Systems Consideration in HRIS (Essay Sample)

Human Resources Management Systems
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Human resource management can be one of the most demanding tasks for any organization. The aspect of human resource management which makes it proves tricky, relates to growing number of employees at any one time (Jackson, Schuler, & Werner, 2012). As a result, human resources management systems are crucial to the management of the staffs at any growing firm. There are quite a number of human resources management systems that are commercially supplied. Most of these systems match the demands of the human resources department, making their work much easier. Therefore, choosing the right software is very crucial and should be done in a manner that considers the applicability of the particular firm and not just the industry in general.
HR Quick by Data Ingenuity is one of the HRIS that is commercially distributed to firms to manage their staffs through the human resources department (Dataingenuity.com, 2014). This system offers a number of advantages as it is simple and yet offers automated services. One of the crucial advantages of the system is that it offers a quick way of hiring and firing the staffs. With a few clicks on the system, a report is created (Jackson, Schuler, & Werner, 2012). New employee data is merged to the entire database when hiring and Microsoft Word report document is generated which can then be printed. When a staff is being fired, the system offers a simple way of terminating employment and generates a termination of employment document ready for printing. The human resource managers can be in a position to track benefits, costs, salary, job history, employment changes and positions swapped on the go, and also print their desired results. The system also assists the users to format their documents in case they want to make a presentation to match the expectation of the user and respective audience.
However, HR Quick is not Open-Source software meaning that, it can be quite expensive for growing firms. At the same time, it does not offer the employees a fully functional self-service portal through which they can easily interact with their data (Dataingenuity.com, 2014). The software does not also offer the ability to track vacations, manage compensation and attendance management, which are very crucial to the both the employees and the management.
Another software that can be used in human resource management is the Orange HRM Open source. This is a system that comes with a host of advantages to the firm that is growing. One of the advantages relates to the fact that it is an open sources software; this means that the software benefits from quality refinement from a team of dedicated experts on a very regular basis. Most open source software benefit from large scores of experts and thus are highly effective and efficient. At the same time, the system is cost free making it a competitive offer for any company that is growing. This system offers the management of all the functionalities of system administration, with a touch of quality data security. Personnel information management(PIM) is also included, with ability to generate reports on the go. Using the PIM function one can be in a position to manage the salaries, costs, leaves, attendance and performance. Moreover, the management is able to attend to issues of recruitment in totality. The staffs also have a fully functional self help module that they can interact with at all times.
On the other hand, this software lacks the compliance tracking which is very crucial for any firm regardless of its status and level. In addition, the software lacks employee on-boarding abilities. This means that staffs and the administration may have a hard time updating their status of the newly employed staffs.
Comparing the two systems, Orange HRM seems the best fit for the organization as it is still growing (Orangehrm.com, 2014). This is because the system is open source meaning it is not going to be too expensive to acquire and maintain. The HR Quick on the other hand is commercialized and is quite expensive for accompany that is growing. It is also important to note the fact that Orange HRM offers the staffs a chance to interact with their data and progress; unlike the HR Quick that does not have that ability. Being open source software, Orange HRM is developed by a large team of highly qualified experts (Orangehrm.com, 2014). This also means that it offers the most polished services, assured quality improvements and ability to easily customize (Jackson, Schuler, & Werner, 2012). The HR Quick, on the other hand, is tailored to meet the customer expectations but trimmed down to cut down on costs of development. This means that, the organizations would have to spend for every other tweak to the system and maintenance as well, while they can get all these services and support for free with the Orange HRM.
Organizations that are using Software as a Service (SaaS) are guaranteed to benefit from a number of efficiencies. One of the efficiencies associates with SaaS, is that they are remotely hosted and thus do not require expensive hardware upgrades. This means that the organization can effectively and efficiently make use of their existing hardware. At the same time, the system is much cheaper than taking up software that requires hefty upfront payments and additional payments for support and upgrades. Cost of maintenance is quite low as the organization does not have to deal with the installation, setting up and daily upgrades and maintenance. It is also important to note that SaaS does not have compatibility issues meaning that it does not compromise on efficiency regardless of the platform in use (Jackson, Schuler, & Werner, 2012).
Companies that are using Microsoft Access are bound to experience some inefficiency. One of the inefficiencies is related to the internet/online limitations. Given that Access does not have server features such as the ones available on Oracle, SQL and ODBC among others, makes it ineffective. It is also limited to few users, meaning that it tend to limit the size of the database. At the same time, it will show signs of lag when the number of users grows, making it one of the slowest database system that a large organization can use. It is also important to note that Access does not offer high security features, such as firewalls to protect sensitive data.
One of the risks that are associated with combining more than one package is that there may be duplications of functions. T...