Just How Global is Your Global HR Software Solution?

Historically, the word “global” was synonymous with big, and global companies were among the largest and best-known in the world. Today, however, “global” has a different meaning.

Today’s global player is often a midsize company that became global through a merger, alliance, or its own organic growth. Frequently, it’s a cash-conscious company whose concentration remains in one country but whose footprint has expanded to include sales, manufacturing or customer service operations in multiple countries. While today’s global company may look different, the challenges it faces, especially in the areas of HR information, employee management, and staff development are just as significant.

When HR software first emerged, big companies began to experience the efficiency of tracking and managing their workforces through installed systems. As those companies expanded beyond the domestic market and as their growth led them to add talent management modules to their HRMS databases, conduits to additional providers and to country-specific systems were often needed. The more countries, the more country-specific systems. The more new modules, the more new conduits. At each juncture, the ability of information to be shared seamlessly, of data to maintain its integrity, and of databases to be used across languages, currencies and continents became compromised. While the resulting systems could now be considered global, the focused system that most companies began with initially probably now looked more like Frankenware than it did like HR software. Just look at a Visio diagram of most “global” software systems and you might be shocked at how difficult it is to understand.

While the larger global companies had systems, albeit imperfect ones, to manage their global employee bases, the midsize market lacked a viable solution. Happily, as the industry grew and as the platform on which HR software was delivered evolved from licensed, installed systems to on-demand, Internet-based offerings, new opportunities emerged, especially for the new “globals.” It actually became possible to create a true global ASP…a one-system/one-world solution that combined HRMS and HCM (Talent Management) modules on one on-demand global platform. It became possible to do benefits administration and recruiting on a global basis. It became possible to provide global Human Resources Augmentation™ services and customer support. And, importantly, it became possible to insure data integrity/transferability/usability, in every language, every currency and under every set of security protocols…in one database.

So, when you think about your current system, or when you contemplate a new “global” one, you need to ask and answer a few simple questions. The list that follows identifies these questions and explains why the answers to these are so vital to the success of a true global HR system.

• Does the global system share data seamlessly, ideally in one database?

Does the global system share data seamlessly, ideally in one database? There is little doubt that those HR systems that claim to be global can access and store global information. However, problems enter when the user tries to share that data outside of its current program. So, for example, while you might be able to create a succession plan in one country, using it as part of a larger global plan across countries doesn’t always work seamlessly. Trying to merge succession plans with current compensation plans might also be difficult, especially when trying to calculate salary and bonus pool implications across different currencies. At each step in the process, the more databases that need to exist, the less usable the collected data. This “unseemly” situation exists very often in those global systems that have been created on a country-by-country basis and that use different vendors for different aspects of their global systems.

• Does the system enable managers and employees to work in their respective languages, or does everything need to be done in English?

While English might be the official language of your organization, it isn’t always the official language of individual locations. Providing locations with the ability to access HR information in their own language can go a long way towards demonstrating respect and acknowledging cultural and language differences within an organization. This is particularly important in organizations that have grown through acquisition, as it can often allow the acquired entity to maintain a sense of national identity as it operates within the parameters of a new parent company.

• Can the system accommodate the Unicode and double-byte character sets that are required for Russian, Mandarin, Arabic, etc.?

The fastest growing business centers of the world are also those whose languages have distinct characters and characteristics. The Cyrillic alphabet used in Eastern European languages like Russian, the Chinese characters of Mandarin, the Arabic alphabet and more represent significant challenges for many global HR systems. Even the difference in an employee’s government/country identification sequence can wreak havoc on many systems. It is important that a true global system be able to accommodate these differences if it is to function well for the organization long term.

• Does the system meet Safe Harbor laws, data transfer laws and security protocols from region to region?

Just as language differences exist country to country, so too do laws pertaining to the collection, storage and sharing of information. It is critical that you take individual country laws into consideration in selecting the right system and that you ask providers to discuss their ability to adhere to the laws of individual countries.

• Is the data on the system co-mingled with data from other companies who share the same data server, or is it segregated on its own server (in industry terms, is the system single-tenant or multi-tenant)?

The tenancy of information is important based on the policies of your company and on the requirements of the countries in which you do business. To some companies, mingled data is not an issue; to others it might be a key criterion in their selection decisions. It might also be important based on the countries in which you are doing business as data privacy and transference is regulated by individual governments.

Knowing where you do business and knowing the laws of those countries can help you to determine whether a single-tenant or multi-tenant system is right for you. There is also a hybrid system known as a virtual single-tenant system where data is kept segregated on the same server by using specific security protocols and safeguards.

