Member Article

How mobile can help HR in the workplace

Today’s ‘typical’ workforce has changed drastically. Once deskbound, it is now common that employees work remotely or are part of a ‘hot—desking’ community. But even this once ‘new’ concept is fast becoming normality. Now, employees and companies are pushing frontiers for better employee engagement and ease of access; all of which are dominated by mobile applications.

Businesses have begun to realise that employees are not productive when they are overworked and overloaded with email. Naturally, the first move was to give employees more flexible working environments, by enabling ‘working remotely’, now it’s all about managing time efficiency. In a nutshell, businesses want their employers to be as productive as possible in a shorter time frame for a better work-life balance. So, taking out slow adapting online training material and traditional business practises and replacing them with mobile learning tools makes for a more modern and effective workforce.

Short-form notifications

One of the major issues with legacy systems is that businesses send out “all desks” short form news emails, which are frequently overlooked by employees within an ever-growing inbox. This means employees are missing out on information about things such as fire alarm tests or out of office networking events. Yet, short form reminders and notifications can be far more easily intercepted in the pop up notification window of a mobile phone. There are applications about that help streamline this kind of content, allowing for the seamless delivery of content and information, the instantaneous push of messages and the ability to better engage with individuals in the workplace. They can also be used to filter messages and updates so that they are sent only to relevant recipients.

Digitised employee handbook

Traditional online material is too slow to adapt, becomes out of date too quickly, and cannot evolve quickly enough to meet the changing needs of businesses. This is especially true of documents like the employee handbook. Often formatted in a lengthy ‘word-doc’ or ‘pdf’, it makes for extensive scrolling for employees and for an even lengthier updating process by HR staff. Whereas, a digitised handbook would present relevant information and policies through quick searches and tabs. Take for example, ‘Blissbook’, which allows companies to update and publish handbook information at any time, which means not having to wait months or years to get the latest policy information out to employees. Plus, the digital signatures mean that employees can sign off on the policies without having to hoard countless paper documents or scanning in.

Service and employee locators

Yet another tedious and timely task within the workplace can be locating necessary facilities and services. Trying to secure a meeting room of the required size, at the necessary date and time can be an exhausting task when corresponding in a trail of back and forth emails or phone calls with a receptionist. Equally, finding the details or location of other employees within large offices can be trying, especially if it requires calling between departments or walking up and down the office floor. Using an app to locate these facilities, services and employees through a directory which could also determine their availability and location would make for a more productive work day.

Certain apps on the market streamline employee details such as direct dial and email address, as well as if they are on holiday or sick leave. Plus, they can screen who can see the information, so more sensitive information is restricted to the HR department. Meeting room apps are a flexible solution to managing company space and optimising company processes by allowing businesses and employees to book meeting rooms directly and save ‘favourite’ set ups for easy repeat actions.

With today’s global environment, many large companies are spread out across numerous offices and locations, so giving employees full access to real-time information at a moment’s notice is an ideal way to keep employees well-connected and informed. Mobile technology, which perhaps was once seen as a distraction is now considered a successful tool for workplace productivity, communication and team spirit! With mobile devices, the opportunity exists to push time-sensitive, relevant information to staff in real-time, as well as enable managers and employees to be more productive throughout the day. With the attitudes of the workforce changing, mobile is helping to meet these expectations, getting more out of less time.

Although there are many great apps available on the market to help optimise the HR workplace, we are still lacking an ‘all-in’ app that provides all of the above services and more. There is the need for a single platform that finds solutions to all of our HR needs, without having to flit from app to app.

HR is a department that can certainly benefit from an effective mobile strategy across all industries. More of these benefits will be discussed and explained further in our webinar on 28th November. So, don’t miss out – register here to find out how your company and employees can get more out of their time.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section