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HRO IT Platforms

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HRO Today has an article out there descrbing their take on the technology platform evolution within the HRO space. They pay particular interest to Oracle and SAP which is quite predictable. While not mentioning that SAP is the clear leader in HRO HRMS at the moment, they do seem to think that Oracle Fusion will be a major player in a couple of years. I’m not particularly in agreement with this as I believe the HRO vendors will have solidified process and technology by 2008 leaving Oracle Fusion out of the picture.

I also think that HRO Today makes too much of SOA architecture.

HR technology offerings play a major role in the decision-making process. According to Fersht, the ability to combine multiple, best-of-breed applications that can be automated and integrated under the common umbrella standard of web services is very tempting… Fersht explained, “The old model was where you would use an end-to-end ERP, and you’d be pretty much locked into using applications that were compatible with the ERP. Now it’s much more open so you can use your SAP or Oracle underpinning application infrastructure and deploy a whole bunch of other applications over the top. This helps you manage your workforce data and analytics better using the best applications available in today’s market.” ((Doig, Denise, April 2006. “IT Platform Wars.” HRO Today. Retrieved from HROtoday.com on May 29, 2006.))

While all of the above is true, it isn’t necessarily reality. Rather than SOA, HRO vendors are counting on a web services infrastructure to deploy best of breed applications – an area they further omit. True, the article notes some vendors like Vurv and Kronos, but the real revelation is that there aren’t any HRO vendors (that I know of) using SAP or Oracle/PeopleSoft for talent acquisition, talent management, and learning. The current gap is too wide for HRO vendors to deploy to clients paying $100 M’s (plural) and while SAP is winning the “core HRMS” battle, the point solutions are winning everything else.

Also interesting to note is how much text HRO today spends on mid-market. This is a market that I’ve argued ADP owns – but then again it depends on how you define the mid market. Certainly all the vendors are keeping an eye on it, and Accenture recently announced their first deal, but the model will be considerably different than larger employers and so far only ADP knows how to scale down to that level.

I wouldn’t be surprised if the mid market will become the domain of ADP, Employease, and perhaps the likes of Genesys (all of whom can do HR, payroll, benefits and have decent self service). But even here, I don’t see the point solutions going away. If you want RPO (recruiting) you’ll still need a Taleo, Vurv, VirtualEdge in the background, and the same goes for talent and learning.

Who’s going to win? So long as there’s healthy competition and you don’t get 6 HRO vendors all on identical application platforms, the customer is going to win. With a healthy selection of application suites and service offerings to choose from, HRO will be a fun and dynamic market to watch.

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2 responses to “HRO IT Platforms”

  1. HRO IT Platforms June 16, 2006 on 2:00 am | by Systematic HR HRO Today has an article out there descrbing their take on the technology platform evolution within the HRO space. They pay particular interest to Oracle and SAP which is quite predictable. While not

  2. […] space, its guys like Derek… Tags:   technology,successfactors,vurv,hr • HRO IT Platforms HRO IT Platforms Source:   HR/HCM Radar Posted on Jun 16, 2006 (886 days ago) HRO […]