HRIS - the magic word for effective staff information management

Dealing with human resources still involves a great deal of administrative work for your organization. Most organizations have formal selection, evaluation, and payroll processes. The HR function needs that you track a load of information on each employee, from personal histories, data, skills and experiences to payroll records. To reduce the manual work connected with such information, you may want to automate these processes by introducing innovative electronic human resources information management technology.

Human resource information systems (HRIS) are crossways between human resource management (HRM) and information technology. The planning and programming of data processing systems is being offered in the form of standardized packages and enterprise resource planning (ERP) software solutions. The most important feature of HRIS software is the connection of human and financial resources through one database, which makes this solution both rigid and flexible. Human resource management systems are typically developed to handle four essential areas: payroll, time and labor management, benefits administration and HR management.

The payroll module automates the pay process through the possibilities that it offers: it can gather data on employee time and attendance, calculate various deductions and taxes, and create periodic paychecks and employee tax reports. You generally receive the data from the human resources and time keeping modules to calculate automatic deposit and manual check writing capabilities. This module also sends accounting information to the general ledger.

The time and labor management module offers technology to the cheap collection and evaluation of information on employee time or work performance. The most advanced HRIS modules use flexible data collection methods, as well as solutions for distributing labor and data analysis.

The benefit administration module allows HRIS professionals to easily file and track your employees' participation in benefits programs ranging from healthcare provider, insurance policy, and pension plan to profit sharing or stock option plans.

The HR management module is an element which covers all other HR areas from job application to retirement. The system records basic demographic and address data, selection, training and development, skills management, compensation planning records and other such activities. High-tech HRIS are able to "read" applications and enter the given infrormation to the right database fields, inform employers and provide position management and position control.

Record keeping is a key activity that you need to plan systematically. It has all the necessary details of an employee. After you have hired, trained and paid your employees, they need to be kept and taken care of, so they can serve the organization better. Welfare facilities are there to take care of the well-being of the employees - they generally do not bring any financial benefit to the employees and it is very important to create a pleasant working environment for your staff. The HRIS help you understand your employees' various needs, set goals for them and do their career planning along with their managers. All this results in better motivation and growing productivity for your company.