• Will the system provide 24/7 global support to accommodate your locations around the globe, or will you only get support on US-based standard time?

All too often, customer support is available to service only the most populous areas and support timing is scheduled to coincide with the workday in those regions. For some organizations, this type of system is perfectly acceptable. Keep in mind, however, that the work day in much of Asia coincides with the night time in the US, and that Eastern Europe, the Middle East and India are generally arriving at work at just about the time that those in the eastern US are leaving for the day.

Knowing what needs you might have and in what regions of the world will help you to determine whether or not 24/7 support to service the globe is necessary, or if you can settle for something with more abbreviated or targeted timing.

• Can the system allow you to run reports based on your global organization, or must you spend time running individual reports and then merge them together manually?

One of the benefits of global HR systems is the ability to view and manage the company’s human assets on a global basis. However, many current global systems that were pieced together country by country don’t have the ability to work synergistically, forcing the user to run multiple reports and then merge data manually.

If reports are important to you, determine if the system you select has the ability to let you work with the data on a global basis and to print the reports you’ll need once that data has been addressed. Otherwise, you might find your time being spent on the compilation of data that another system might have been able to do for you.

• Does the system enable validation tables that translate into different languages to accommodate users in different parts of the world?

Drop down lists are an expected feature of software systems but the architecture of the drop down can make all the difference in the world when it comes to regional usability and reporting capabilities.

Some systems will allow for a change to be made in the field heading, but won’t translate that change into the drop downs themselves for different security roles. So, a language change in the heading still has English-only drop downs. Aside from usability implications, there might also be legal implications as it relates to compliance with country-specific data laws.

In addition, reporting and search/query become much more difficult if a company does not have information in the native language. Some systems can accommodate this; others just cannot.

• Can the system manage currencies and compensation plans from different countries or regions, e.g. expats?

The more countries in which you operate, the more currencies you need to manage. And the more global your company, the more likely you are to deal with employees who are citizens of one country working in an office in another country. This can be challenging on many levels, but particularly when it comes to managing compensation and bonus programs across borders. So, for example, when a manager in the US evaluates a supervisor in Germany, can the system show that manager a conversion from dollars to euros so that he can accommodate the increase within his departmental budget? Is the system advanced enough to update currency conversion rates on the schedule you deem appropriate?

Budgeting aside, compensation criteria often differ country to country. While a percentage increase might work in one location, another might require that increases be considered based on the level of the employee in the company. In other countries, like Canada, laws require that salary adjustment communication be done in the local language of the recipient.

The more “global” the system, the more the compensation module would understand and accommodate these global nuances.

• Will the system allow for different benefit plans in different countries and can the PTO/absence and electronic calendars be configured to reflect different work days and holidays?

Benefit plans vary country to country. Government-mandated absence policies vary, as do holiday schedules. In fact, many differences in scheduling and administrative functions will be different in different parts of the globe. The question is, can the system you select allow for all of these differences in a seamless way?

So, when an employee is one country takes a one-week vacation, will the system already know that the work week runs Sunday through Thursday while also being able to recognize a Monday through Friday vacation in another country? When military service or jury duty is required of an employee, will the system understand how to allocate that time? Will the system recognize different national holidays? Will it be able to track insurance and benefits around the globe?

Once again, depending on the breadth of your global footprint (and the expected breadth going forward), many of these issues might be key criterion issues in your global software selection.

• Can the system do one global payroll export or must it export payroll country by country with multiple data conduits?

Most HR systems can build conduits to export payroll on a country by country basis. In fact, that might make sense if the company works with multiple payroll providers around the globe. But, knowing what your current needs are, and what your future needs might be, will allow you to determine whether the multiple conduit approach is best for you.

As we know, the global business world has changed and the change has been most dramatic at the midsize company level. As global business has changed, so too have the needs of global businesses changed, particularly with regard to the management of human capital. Luckily, great strides have been made in global HR software and services, and especially in software and services for today’s midsize global organizations, making it easier to manage people as long as one has the right HR solution. Knowing what you need and what is available, however, is the key to making the decisions that will be right for your organization, for today and the future.

This white paper was prepared by Sapien LLC, one of the most progressive and innovative providers of on-demand HRMS and HCM software solutions, and of Human Resources Augmentation™ (HRA) services. Emerging as the leader in the global evolution of HR solutions, Sapien can be reached at www.sapiensoftware.com or at 866-E-SAPIEN.