T3 – @Paysavvy

This week on T3 I take a look at the ‘modern day alternative to ADP’, Paysavvy. Paysavvy is a Canadian company that is a fully integrated payroll, HR, and time management for mid-sized companies.  I usually wouldn’t right about a payroll company on T3 but Paysavvy is a little different.

Only five years old, they really came at payroll from a different direction than those who were already entrenched in the industry. Currently, they only provide services for Canadian payrolls and since I’ve got a gigantic audience in Canada for reasons I don’t understand, I thought what the hell! They will support companies outside of Canada who have operations and a need to run payrolls in Canada.

I also love the fact they just come right out and call out  the industry giant ADP.  Who does that?! Someone who is very confident that what they are offering is good, really good.

5 Things I really like about Paysavvy: 

1. One of the few companies vetted by the Canadian Revenue Agency (CRA), so you know they are reputable and can be trusted with the one thing HR departments get more bad publicity with than anything else, payroll administration.

2. Build for the SMB organization. Integrated with Quickbooks, Sage, Microsoft Dynamics, Netsuite, etc. But, also build for modern day organizations whose employees want to do automated charitable giving (through sites like Chimp) and retirement & investing (through Wealthbar). Enterprise level functionality and tools, but not enterprise pricing.

3. Customer service support is personal and provided in ways fast moving SMB clients need. Direct access to personal support with the same person each time, dedicated customer support reps. Live chat feature for the times you don’t have time to jump on the phone. All customer support folks housed onsite at the corporate office, close to those developing and selling the product.

4. Built specifically for Canadian payrolls. Includes all Canadian holidays automated, year-end closing documents you can email directly to employees, ability to go seven years back on all payroll data within the system.

5. The system is super easy to customize and they actually have the step-by-step instructions on the dashboard you can pull up when you want to make a change, instead of having to wait for someone else to do it.  Fully integrated online or clock entry system with manager approval processes.

I know. I know. It’s a Canadian Payroll system. Yep, but it’s a pretty damn good Canadian Payroll System.

Eventually, Paysavvy is looking to quickly build out full HCM capabilities in the attempt to be a fully integrated end-to-end HR suite, all on the same platform, but still built for their core SMB audience. I’ll update you when this comes on line.  In the meantime, if you’re in need of a Canadian based payroll system, check them out!

T3 – Talent Tech Tuesday – is a weekly series here at The Project to educate and inform everyone who stops by on a daily/weekly basis on some great recruiting and sourcing technologies that are on the market.  None of the companies who I highlight are paying me for this promotion.  There are so many really cool things going on in the space and I wanted to educate myself and share what I find.  If you want to be on T3 – send me a note.

T3 – GR8People

This week on T3 I take a look at the recruiting platform Gr8People.  Gr8People bills themselves as an all-in-one recruiting software solution, with it’s goal to eliminate the need for ‘third party’ software solutions.  What they are trying to do is be the Oracle or SAP of recruiting software. A suite, where you don’t need to bring in any other pieces into your recruitment process.

The folks who are behind Gr8People are the same folks who developed and launched VirtualEdge back in the day. VirtualEdge was purchased by ADP, and ADP recently decided to sunset that product. When VirtualEdge was launched is the cutting edge.  Gr8People is attempting to be as cutting edge in today’s terms.

The challenge most talent acquisition shops face today with technology is they can’t get everything they need in one piece of software: CRM, Sourcing, ATS, Branding, Search, hiring manager collaboration/approval/process, recruitment marketing, referrals, etc. Most shops will have 4-8 different solutions and pieces of tech to get all this done. Gr8People is trying to give you a one-stop shop for your entire talent acquisition process.

5 things I really like about Gr8People:

1. I say this frequently, but they are led by a group of folks who have been in the recruiting business combined well over a 100 years! That makes a huge difference.  They are familiar with both the SMB market and enterprise.  They just flat out get talent acquisition from the corporate side of the fence!

2. It’s module based so you don’t have to scrap your current ATS to begin using Gr8People, but most will once they start using the pieces. You can start with Sourcing and Branding, and it will integrate with your current ATS. What you’ll find is most will try this, but eventually dump their old ATS. The entire reason is because you want a suite of products that are designed to work together for your shop.

