HROTodayGlobal

HEROS In 2009, Sheridan left AstraZeneca to become a consultant with Orion Partners in London. There, he was responsible for the HR technology practice. Sheridan also redesigned the firm's website and implemented social media strategies. "Personally, this was great for me as I broadened my industry experience, to deal with multiple industry sectors," he says. "Professionally, I found that no matter the industry, there was a bit of confusion in the marketplace when it comes to technology vendors. There's a big interest in the potential of HR outsourcing but some poor experiences of it. There's also some hesitation and scepticism among clients about whether they could actually pull that off and deliver value out of it." In July, Sheridan became an associate at Phase 3 Consulting, and took on an interim position at Care UK to help the healthcare and social service provider outsource a number of its HR operations across its five divisions, and to develop a new careers website. Sheridan has learned other important lessons in his varied career. "First, a single integrated solution, particularly across global enterprises, might sound very good, but in reality, is it really achievable and worth the compromises involved?" he says. Secondly, he says, there is a missing professional role within outsourcing—someone who can work with HR leadership in an integrated way, and not within each silo of HR, such as learning, performance management, and compensation. There needs to be someone "working with leadership and management of HR in a way that bridges the gap between them and their technology solution providers so that they are really matching what they are trying to do in HR, rather than being quick and easy point solutions." "The thing would be that it's very easy to make assumptions about a solution working in one part of the globe and then transporting it elsewhere," he says. "Whereas in reality, there are some problems in making those assumptions." Lately, the disconnect has been growing between what buyers of outsourcing solutions and providers of those solutions consider to be truly groundbreaking in helping make their workflow more efficient. In fact, those differences in perception were highlighted earlier this year in the of both practitioners and vendors. Sheridan says that the disconnect is partly the result of vendors overstating the power and benefits of their products, which leads to an unrealistic rise in buyers' expectations. "At the end of the day, people management isn't rocket science—at least the systems aspect of it isn't," Sheridan says. "Systems are only as good as the data you put in." Moreover, there is fragmentation in the market. "It's very commonplace for people to be using multiple systems for different aspects of HR—recruiting, payroll, learning solutions—rather than an integrated solution," he says. "That causes difficulties for buyers making the decision, 'Should I go for one solution and sacrifice functionality, or should I go for a suite of solutions and struggle with integration?' That's a confusing scenario." The issue of whether to switch from a legacy software system to a SaaS delivery model for HR operations is also confusing to many. "There are apparent drawbacks to that—I'm not sure they are real, but some customers might have concerns about the data being externally hosted, particularly those in sensitive industries such as defence manufacturers or governments," he says. Many companies have invested heavily in legacy systems, and so the business case for switching to a SaaS model may not be as strong. Moreover, it might be more prudent to wait for their own provider to develop a SaaS model of the legacy system they are currently using, and so they might get an advantage out of waiting, rather than making the switch to a SaaS model from another provider too early. Further penetration of HR operations with the SaaS model, including core administrative functions, will drive HRIT innovation in 2012, Sheridan says. Another innovation driver for next year will be the realisation that the real "value-add" for HR outsourcing is in talent management, as opposed to basic HR service delivery, he says. As such, there will be continued growth in the investment of solutions that gives HR managers an integrated talent management environment that incorporates employee data and analytics. There will also be more innovation around HR apps on mobile devices. These drivers of technology will change HR operations, by their enhanced ability to provide more intelligence around people management, which better connects employees to management and to one another, Sheridan says. "The technology is really about connecting the workforce together and enabling rich data about the workforce to be mined and presented to leaders in a way that helps them make the big decisions better, as opposed to just automating processes and providing online services to employees and managers," he says. FALL 2011 | www.hroglobal.com [9] HRO T oday Innovation Gap Survey

• Cover