I’ll quietly admit that I don’t know enough about absence management and leaves administration. About all I know is that FMLA, state permutations around FMLA and absence policies are somewhat complex.
Reading this article, I’m not sure I’m totally convinced that best of bred solutions are always the best way to go, but as with any software choice, it is a good option many times. I’d like to think that an organization’s timekeeping system will generally be robust enough to cover most absence management. Systems like Kronos and Workbrain should come with enough functionality out of the box (ok, perhaps an additional module) to perform the basics of absence tracking and metrics.
When things get trickier is when the compliance factors of leaves management come into play. Most leaves are fairly easy to administer even when you apply different policies to different groups and classes of employees. Other leaves like FMLA can be much more difficult. With many states having their own variations of the FMLA law (in California, CFRA cannot run concurrently with PDL giving an expecting mother up to 7 months of leave time…) the policies must be programmed to accommodate many different scenarios, and specialized software probably has an advantage of doing things correctly right out of the box. For example I have no expectation that the timekeeping systems most ERP’s provide will have state rules already programmed in, but your timekeeping system’s leaves module might.
When leaves administration systems get really fun is when you deploy the self service and workflow routines.
- Employee requests FMLA leave
- Manager receives request
- Manager goes through automated questionnaire to determine if the leave is FMLA eligible
- Manager approves leave
- System periodically gets updates during leave.
The critical issue in self service is not that you’re automating tons of paper, although that’s a great advantage. The critical issue is that your manager are enforcing actual policies and laws that have been encoded into an application rather than interpreting the law on their own.
One response to “Leaves Administration Software”
Quick typo report: “your manager are enforcing actual policies ”
Again, perfect timing for this article. My organization is in the midst of revamping the way we track and administer vacation and leave time. We currently utilize Lawson’s Time Management (TA) piece but we’ll be switching in November to Lawson’s new suite, Absence Management (LP). With over 300 vacation and long term sick plans, it’s safe to say we’re more complex than more companies in regards to this type of tracking. With TA, anyone that is an exception from the normal accrual or allotment cycle has to have their own, single, custom plan made. With LP that won’t be the case. Accrual rules, cycles and more are all pieces of a larger puzzle, in our case, vacation plans. Thus, instead of a new plan being needed for 1 person, you simply assign them a different puzzle piece or rule and off they go, part of a larger, simpler plan.