With the next generation of HR BPO taking shape, companies are learning from past mistakes and employing new conventional wisdom around the process of migrating to an HR BPO solution. ((Christie, Mike and Wright, Mike. “Lessons Uncovered: The New Conventional Wisdom Around the Second Generation of HR BPO.” Hewitt Associates. Retrieved from www.hewitt.com on December 21, 2006.))
I don’t know that their new conventional wisdoms are anything terribly new or earth shattering but they are worth pointing out.
- First Things First: The Importance of Sequence
- Make a Realistic Organizational Assessment
- Don’t Go it Alone in an HR Vacuum
- Make the Business Case Broader Than HR
- Contract with Implementation in Mind ((Ibid))
I’m going to change the order of the bullets for the purpose of my commentary, but I’ll start out by saying that these points are all well taken and quite important.
The importance of sequence and the organizational assessment. Not skipping steps is critical. Early on in the cycle, it’s quite easy to get too excited about the process and try to move forward with too much pace. Thinking that you can move forward before you are truly ready and get caught up on details later is a mistake. However, getting too entrenched in the detail too early on is also a mistake and will cost you time and possibly create poor decisions that would have been better had you waited. How do you solve this dilemma? Put a bit of trust in your consultant who’s been through this before.
Contract with implementation in mind. The first thing I’d like to mention is that from my point of view, the contract sets all sorts of legal parameters around service level agreements, costs, timeframes, etc. However, what is not in the contract but MUST be considered at that time is how you’ll treat your partnership with the HRO vendor and your governance around that relationship. Setting up the framework for this up front (and sticking to it through your relationship) is far more important than anything else in that contract.
Don’t go it alone and making it broader than HR. I can’t shut up about this. HR has to be broader, not only in HRO engagements but in everything we do. If we want to be business strategists, we need to think about everything as part of the business and not as a silo. Making this a broader objective early makes it easier to win later.
4 responses to “Some HR BPO Conventional Wisdom”
[…] systematicHR: Some HR BPO Conventional Wisdom “I can’t shut up about this. HR has to be broader, not only in HRO engagements but in everything we do. If we want to be business strategists, we need to think about everything as part of the business and not as a silo. Making this a broader objective early makes it easier to win later.” […]
I would add two things to this:
1. do not compromise in the contract on how systems will be integrated. Putting that off until later or outside of the contract will be the kiss of death for ongoing operational work.
2. if you are going to outsource, do so with more than cost savings in mind — it should be justified on improved services (yes, in the contract…) as well.
Managers and others who are tied to goals around a date to have the outsourcing done tend to give away these principles just to get the contract signed. It’s the wrong position to be in.
To quote You Can Negotiate Anything: “I care…but not that much.”
That’s where you need to be so the emotions don’t overtake the longer term needs of your business.
Seeking opportunities to reduce Workers Comp cost and provide affordable health insurance benefits, I looked into PEOs. By outsourcing human
resources for your current employees,business owners can reduce employee overhead and administrative paperwork. Professional Employee Organizations removes the non-productive tasks from your business so that you can
concentrate on growing your business. It’s like having your own personal staff of human resource experts to handle all of your employee hassles. I researched numerous PEO websites at http://www.onlinehrhelp.com. Good luck
on your search!
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