3. Extremely configurable to how you want your process to run.  They’ll set up in a best practice model, but you can easily move things around to how your shop runs very easily.

4. One click apply from Facebook and LinkedIn! This is awesome and powerful, more companies should be doing this.  If you really want passive candidates, don’t make them go through your 23 step apply process!

5. Embedded analytics that run throughout all the modules so you get complete metrics from marketing to source to apply to interview to hire.

There’s so much more: candidate self interview scheduling, built in talent communities, internal communication tools, real recruitment marketing. Like I said, these guys get recruiting automation and technology at a different level than most companies!

I will say, it’s not completely all-in-one. You still have some integration with outside technology that they partner with, although it’s invisible to you as they build and bill the integration on their end, for posting and searching across multiple job boards/sources.  Also, they still have some pieces I would like to see added, like interview automation, selection assessments, onboarding, etc. (some of this is done with the organization’s system of record)

If you’re running a Talent Acquisition shop, you definitely need to demo Gr8People and check them out. At the very least they’ll give you some great insight to current best practices, and help you think about your own shop.  At the best, they’ll give you a great option for a pretty strong recruiting platform!

T3 – Talent Tech Tuesday – is a weekly series here at The Project to educate and inform everyone who stops by on a daily/weekly basis on some great recruiting and sourcing technologies that are on the market.  None of the companies who I highlight are paying me for this promotion.  There are so many really cool things going on in the space and I wanted to educate myself and share what I find.  If you want to be on T3 – send me a note.

ACA Complaince – HR, You’re In Trouble!

I wanted to title this – “The most boring post ever!” But you guys know I couldn’t write a boring post!

Going through my debrief of HR Tech and I had a meeting with ADP regarding health care reform compliance.  Yes. It was as boring as it sounds!  But there’s a catch, this is stuff that the real HR folks are really concerned about, especially small and medium sized HR shops (50 – 999 employees).  Let’s face it, we don’t have the staff or budget to really feel 100% confident we know what we really need to be doing!  It’s something that can make us look like fools to our executives.  So, I wanted to pass along some stuff I think might help.

ADP has data coming out of their ears! They surveyed our executives in the SMB space and here’s what they are saying:

  1. 69% are concerned with the cost of health coverage and other benefits
  2. 54% are concerned with health care reform legislation

I’ll bet you that 54% is really 100%, but the other 46% believe you (HR Pro) have it under control, and most of us probably don’t!

ACA is confusing, and it seems like a moving target.  Most vendors will tell you they can help, but when you really look into the folks who are giving them the information to give you, they’re really no different than you or I.  What I really liked about my meeting with ADP is they have the resources to throw some really, really smart people at this, and they have the size and influence to probably get insight directly from those writing the legislation.  With great size, comes great access!

ADP has launched a new solution called ADP Health Compliance.  ADP Health Compliance combines Software as a Service (SaaS) with rigorous managed services staffed by ACA experts who can help to enable compliance while managing all of the complex regulatory requirements: Eligibility, Affordability and Regulatory Management.  And you don’t even need to be an ADP client to sign up to use this solution!

“The ACA has transformed the practice of workforce management into a fluctuating system of checks and balances, and one missed step can be the difference between compliance and significant financial penalties,” said Saliterman.  “ADP Health Compliance’s managed service feature is truly unique and can provide large employers with the expertise that only a leader in tax and compliance can deliver.”

“In our restaurants, the vast majority of our employees are variable hour workers whose time will change shift to shift, week to week.  We need to constantly monitor employees hours—12 months a year—to determine who is required to be offered  health coverage benefits and whether or not that coverage is affordable, which can be a heavy lift,” said Bruce Clark, Chief Financial Officer of Hooters Management Corporation, an early adopter of ADP Health Compliance.  “Restaurant operators are good at running restaurants, but that doesn’t mean that they’re good at complicated compliance tasks.  Our plan is to keep doing what we do and do that great, and we’ll leave ACA administration to our expert partner…“

Yeah, ACA isn’t sexy.  It’s not employee engagement platforms, and digital interviewing and big data.  ACA compliance is where HR Pros earn their chops, it’s real-life HR, and it’s something we can’t afford to get wrong.  ADP isn’t paying me.  I think they have a product a lot of you could actually use, and it protects your organization.  Check it out. It’s probably worth your time to take a look and see where you might be at risk!