It’s been quite a year this 2020. And it’s all due to the effect of Covid-19. People are practicing social distancing, wearing masks thanks to this pandemic. What’s more is, employees are being asked to work from home by the biggest companies in the world.
Speaking of working from home, WP ERP has played a big part in this initiative. Specially it’s HRM module. Therefore, today we are going to conduct a deep HRM review for the year 2020 and see how it made an impact.
WP ERP HRM is a tool that will help you manage your entire HR department from the WordPress dashboard. From taking attendance, managing leaves to distributing assets and taking care of employee salary, all can be done using the HRM module of WP ERP.
Although WP ERP is very much capable of managing big companies now but in the year 2020, it has helped many small to medium companies manage their business perfectly.
Don’t worry, we are going to go over all the details and also give you a sneak peek of what is coming in 2021. So, sit back and enjoy.
Looking Back at 2020: A Year of Challenges & Empowerment
So, in this part of the HRM review, we will have a blast from the past and see what went down in the year 2020!
As you all know that WP ERP launched it’s the pro version this year. So, there were a lot of changes to the structure. It became faster and easier than ever!
However, the HRM module has gone through some changes as well. We made it more suitable for big corporations as well. Now, any type of company can manage their HR department using our HRM module.
Here are notable features that were added in the year 2020 for the HRM module,
- Added document attachment field at the leave application form
- Added CSV import feature for uploading bulk holidays
- New and advanced leave management
- User can now apply for leaves for multiple leave year
- New Approved By column on leave request table
- Bulk approval option for leave requests
- History tracker on updating employee status
- Validation for all fields of employee, contact, and company forms
- Hr calendar weekend marker
- Digest email for HR Manager
- Bulk Edit for setting Employe pay item
- Shift holidays to hr calendar
- Shift based day off count for the leave request.
Also, there were some new informative articles and documentation updates regarding the HRM module from our content marketing team as well.
Total new blogs =28
Total new docs=26 (including updates)
Fighting Covid-19: How The WP ERP HRM Module Helped
So we are going to dive into how the WP ERP HRM module helped to fight against Covid-19 in this part of the HRM review article.
Although WP ERP has three modules ( CRM, Accounting ), we are going to focus mainly on HRM as this blog is dedicated to HRM. However, if you want you can read about the other modules here.
As we said earlier, because of the pandemic, the normal business flow was interrupted. Moreover, it was a heavy blow, especially on small to medium businesses. Because managing a company is hard as it is. But when you can’t do it physically, then it becomes really tough.
That’s where the Human Resource Management of WP ERP comes in. Some might disagree, but managing the HR department is one of the crucial and complex tasks. Managing remotely is completely a different (not to mention hard) challenge.
However, those who were using the WP ERP HRM module to manage their company didn’t find it so hard. Because in the midst of Covid-19 they were still,
Making Sure The Employees Are Maintaining Office Hours
The first step most of the business owners took at the start of the pandemic is to start the work from home practice. Moreover, to keep the company staff away from danger and still keep it well running through the difficulties of the pandemic, it was the right decision.
However, one of the problems of working from home is that employees may fail to maintain office hours. Although, some studies show that productivity increases if employees work from home. However, that is still no excuse to get lazy and don’t turn up to work on time.
But, the amazing Attendance system of WP ERP HRM solved this problem. With it’s advance features like,
- Multiple check-in & check-out (new)
- Different shift generation (new)
- IP restriction
- Reviewing & Filtering Attendance Records
- Reminder emails for employees
- Self attendance system and more.
It became easy to make sure that employees are still attending the office on time.
Giving Proper Training on How to Conduct Work From Home
The employees are all familiar with the concept of the Work From Home/ Remote Working System by now. However, only a handful of those has hands-on experience.
But this situation has compelled them to conduct their duties from home. However, there are some basic rules you need to maintain while you are working from home. Like, always be available in-office hours, don’t miss meetings, reply to every message, and mention, etc.
Without proper training, the employees may fail to follow up these rules. However, using the Training extension of the HRM module, it was easy to train the employees about the basic etiquettes of the remote working system.
The training extension lets you create training sessions for all ( or any ) employees on your company right from the admin dashboard. Not only the system of remote working, but you can arrange the training that will help the employees grow their skills and make a fruitful impact on the company.
Managing Employee Leaves Like a Pro!
As of 9 December 2020, there have been 67,780,361 confirmed cases of COVID-19, including 1,551,214 deaths, reported to WHO.
We can understand how serious the situation is. Many people are getting affected by these horrible diseases every day. Employees of companies are also among those people.
So, this year there were many untimely and unfortunate leaves that happened due to Covid-19. Well, we don’t have to point out that the leaves of employees have highly affected the normal leave management system of every company.
But, the companies that are using the WP ERP software didn’t have to worry. The Advance Leave Management System of the HRM module took care of it pretty easily.
- Flexible Leave Management Policy
- Smart Leave Entitlements
- Various Leave Types like Annual, Casual, Sick, etc
- Advanced Leave Types.
