systematicHR

Colin had an article that I loved about ROI.  I’ve long since abandoned ROI for TCO and my compatriot Donald Glade I’m sure has similar feelings.

You shave a nickel off every $5 bill that passes by, and at the end of the year you’ll have this jar full of nickels. You can definitely get the pennies and nickels out of the process, but they have a habit of disappearing on their way to the jar.  ((Kingsbury, Colin,  February 28, 2007.  “When the ROI on Sfotware Equals BS.”  Retrieved from http://www.hrmdirect.com/hrm2/blog/ on March 15, 2007.))

But at the same time I got to thinking that there actually are a few places where the ROI is real.  I agree that taking time out of process for practitioners is not the answer, but if you take it out where the customer is concerned, there’s a real impact.

• You deploy self service for employee address changes.  An excellent change management process drives 80% of the address changes to the web over the first six months, letting you take less calls in your call center.
• Your three year “healthy and fit workforce” campaign lowers your average employee cholesterol level by 1 point.  Your health and welfare consultant and medical plan vendors think this will net you $M’s less in total insurance fees over the next decade.
• Your new policies striking better work life balances, implementing new total compensation philosophies, and increasing the quality of communications to employees from managers and corporate leaders has increased engagement.  Turnover is down, productivity is up, and you just made the Forbes 100 Best Places to Work for the first time (ok – maybe that’s a stretch).

Colin is right though – better process is good, but efficiency is not always captured as expected.  What we’re going for, and what Colin effectively points out, is effectiveness.  This applies not only to software and process, but in your interactions with employees.  Become effective, and the efficiencies will show up in places you don’t expect.