HR bureaucratic tasks: 8 tips to free them

Do you know how much time you waste performing bureaucratic HR tasks? Very much. Between salary processing, onboarding, compliance with tax and legal obligations, vacation and absence management. There are many hours a month that can be dedicated to the strategy and development of internal campaigns to involve employees and avoid turnover.

A good Human Resources manager must be charismatic and have a strategic vision of the business in order to take advantage of and improve the capabilities of employees. But what if that leader spends half of his time handling administrative tasks?

As much as you do, working hours have limits. Also in the Human Resources department. It is indisputable that, regardless of good will or effort, it is impossible to work more than 24 hours a day. But by eliminating repetitive tasks you can be more efficient and dedicate yourself to tasks with greater added value.

At the end of reading this article you will know how much time you can save in the execution of bureaucratic work by using human resources management software.

Reduce HR administrative tasks and empower employees to manage their personal data, absences, vacations, and much more. Give your HR team time to drive innovation and highlight what everyone can do to contribute to the company's success.
Optimize, digitize and automate processes and make decisions based on real-time management information.

Recent studies reveal that more than half of the time of managers and Human Resources departments is spent on administrative work, the famous bureaucratic tasks of HR.

There are several possible strategies to keep administrative tasks to a minimum. Some involve changing and simplifying processes, others investing in Human Resources support software that solves, practically effortlessly, many of the problems related to duplicated tasks or tasks that can be automated.

Only the possibility of introducing the employees' personal data into the system only once, during the onboarding process, or the company's operating rules that can thus be consulted by everyone (instead of sending them on request to each employee) saves time precious in bureaucratic HR tasks that can be used in the development of value-added tasks.

The cost of hiring a new employee is around $3,500 (directly or indirectly), according to a study cited by investopedia. This value includes much more than salary, complements – such as the company car – and other compensation – such as the attribution of shares or the right to distribute profits. It is also necessary to account for the time spent on recruitment and selection and later on training and integration into company policies. In total, it can take six months or more before an employer begins to see a significant return on investment in the form of total productivity. Studies indicate that in 2020/21 companies spent USD 92 billion worldwide on training alone.

Using the right tools, such as the employee portal, is one of the ways to reduce bureaucratic HR tasks at this stage.

Through this tool, each new worker can autonomously register their data and upload the necessary documentation to take their first steps in the company. This process can even start before admission, with the introduction of data at the time of selection and recruitment. The company is thus optimizing the work of human resources who will be able to calmly confirm the data in much less time.

With this tool:

• Onboarding processes are automated;
• Each employee registers and consults his/her personal information;
• Autonomously, the employee submits his/her personal documents;
• A notification is launched so that the employee can digitally sign the contract.

Directly related to the previous point is talent retention. With such high costs in recruiting, selection and initial training, it is essential not to waste this amount, optimizing and extending, if necessary, the duration of the onboarding process.

There is a consensus among HR professionals that the onboarding process takes at least three months, but many companies are currently extending the onboarding process to a year. The goal is to retain talent. Studies reveal that close to a third of employees leave their job just six months after joining, with two thirds of these leaving within the first three months. One of these studies even says that 88% of employees consider that companies do not provide a quality onboarding program.

The weakness of the integration process is often the reason for leaving, for example clearer guidelines on responsibility or because they would like more training. Improving this process improves new employee retention by 82% and productivity by over 70%, according to Glassdoor.

This is where a tool like the Employee Portal can help improve talent retention. The management and evaluation of performance becomes something simple. Employees can, at any time, consult information about their objectives and skills required for each type of function. It also allows employees to carry out self-evaluations, being able to compare them with the evaluations of the hierarchical chain.

Furthermore, by taking advantage of a digital onboarding tool, accessible anywhere and anytime, HR professionals can take advantage of the time spent on bureaucratic HR tasks, to find modern onboarding solutions and delight employees:

• Training in practice (hands-on);
• Digital presentations and guides
• Digital manuals and books;
• Videos;
• Podcasts;
• Discussion groups;
• Among others, which can, in most cases, be consulted online.

Training should also be varied and in line with expectations:

• Compulsory training related to compliance (eg related to safety and health at work);
• Processes, procedures and business practices;
• Training and development of technical and soft skills (soft-skills);
• Involvement in the culture, values ​​and mission of the company;
• Training on products and services;
• Among others.

The work of HR management quickly ceases to be monotonous, to be much more creative and an unavoidable asset for the company.

Releasing administrative effort is another advantage of using human resource management tools. Studies indicate that small and medium business owners spend around 16 hours a week – that's more than two workdays a week – dealing with administrative tasks and obligations or that HR management feels they are spending too much time on tasks administrative (55%). With half the time spent on these tasks, the ability to promote engagement, talent retention and, ultimately, the company's profitability are compromised.

Staying in compliance with tax obligations, Social Security or various legislation is another area where you can optimize your time. A study by the Kansas City Business Journal, referring to the USA, states that 44% of SMEs spend more than 40 hours a year to be in line with legislation and a third spend 80 hours a year with compliance.

There are two hypotheses to reduce these bureaucratic HR tasks: subcontracting or optimizing human resources applications in companies. Outsourcing can be a solution to free HR from these tasks, but using a tool like the Employee Portal is another. The company's productivity, growth, and sales have room to increase.