That’s what the new and improved leave management system brought to the table. Not only that,
- Halfday leave
- Sandwich rule
- Leave carry forward
- Leave encashment
- Unpaid leave
- Leave segregation
- Leave accrual
- Multilayer leaves approval.
You had these leave types on your disposal as well. That is why it became pretty easy to manage the leave system in this difficult and testing time.
Hiring The Right Candidates
The most recent unemployment rate – from July to September – was 4.8%, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS).
Many people have lost their jobs during this pandemic period. However, as easy as to fire an employee, it is difficult to hire a new & qualified one. HR/Admin struggle to find the right candidate even when they are interviewing them physically.
It becomes even more difficult when they have to do interviews virtually. But using the Recruitment extension of the HRM module this job became quite easy.
The extension makes it easy to create job descriptions, preparing the hiring workflow, and lastly posting the job opening. That will make sure you are still hiring the right candidate in this difficult situation.
Enrolling Employee Salary on Time!
In this difficult period of time, getting the salary on time was like a breath of fresh air for the employees. Because they had to buy supplies in bulk quantities in order to avoid going out many times.
Using the Payroll extension, managing employee salary, creating pay runs, and approving them, all was done right from the admin dashboard. How cool is that!
Sending Notifications & Providing Reimbursement!
Notifications are very important, especially in the work from home system. The SMS Notification extension of the WP ERP HRM module helped business owners/Admins/HR to send important messages and notifications to their contacts and employees.
Also, the Reimbursement extension helped manage the office expenses for support employees, who provided door to door services even in these trying times.
So, you can see how the HRM module has been helping all the business owners to manage their business in these difficult times. And through this HRM review article, we are trying to convey that message.
HRM Review: Year 2021 & What Lies Ahead For the Module
With a lot of hope, we are going into the year 2021. Hoping to get out of this pandemic and return to our normal lives. That also includes going back to offices and carry out our jobs.
With that in mind, we are also planning to give the HRM module of WP ERP a new shape and look. That is why we have lots of features and improvements in mind to give our users a better experience.
So, in this section of the HRM review article, we are going to discuss the upcoming features of the module.
Brand New Design of HR Frontend
Using the HR Frontend extension, you can easily manage all your tasks from the frontend. You don’t need to use your backend. As a result, you can strongly maintain privacy & keep your valuable data secured.
The features of the HR Frontend extension includes,
- Authorization of the user’s activity
- Access elements in the frontend
- Enables smart employee filtering option
- Access to comprehensive employee information
- Easy announcement feature
- Auto report generation
- Track & monitor employee attendance
- And Leave request approval.
And we are redesigning the whole HR Frontend in order to give our user a better experience and also they can use it more conveniently.
Mobile App for HR Management
There are more than 3.8 billion smartphone users globally!
Statista
Everyone is using a smartphone right now. So, we thought why not introduce a mobile app for our HRM module. That way, the Admin/HR can manage their company right from their mobile phones.
No matter where they are, they can do all the things from the HR mobile app. So managing the HR department will become easier and less complicated.
Employee Evaluation
Employees are the heart and soul of any successful company. If they perform well, then it will certainly help the company grow. To know which employees are performing well, it is important to evaluate them in the right ways.
With that thought in mind, we are bringing an Employee Evaluation system in our HRM module. You will have features like,
- P2P feedback
- 360 evaluation
- Analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of an employee
- Goal Management for Employee
- And more.
Now, employees will get the appreciation they deserve for their performances.
Employee Benefits Extension
Besides the salary, most of the companies around the world provide some extra facilities for their employees. Like,
- Provident Fund
- Gratuity
- Medical Funds
- Performance Bonus etc.
With our new Employee Benefits Extension of WP ERP HRM module, you can easily manage all this with the utmost ease.
Off/On Boarding of Employees
The most crucial part after hiring or firing an employee is the onboarding and offboarding part.
After an employee is hired, it is important that they learn about the work system and the environment as quickly as possible, in order to blend in. And with the perfect onboarding system, this part becomes easy for both the employee and the employer.
Also, after leaving an organization, it is important that they go through the proper process of debriefing. Like, returning assets, company car, other benefits. And the offboarding process takes care of it.
So, we will add a system to our HRM module that will take care of both of these.
That’s just the tip of the iceberg. There are plenty more features in the pipeline, waiting for you to make your journey of using the WP ERP HRM module more fun. But if we try to cover it all in this HRM review article, it may bore you.
Adios 2020, Hola 2021!
2020 was a challenging year for the world. But, we can say that we are quite relieved that the year is ending. And we are getting ready to welcome the year 2021.
Hopefully, 2021 will give us the chance to get back to our normal lives.
The purpose of our HRM review blog was to give you a chance to look back on the hard work we have done in order to make your life easier, and also what we will do in the future to make it more worthwhile.
Therefore, we sincerely hope that you will stay with WP ERP and give us the chance to take your company to the next level.
Till then, wish you a very prosperous Happy New Year 2021!
