Dear HR Users, This is Why Your “Simple” System Request “Takes Forever”
As someone who has been either on the Tech side of HR or the HR side of Tech for most of my career, I have observed both sides extensively and understand both perspectives. Most of the time, both sides are reasonable. Sometimes one side just doesn’t get it! This article focuses on the perspective of the Tech side (I promise I will write one for HR soon).
So, without further ado, here are the most common reasons why it takes forever to fulfill system requests:
The system has the world’s most convoluted security permissions: In the simplest terms, security permissions are meant to answer the question “who is allowed to do what for whom?” Simple, right? Except if specialized groupings were built on top of specialized groupings over the last few years, it is going to take a while to understand and untangle all of that so we can configure the right groupings for you when you say you want “Managers to see X function”. Bottomline: if you want to speed things up, help us get role based permissions and security groupings right.
The system was never designed to do this: Please remember that not all systems are designed to perform all functions. Also, your tech team may not have installed all the upgrades available for your system or purchased all the available modules. This isn’t to say that we cannot find a workaround for your business requirement; just that the end goal may not be reached following the exact path you may have in mind.
The data architecture was never designed to do this: If the Applicant Tracking System was never configured to capture the candidates’ journey from application to hire, we cannot analyze the data and create a visual funnel for you. The data was never collected for each of the hiring stages; therefore the analysis cannot exist (please don’t make me fudge the data).
The team needs time to do the research: System configurations are complex and sometimes even experts need the time to research and validate their proposed solution before they implement it in your production tenant. Implementing a solution without proper research and validation could cause downstream impacts that will put the entire business at risk. Research in this case means perusing dozens of knowledge articles, user forums, and looking at demo videos. All of this takes time to find, review, digest, and apply to your specific request.
The system is bent into a pretzel: Yes, the scripted demo you saw probably presented the solution to your problem very succinctly. Please remember that most demos are performed in curated environments with the system and data elements configured to function exactly as it was originally designed. If your system has been customized and bent into a pretzel, it is going to take a while to get you the “simple” solution that you are looking for.
Separation of duties is a real thing: If your process of simplifying things involves having one role perform multiple tasks, then it will take a while to configure this because your tech team is responsible for making sure that the system is secure and high-risk activities are prevented. For example, the same role initiating and approving a transaction is considered high-risk on the systems side, so chances are additional time is going to be spent in understanding the intent of the request and providing alternate solutions.