Overview of HR Applications

Industry watchers break down the field of HR software into three main categories: Core HR, Workforce Management, and Strategic HR also called Talent Management or Talent Administration software.

• Core HR encompasses the three traditional human resources management functions: benefits administration, personnel tracking and payroll. Every company will require these functions once it has reached a critical mass of employees. You need core HR functionality when, for instance, manually running payroll and managing employees with spreadsheets becomes too burdensome a task.

• Workforce Management, or Workforce Administration as it is also called, comprises the range of software solutions intended to effectively schedule and track your workforce. These solutions are ideal for organizations whose employees work in shifts, and include applications to track time and attendance, monitor compliance with labor laws, and usually include payroll functionality, or integrate well with other payroll software.

• Strategic HR involves growing your company by attracting and developing the best people, as well as better managing your workforce overall. Strategic HR applications generally provide some combination of applicant tracking and recruiting, learning management, as well as performance review functionality. This type of software streamlines these strategic processes to ensure that a company is using its staff as efficiently as possible, and also that employees are continuing to grow and develop--increasing employee satisfaction and retention rates.

Of course, core HR, workforce management and strategic HR functions often overlap. While there are best-of-breed solutions for individual functions in each category, there are also integrated suites boasting across-the-board functionality.

HR Application Categories

Core HR
Benefits Administration	Manages employee benefits such as paid time off, medical/dental/life insurance policies and 401k participation.
Personnel Tracking	Centralizes employee data, such as SSN, contact information, past employment and demographic information.
Payroll	Tracks employee salaries, bonuses, 401k contributions, health and other deductions; calculates withholding for taxes; and cuts paychecks. Most solutions provide integration for direct deposit as well.
Workforce Management
Time & attendance	Helps staff track employee attendance and absences, and enables employees to clock in and out. Many solutions also track accrual and usage of sick days and PTO. Rules-based engines provide alerts when employees miss or perform established amounts of work.
Employee scheduling	Provides functionality for scheduling employee shifts and attendance to ensure compliance with staffing needs. Systems can schedule employees across departments, locations and projects, and provide alerts to employees when schedules change and when staffing levels are inadequate.
Strategic HR
Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS)	Provides a centralized database that lets recruiters store applicant information and employment applications throughout the application process. Features include candidate tracking, applicant status monitoring, and direct integration with other HR applications. In addition, many vendors include on-boarding features, like the ability to perform background checks.
Employee Evaluation	Also known as Performance Review software, these applications offer a centralized system where supervisors can conduct and track reviews with employees. Features performance measuring, tracking and goal management.
Learning & Development	Establishes a centralized hub to monitor new employee training and the ongoing skills development of existing employees. Features include content authoring and management, curriculum and certification path definition, testing and reporting.