Unlock the benefits of employee self-service portals (2024)

HR professionals are responsible for fostering an employee-first workplace culture, optimizing talent acquisition strategies, and managing employee engagement and retention. With routine employee inquiries and administrative tasks taking up a significant amount of HR time, implementing technology and tools, like employee self-service systems, can help HR professionals optimize their workload.

Employee self-service (ESS) allows employees to access and manage personal information, which includes their contact details, job profiles, salary slips, income tax forms, leave balances, and other information related to their job role. Employee self-service platform reduces the workload for HR professionals and allows employees to update their professional information through the platform.

Further, ESS covers a range of categories under which employees can put in support requests. The categories include IT services for resolving technical, IT-related issues, financial services, and HR services, which provide employees with access to information about benefits, leave requests and other professional information.

The primary goal of using an ESS is to reduce the burden of managing administrative tasks on HR teams, while also improving employee satisfaction.

Use personalized dashboards

Most employee self-service portals have a user-centric design. Employees can tailor their own dashboard, so it displays information that is relevant to them, like personalized announcements, leave balance, upcoming tasks, etc.

Change personal information

Employee self-service (ESS) platforms have a ‘personal details’ section where employees can update their personal information, like contact details, personal email addresses, and residential addresses, without having to submit a lot of paperwork to HR. These platforms also include a section where employees can update emergency contact information, which is crucial information for the HR department.

Update pay and bank details

An HRMS with an ESS portal allows employees to access their payroll information, previous pay slips, and income tax information. Employees have control over updating their bank details and ensuring that they are accurate. This significantly simplifies things for employees who may want to change their bank account for any reason. They no longer need to send multiple emails to HR to request them to update the new details, as they can simply log in to the ESS platform and update the details themselves.

Apply for leaves

Leave management, especially in larger organizations, is extremely overwhelming for HR professionals. HR may end up scouring their emails for certain communication sent to them or looking through their chats for a particular conversation. They may even get swamped by multiple requests, which they are required to direct to the relevant recipients all across the organization. An employee self-service platform can streamline this process significantly by allowing employees to easily check their remaining leave balance and submit their leave requests directly through the portal, which will then be routed to the relevant stakeholders. Managers will also be able to approve requests or reject them, with reason, using the employee self-service portal.

Update timesheet and ensure timekeeping

Employee self-service systems come with tools for easy timesheet management, allowing employees to fill their daily timesheets with hours completed and submit them for approval with ease. ESS platforms can also be integrated with timeclocks, which allow employees to keep track of their working hours.

Ensure communication

An employee self-service system serves as a hub for communication within the organization. It can be used to make announcements and give updates. ESS reduces the reliance on scattered communication channels, allowing employees to stay informed through the platform.

Grab learning and training opportunities

Organizations that offer online or on-demand training programs for their employees can integrate the same with their ESS system. This will allow employees easy access to all training opportunities that are on offer. Employees will be able to log in to the portal to access their coursework as well as to submit their post-training assessments. The portal will also be able to provide HR with an overview of which employees have completed which training programs.

Ensure performance management

Employee self-service platforms can be used to streamline the organization’s performance review management process. Employees, supervisors, and managers can submit forms on the platform on a regular basis instead of basing performance reviews on memory.

Improved efficiency

An HRMS with ESS capabilities allows organizations to streamline multiple processes, which makes it easier for employees to manage their work-related tasks and access necessary information. This way, an ESS helps increase efficiency, reduce errors, and ensure faster response times.

Reduced administrative burden

Using an ESS reduces the burden of administrative tasks on the HR department, as employees no longer need to contact HR for basic information or to put in requests. This frees up the HR department, allowing them to focus on more strategic tasks.

Improved employee engagement

An ESS system allows employees to take control of their personal information and work-related tasks, which improves employee engagement. As employees feel empowered and supported by the organization, their job satisfaction and retention rates also improve.

Enhanced compliance

Employee self-service platforms help organizations manage compliance risks, decrease errors, and ensure compliance with regulatory and legal requirements, like tax regulations, data privacy regulations, and labor laws.

• Accessibility: Through employee self-service systems, employees can access their personal and work-related data at any time. This feature bridges multiple time zones as well, and it proves useful for remote workers or teams with members in different geographical locations.
• Autonomy: ESS empowers employees to manage their own personal and work-related data.
• Accuracy: The risk of errors can be reduced by allowing employees to check and update their own personal information on the ESS portal. Many employee self-service systems are also able to check the data entered by employees for plausibility and formal correctness.
• Transparency: Employees can have a clear overview of their work hours, vacation days, benefits, pay slips, and other relevant information through the portal.

• Adopting the new system: Even if organizations select the best-suited employee self-service system, it cannot be used to its full potential unless all employees are on board.
• Integrating with existing systems: A standalone ESS system that is not part of an all-in-one HRMS should allow for integrations with the organization’s existing systems. Without proper integrations, any efficiency gains that come with the ESS will be lost.
• Establishing new processes: The implementation of an ESS system means that some processes will get automated while others will have to change. This means that all relevant processes must be audited to determine what works, what doesn’t, and how the processes that work in the ESS can be reflected.
• Dealing with information gaps: If the data migration from the old system to the new ESS is not done correctly or if the workforce does not use the features of the ESS, information gaps can occur.

