What can HR software do for my small business

Small businesses can get along without HR software. Using Excel spreadsheets, Google Calendar, paper lists and post-it notes, it’s absolutely possible to keep yourself up to date, organised, and on the right side of compliance.

In a small business, it’s usually the owner or an office manager who sets time aside to manage the flow of people-related admin. Which is fine, but – you knew there was a ‘but’ coming – what about the tasks you don’t plan for?

Unexpected events, like a few hours overtime or an unexpected staff absence, set off a chain of admin tasks that need to be completed accurately as and when they occur. Let it slide once or twice, and come the end of the month, none of your spreadsheets add up and you’re relying on memory to work out what the numbers should say.

Spreadsheets and post-it notes can only take you so far before the complexity of manual HR admin begins to eat away at the time you should be spending on other things, like growing your business… or sleeping.

In HR software, small business is one of the fastest growing areas, and there are more options today than ever before. Tools like citrus HR are available through a no-commitment subscription model specifically designed to be affordable for small businesses.

What is HR software?

First, let’s be absolutely clear on what we’re talking about. HR software is a tool that eases administrative headaches by bringing together all your HR management, your HR data, and all your admin tasks into one place. Absence and leave, expenses, payroll, performance, reporting and more… it all lives in your HR software. And, if you select cloud-based software, you can access it wherever you are, whenever you need it.

So, what can HR software do for your small businesses?

Get time back:
Time is always the biggest challenge in business. And the heaviest HR burden on small businesses is the time it takes to ensure admin is properly taken care of. That means things like important information being accurately recorded, personal records kept up to date, sickness and annual leave tracked, expenses processed, and employee questions dealt with promptly.

In a single swoop, the self-service and automation elements of HR software take away most of this burden. When all your people information lives in your HR software, employee queries are drastically reduced. Self-service means people don’t need to ask you how much holiday they have left or ‘please can you update their bank details’, they can simply log in and do it for themselves.

When someone works overtime or takes time off sick, this is logged in your HR software. It’s a game-changer – the system knows what your people’s assigned work patterns should be. It logs the change in the person’s employment file and performs all the required adjustments and calculations automatically, ensuring your records and payroll report reflects the new information. No more late-night HR spreadsheet wrangling. Hallelujah!

Unlock HR insights:

What’s your headcount? Your employee turnover rate compared to last year? Sickness levels or Bradford Score? How much annual leave are you due to pay a leaver? When questions like this arise, you’re often in a scenario where you need fast answers, which is precisely what HR software is designed to provide with just a few clicks.

HR data can tell you lots of interesting things about your business, help you identify trends and become more efficient where it counts. You want to see absence trends for the last year? Work out where your people are spending most of their time? View and manage holiday requests to make sure you have the manpower to deliver that big new contract?

With a dedicated HR software tool, you can combine and compare information in moments to report on whatever aspect of your business you need to. Insights that would otherwise take hours to reveal are at your fingertips in moments.

Boost accuracy:

In 2017, when a young man in Ireland was incorrectly paid 20,000 euros by the business who’d employed him for two days as a temporary labourer, he saw it as a ‘gift from God’. Unfortunately for everyone, the money was gone before anyone spotted the mistake, resulting in a nasty hit to the employer’s bottom line, and a short prison stretch for the young man.

When we handle data manually, entering it, updating it, transferring it, the likelihood of a mistake is high. It’s just human nature, we make mistakes and we’re bad at spotting them. Ditching spreadsheets in favour of HR software significantly reduces the amount of manual data handling required to deliver HR and payroll.

This is good news. Inaccurate data can be annoying when looking for insights, and potentially disastrous when you misplace a decimal point in your payroll report.

Cut compliance risk:

Compliance is something no business can afford to ignore. But as the requirements change and multiply every year, keeping track of requirements manually is a massive headache for a small business.

Are your processes up to date? Do your people need a training refresher on data protection? Are they aware of your health and safety practices and are those practices up to date?

Your HR software should remove the guesswork and last-minute panic from compliance, reminding you to renew or refresh important documents, and notifying you when important compliance deadlines are approaching.

The number of businesses running afoul of GDPR regulations has steadily increased in recent years. But with HR software, you can also rest easy in the knowledge that your people’s personal information – a massive trove of highly sensitive personal data – is GDPR compliant and securely stored on a cloud server.

Build trust:

HR and payroll mistakes and inaccuracies don’t just cost time and money, they erode the trust your people have in you as an employer. Good people are harder and more costly to recruit than ever, so you want your people’s experience of working for you to be positive.

HR software allows small businesses to easily keep track of the things that matter to people. It’s the little things. Making sure you remember their birthday. Or scheduling regular performance reviews to make sure they’re progressing and developing how they want. Your HR software can automate tasks like that and remind you when they’re approaching, so your people can trust that you’ve got the details covered and you’re looking out for them.

Citrus HR customers use HR software to deliver high-quality HR without spending hours on admin, giving them back vital time to spend growing their business.