As we continue to work in a challenging business landscape, it is important to provide your payroll department with extra resources to help them to continue to be efficient and organized due to the obstacles they are currently facing. From changing workplace arrangements to economic uncertainty, these trends have a major impact on payroll professionals.
For example, we are in a time of historic turnover which puts pressure on human resources as they learn to handle changing pay packages and an increase in employee onboarding. Payroll departments also are most likely finding themselves struggling to accurately track employees as many companies are changing to a hybrid work environment.
With this in mind, if you would like to help your payroll department thrive, it is time to offer them solutions to the challenges they are currently facing.
1. Simplify Digital Processes
According to the Wall Street Journal, nearly 10% of businesses implemented more than 200 applications before the pandemic. In a study conducted by Citrix, it was found that 64% of those surveyed were using more communication and collaboration tools than they were prior to the pandemic. Out of these individuals, 70% believed that these tools made their work more complex.
With this in mind, it is important to consider simplifying your technology as too many applications can waste employees’ time and negatively affect productivity. If you want to help provide a better experience for your payroll department, consider finding a single digital solution that can help with time tracking, time reporting, and expense reporting. This will help reduce employee fatigue and help with productivity since your employees won’t be working with multiple systems.
2. Expand Expense Reporting
Today many payroll departments are learning how to manage expense reporting not only for business travel but also for new remote employees to set up their workspaces. It’s important to consider developing a home expense policy. This will create a system that helps avoid one-off spending decisions as well as allowing timely reimbursement. You will also want to create a remote work employee expense reporting policy that is simple, flexible, and consistent.
3. Create A Leave Management Process
It can be challenging being a remote employee, which is why it is important to create a leave management system that prioritizes workers taking time away while maintaining optimal staffing levels.
You can start by evaluating any current leave policies to ensure they are appropriate for a post-lockdown environment. For example, one idea you could implement is offering employees their accrued personal time that expired during the pandemic. This would definitely help morale and promote a healthy team.
This could be implemented with an automated leave management solution. This helps avoid one-off approvals as the solution should allow employees and managers to self-serve when requesting their time off, approving absences, and tracking employees. Overall, if you want the best solution, the system should be able to track types of leave, employee time tracking, and expense reporting.
If you want to simplify processes for your payroll department, it is important to adjust to the rapidly changing business environment and assist your staff as they navigate through these uncertain times.
Although a single solution isn’t going to solve all of your department’s problems, you can take small steps to help improve their jobs. By focusing on enhancing time tracking and expense reporting, you will be able to help them excel at their positions and in return help your business thrive.
https://www.cpapracticeadvisor.com/2021/10/18/meeting-todays-payroll-challenges/