Selecting a system

• Research: Conduct thorough research to understand the challenges the organization is facing at present. It is necessary to start with a needs analysis, as the ESS system can be chosen based on whether it can address these challenges or not.
• Integration: Consider all platforms that are already being used, which the ESS should be able to integrate with. Then, look for ESS systems that ensure seamless integration with the existing infrastructure. Moving all systems to an all-in-one platform should be considered.
• Access: It is important to select an ESS that can be used via mobile apps on both iOS and Android to allow easy access to all employees. This is especially useful for shift-based workforces that may require access outside of their standard business hours.
• Easy-to-use: Ensure that the selected ESS system has a simple user interface, which can be used by anyone across the organization, regardless of how tech-savvy they are.

Implementing the ESS

• Communicate: As soon as the ESS system is finalized, it is important to begin communicating with all the employees so they can prepare themselves for the new system. Inform them about how the system will benefit them, what it will require them to do, how to access it, and when the system will go live.
• Timing: The installation of the ESS and data migration should be planned well. It is important to avoid particularly busy times and have a well-defined schedule for completing the same.
• Security: To maintain the sanctity of data, consider which parts of the profile information should be made available for the employees to update and which information should need approval before being updated.
• Training: Employees should receive the necessary training as early as possible to ensure that they can start using all features of the system as soon as it goes live. Early training can also help alleviate any doubts or concerns employees may have about the new system.

Adopting the system

• Cut-off: Set a strict date for when the old systems will stop working. Using ESS with old systems together can cause a lot of confusion and negate any time efficiency benefits that the ESS can deliver.
• Onboarding: New hires should be offered access to the ESS from the time of onboarding. It can accelerate the onboarding process and allow employees to engage with the organization using the ESS even before their first day.
• Communication: Regular updates regarding the portal with tips to get the most out of the employee self-service system, reminders about keeping personal details updated, and support or training resources should be sent out to the employees.
• Point-of-contact: Having a single point-of-contact in place for doubts, support, or questions. It will streamline the process for issue resolution and reduce potential confusion or frustration from employees.

1. Design the ESS

Survey employees to understand what they need from an ESS system and assess recent HR inquiries and requests to identify common patterns. This will offer insights into the most time-consuming issues that HRs can deal with. It is also important to consider the user interface and experience offered by the system and ensure that all employees are able to navigate, use, and customize the system. Time should be allocated to continually refine the ESS system to enhance the employee experience.

2. Market the system

It may not be enough to simply inform the employees that a new ESS system has been implemented. It is necessary to tell the employees the benefits of the system, like saving time, getting quick answers, more control, etc. A plan should be created to introduce the new ESS system to employees. It is important to ensure that all employees know how to use the system by holding training sessions that include actual use cases.

3. Integrate with existing systems

The tools offered by the ESS should easily integrate with the other business software of the organization. Integrating ESS with the existing software can help establish relevant data flow, which will help save time and reduce errors. It becomes crucial to evaluate the compatibility of prospective ESS systems with current tools, like payroll, time and attendance tracking, learning management tools, benefits admin, compensation management systems, HR information systems, communication channels, and performance management systems. The integrations should also be checked regularly to ensure that there are no issues that may surface after a software update.

4. Security measures

Improper implementation of an employee self-service system creates potential security risks. Every employee having access to sensitive information, even if it is their own information, creates a risk of information going into the wrong hands. Even a single employee’s information getting compromised will lead to several legal and financial issues. Having top security measures in place can minimize the risk of such incidents from occurring, and it can isolate and eliminate issues and threats if something does happen. The ESS platform should offer robust security features, like strong passwords, multi-factor authentication, encryption, access control, offboarding process, and secure data backup. The security measures should also be audited regularly to identify and fix any vulnerabilities or threats.

User feedback and anecdotal evidence are important parts of assessing whether the new ESS system has been successful. However, subjective reviews are not enough, and organizations must set some performance metrics in place that can be measured at regular intervals to provide a complete picture of how the ESS has been performing.

Metrics for measuring success

• HR administration time: How much time are HR professionals in the organization spending on administrative tasks and activities that will be handled by the employee self-service system? With a successful ESS in place, a reduction in this time will be noticeable.
• HR information requests: How many employees are currently sending requests to HR every month for information about leaves, payroll, or rostering or requesting for changes to be made to their employee profile? A decrease in the number of these requests is one of the most significant measures of the success of an ESS system.
• Data quality: An improvement in data quality can be measured by comparing the number of inaccuracies in reporting and payroll at present to those that happen after the implementation of the ESS.
• Increase in employee engagement: Improved employee engagement and morale can be gauged by including questions regarding access to HR processes and services in employee satisfaction surveys. The results will indicate how well the ESS system has been adopted across the organization.
• Processing time: The time taken to process key activities, like leave request submission and approval, unavailability requests, expense claims, etc., will ideally decrease with the successful implementation of the ESS.

For HR teams that are under a lot of pressure from handling repetitive administrative tasks, an employee self-service system can prove to be a complete game-changer, acting as a hub for communication, key employee information, and streamlining daily requests from employees. Additionally, it is a great solution for employees, offering them autonomy and improving employee engagement and retention.

Written by

Vaishali Parnami

Vaishali has been working as a content creator at Mercer | Mettl since 2022. Her deep understanding and hands-on experience in curating content for education and B2B companies help her find innovative solutions for key business content requirements. She uses her expertise, creative writing style, and industry knowledge to improve brand communications.

About This Topic

Human Resource Management, also known as HRM, is the function that manages employees, starting from their recruitment and induction to development, appraisals and promotions, with the aim of maximizing their performance in-line with organizational objectives.