Empower your people with an employee self-service portal

Managing HR processes manually has become a thing of the past. As the global workforce becomes more diverse and dynamic, running HR operations manually is more tiring and time-consuming than ever. When employees have to go to their HR managers for every small clarification, it’s a waste of time and productivity for both employees and the HR department. This where Employee Self-Service (ESS), a prominent feature of HR software, can help. Read on to decode the basics of an employee self-service portal, including its key features and how it can be beneficial to your organization and its employees.

What is an employee self-service portal?

With ESS, employees can track and manage their own activities and perform their administrative tasks without depending on the HR department for everything. Employees can access their personal details and professional records anywhere, any time, without hassle. These portals are aimed at offering more power and autonomy to employees while reducing the administrative burden on HR teams.

What are the key features of an employee self-service portal?

According to a survey conducted by Nintex, 49% of employees report having trouble with locating documents. This can be avoided completely as all the essential information is present in a single, centralized location. With an employee self-service portal, employees can:

• Access information at their convenience
• Input their personal and professional information easily
• Apply for leave in just a few clicks
• Track and maintain their time off balances and attendance details
• Record their working hours
• Check the time spent on certain projects or number of hours logged per day
• Access any documents shared to them or upload documents they need to share
• Clock in and clock out with geo-restrictions
• See the essential details of team members including phone numbers, seat locations, ID numbers, etc.
• View announcements made by management 

What are the benefits of using an employee self-service portal?

Now that you understand what an employee self-service portal can do and some of the key features of an ESS portal, let’s see the benefits that it will bring to your organization.

• Empowers employees

One of the foremost benefits of an ESS portal is that it empowers employees to track their activities by themselves instead of having to wait on answer from HR. ESS also provides them with greater autonomy over their information, allowing them to make decisions on their own. It enables employees to update their information without depending on anyone else. Other necessary HR information including sick days, time off balances, and attendance hours are easily available to your employees, providing them more clarity and opportunity to plan ahead. This helps them feel trusted and improves morale and motivation.

• Enhances the efficiency of HR tasks

As most HR processes are automated with ESS, paperwork is reduced and tasks are completed more efficiently. This saves time and increases productivity across the board. As an HR manager, you can concentrate on other pressing issues including employee retention, employee happiness, work-life balance, and employee recognition. Putting responsibility into the hands of employees means you don’t have to chase people down for important information. Employees can fill those details out themselves. This also reduces errors when recording employee information.

• Ensures greater transparency

Employees can access all essential documents including company policies, safety procedures, insurance documents, annual tax returns, and more from anywhere at any time. Any announcements posted by management or the HR department are available to all employees, ensuring that everybody is on the same page. This transparency creates a sense of trust among employees, and they will feel more valued in your organization.

• Improves employee engagement

It is a known fact that HR operations have a huge impact on employee engagement and productivity. No matter how good an organization is, having a dysfunctional HR system can hurt the success of your business. In such a case, an ESS portal, which empowers employees and helps them to coordinate with their peers, can greatly improve employee engagement, job satisfaction, and your overall bottom line.

• Leads to improved security

ESS provides the highest level of data confidentiality as data is stored online and it’s password-protected. An ESS portal can be accessed by employees only when they are given permission. Unauthorized users cannot access employee data. If employee information is being recorded on paper, the risks of data theft and misuse is very high.

With a self-service portal, your employees can track their activities independently. Everything from attendance to time off can be managed by your employees without any confusion as all the data is present in a single location.  Using Zoho People’s self-service feature, employees can set up their profiles, request time off, log time spent on projects, access essential information, and do much more from a single platform!

Also read: What activities can employees can complete using a self-service portal?