducted by posting relevant questions at the website and then encouraging the employees to fill in their responses online. The results of the surveys are automatically calculated and an MIS can be produced to check for the areas of concern. PeopleSoft provides various types of analytical reports in various formats which the user can analyze. Besides surveys, the PeopleSoft’s web capabilities allow to run various communities where the employees can be members and share information. These communities could be business specific communities where there can be discussions and information sharing regarding activities happening at the business level or there could be communities like policy and compliance community. With the chat facility provided by PeopleSoft, employees can have on-line discussions. This can create an open work culture which will lead to healthy environment. 12- e-services that support person specification e-services include monthly schedules which individuals can view and even entering schedule preferences. Along with this, there is also the contact information which the employee can use to enable him or her to make changes to the schedule. The employee can view his or her leave balance, training history, training plan, salary details and so on. There is a complete database of company policies which the employee can access whenever he requires. Besides these, there is help-desk facility which helps in trouble shooting activities. The employees can go on a live chat with the help-desk who can then provide them with a list of possible solutions. Other services include personal profile maintenance by the employees themselves. The employee can login and update his or her profile and does not need to go to HR or supervisor for small modifications. Using PeopleSoft e-Benefits, employees can access benefit plans and programs to process their annual open enrollment and changes to personal and dependent data when benefit-related life events occur (oracle.com). This system helps the employees in viewing their benefits and communicating their choices. 13- Training and learning. The software has the ability to track performance of employees through its Talent Management facility. This keeps track of an employee’s key skills and also career plan as created by his supervisors. There is a repository of training courses available in the database along with their schedules and the mode of training. The individual can be nominated to these trainings either by self-nomination (for some courses) or by his supervisor based on his career plant and the need to develop certain key competencies in him or her. Besides enrolling employees into various training courses, the training history of the employee can be tracked. Training costs are also tracked by the software. There are options to input the trainer costs or the cost of the session by the administrator. These are automatically linked to the respective business head and are added into their costs. Country specific legal requirements for training have also been incorporated in the software. For example, some countries specify legal training hours for skill development or adaptation to job change or job preservation and non-specific training (sig.nfc.usda.gov). This information about the type of training an employee is undergoing can also be tracked through this system. 14- Create organizational structure. Organizational structures are created by specific job code allocations. A complete hierarchy tree is created by linking individual employees to their supervisors and this linking goes up to the highest level in the business unit and then the country and so on. There are facilities within the software to move employees individually as well as a team from under one supervisor to the other. Also, when an employee leaves an organization, his or her records are automatically removed from under the supervisor list and hence from the hierarchy tree. However, the records may still remain in the main database as archive and can be referred to at a later date. 15- Retention Career and succession planning are important activities of Human Resource function to enable retention of talent within the organization and also to achieve organizational goals by ensuring that the right candidate is selected to steer the company. By formalizing and automating an employee career plan administration, an organization is in a better position to manage and develop employee skills (ISACA 2006). Thus, career planning is an important aspect of the above stated objectives. PeopleSoft enables this activity by first allowing the employee to define his own career path. This requires capturing current job details (which are already in the database) followed by his aspirations, location and job preferences etc. Once this is done, his potential is ranked against rest of the employees in the database. Then a career plan is developed on the PeopleSoft platform where relevant trainings to develop the skill set required for progression are captured. Once the competency development is achieved as per ratings from the training tracker, the employee moves up his progression plan. Succession planning can also be done through PeopleSoft. All are concrete and documented steps towards employee retention. 16 - Payroll (Compensation and benefits). Each country has different legal requirements for compensation and benefits. PeopleSoft has country specific features besides the basic compensation calculation abilities. For example, for Japanese payroll, the software is being enabled to provide standard electronic bank file formats to allow the users to electronically transfer monthly deductions and retirement allowances (cms.calstate.edu). Similarly, postal codes of Japan will be automatically updated. This feature is linked to the filing of tax returns based on the area of residence (cms.calstate.edu). These tax calculations as well as work force management will automatically happen through the system. The software can also provide “unemployment certificates” and “age certificates” as per the data fed into its database (sig.nfc.usda.gov). Any deductions into the savings plans by the employees are automatically adjusted in pay slips of the employees. Besides the above mentioned facilities, a unique feature of this software is that all salary details can be viewed by the employee at any point in time. He or she can even take reports of his year-end salaries for keeping his records or for any country specific legal requirements. The software has the option of generating country specific tax related or annual salary related forms. Thus, there is minimal human intervention in payroll process of a company. Besides country specific options, the software has job codes or pay groups or pay plans that help in automatically increasing the salaries of individual and group. Incentives are also linked to the sales incentives management process for getting data on sales incentives directly. 17 - Daily Attendance. Daily attendance is captured through the attendance tracker. This is an important feature for calculating the payout of the employees. One of the ways of monitoring this is through time-sheets maintenance. The employees input their attendance in these time-sheets and any variations in these automatically flow to the supervisor through the workflow process. The supervisor has the authority to approve or reject the late attendance and the decision will reflect on the leave balance as well as his payout. References Allbusiness.com, 2004, PeopleSoft delivers Enterprise Human Resource Management 8.9, Business Wire, viewed on August 13, 2010. http://www.allbusiness.com/labor-employment/human-resources-personnel-management/5602116-1.html Bc.edu, PeopleSoft create a position process, viewed on August 12, 2010. http://www.bc.edu/offices/hr/managers/mgr-resources/psoft-create-position.html cms.calstate.edu, 2006, PeopleSoft Enterprise HCM 9.0 Statement of Direction, viewed on August 13, 2010. http://cms.calstate.edu/06_Projects-Initiatives/06G_HCM90_Upgrade/06G_PublicDocs/9.0%20Statement%20of%20Direction.pdf ISACA, 2006, Security, audit and control features PeopleSoft: a technical and risk management reference guide, ISACA Oracle.com, PeopleSoft Enterprise Human Capital Management, viewed on August 13, 2010. http://www.oracle.com/us/products/applications/peoplesoft-enterprise/hcm/053827.html Perotin, V and Robinson, A. 2004, Employee participation, firm performance and survival, Emerald Group Publishing sig.nfc.usda.gov, 2004, Release notes for PeopleSoft Enterprise HRMS 8.9, viewed on August 12, 2010. http://sig.nfc.usda.gov/hrlob/9.0/release/HRMS%208.9%20Release%20Notes.pdf Tyler, M, 2007, Tolleys Workplace Accident Handbook, Butterworth-Heinemann Read More