The Employee Portal allows employees to autonomously introduce personal data, vacations and absences. This collaborative platform reduces HR's bureaucratic tasks, saving time not only for management, but also for the employees themselves. Why deliver paper documents when you can scan the invoice for entertainment expenses as soon as you pay? This way, at the end of the month, the employee avoids wasting time looking for invoices, putting them together and delivering them to HR (who has never lost an invoice?). In minutes, HR and employees free themselves from this task.

The collaborative platform optimizes:

• Medical leave processes;
• Schedule control or schedule exemption;
• Request and approval of expenses

Management of absences, booking vacations or overtime is another burden for human resources departments. The solution to reduce HR's bureaucratic tasks can, once again, be subcontracting or resorting to collaborative solutions such as the Employee Portal. Also in this regard, the company is freeing up HR for tasks with greater added value and by taking advantage of the good practices and lessons learned that these suppliers have on these topics, the gain will be even greater.

Absence management is often related to employee absenteeism, due to injury or illness, through policies and processes that must be duly shared with both employees and managers, a task performed by Human Resources.

One of the ways to reduce absences due to injury or illness is to be compliant and have occupational health and safety plans in place. But it is also necessary to manage overtime or booking holidays.

On the Unik Employee Portal, workers can check-in/out when they enter and leave the service, even when working remotely. That's where they can manage absences, check working hours or request time off or holidays. The bureaucratic tasks of HR are now limited to approving or rejecting requests.

HR management optimizes time with this collaborative tool:

• Automating vacation requests;
• Realizing in seconds which collaborators are available;
• Sharing the vacation map;
• Accelerating the process of submitting absence justifications

Remember the article: Vacation Map: Employee Portal vs Excel, Which is Better? – Uniksystem

Do you know how many hours a month your company needs to close the month and calculate employee salaries? For every 150 employees, one person is required to handle payroll.

With the aggravating factor that the end of the month occurs on a certain date (usually between the 20th and 23rd of each month), it is not feasible to anticipate or postpone it. By anticipating the accounts they would be incorrect, by postponing they would jeopardize the timely payment of salaries, contributing to the dissatisfaction of employees.

And remember: if you're late, employees quickly look for another company. After all, many of the new employees leave the company in just three months for various reasons. A late payment would be just another one.

Collaborative solutions, with the Collaborator Portal, allow a 70% reduction in all administrative tasks. In practice, and round numbers, instead of 10 hours, spend only 3 hours a month on these tasks.

Finally, remember that if you do not automate and improve your processes and bureaucratic HR tasks, you will lose out on different skills. If you don't, your company will suffer from entropy while your competition will gain ground by adopting these new methodologies and tools.

The concept of work is changing, as well as the organizational culture. Measures must be taken to transform the traditional environment into something more dynamic – as the world experienced during the 2020/21 pandemic –, taking advantage of the absence of time and space barriers.

Human resources software can help companies meet this challenge. By 2021, two-thirds of companies will have invested in human experience technologies, as anticipated by IDC a priori, which, naturally, includes including the internal user experience. It's still not too late to catch the train in progress.

By 2023, 70% of European companies will use technology that enables a borderless workplace. It is also essential to integrate Human Resources software, such as the Employee Portal, from UnikSystem, in the ecosystem of applications necessary to perform tasks with lower added value (such as employee onboarding) quickly, anywhere and anytime.

In short, all these improvements can be achieved through flexible HR applications, dematerializing processes, optimizing and eliminating bureaucratic HR tasks. Here is a summary of some of the advantages of using a human capital management support solution in the cloud:

• Save resources, including time: the investment in a human capital management solution is proportionally lower than the one invested in people to perform repetitive HR bureaucratic tasks. Data collection is simplified, without the need for physical resources, equipment, computers or specific servers. Imagine having an additional 30 hours to dedicate to HR strategy. It's the time you spend in the process of selecting and recruiting an employee over the course of a month or two!
• Space saving: With the values ​​of commercial spaces and services skyrocketing, it is essential to optimize space. I'm already thinking about how much space is being occupied by the «Arquivo Morto». What if everything was digitized, dispensing with physical paper support? How many rooms would you free?
• Optimize payroll processing, attendance control and other time-consuming processes in a welcoming environment. As already mentioned, without quality HR software, you will need a fully dedicated employee several hours a month to process the salaries of every 150 employees. These are tasks that cannot be distributed throughout the month, they have to be concentrated in a certain reduced time window. However, just one person doesn't have the time to do it on time, especially if there are 300, 600 or 1200 employees. HR software saves you hundreds of minutes in calculating contributions, paying taxes and allocating funds. You can use those hours to develop good welcome manuals so that the new employee feels at home from the first minute, limiting turnover. In addition, the software, which has a pleasant interface, includes pre-calculated and secure formulas, with relevant data accessible to each employee. In Excel, one misstep – by HR or an employee – and hours of work can be lost in an instant.
• Ensure compliance in less time: There are processes that are beyond your power to control. Complying with all legal and tax regulations can take up to 20 hours a month. Or even more. In the US, according to an article in the Kansas City Business Journal these can take up to 80 hours a year. HR software providers have departments specializing in updating these materials. For you, it is enough to allocate employees to the correct option.
• Take advantage of the cloud. With all data accessible at the distance of a click at any time and place, human capital management takes advantage of collaborative work, involving each employee in the respective process. In case of doubt, it is simple to alert the employee and speed up the process. In managing health benefits alone, HR departments can spend 1.6 hours a week on administrative work alone. With HR software, this time can be used to develop campaigns to involve teams in the company's culture, values ​​and mission. When everyone rows in the same direction, the company goes further.