From their emotionless appearances to being the workplace party buzzkill, HR has no lack of adages related to their job. Valid or not, they are a well known piece of office legend. The most well-known among the HR prosaisms are the way the job of the HR workforce has become inseparable from calculation sheets. Right from the commencement of VisiCalc during the 70s, to SuperCalc, Multiplan, to the Lotus 1-2-3, and to the new Microsoft Succeed, the bookkeeping sheet has been the default the board instrument, yet keeps on being the administration device of decision for HR experts all over the planet.
What’s more, we surely get the appeal. At the point when the organization is little or moderately new, there isn’t much complicated data for HR to work upon. This gives HR staff more solace and adaptability in utilizing free and somewhat accessible calculation sheet devices, for example, MS Succeed. It was a characteristic movement from keeping paper records of participation, finance, or leave the executives. Furthermore, as a trough for little to medium-size groups, it isn’t exactly hard to keep a nearby record. All it requires is an individual with essential PC information to deal with the everyday administration on calculation sheets.
This technique for the executives turns out however for some time. In any case, as little and medium-sized organizations increase and extend their activities, HR processes additionally advance and grow. HR assignments become convoluted, and accounting sheets become wasteful in giving the information and examination the association might require continuously etc. The apparatuses that were once simple to utilize and adaptable for completing estimation and investigation would ultimately become impractical and inclined to significant mistakes.
The inefficiency of spreadsheets
1. Poor control restrictions
A spreadsheet can be password protected, but that’s as far as you can go when it comes to restricting who can use, view, and modify it. There is no firewall that only allows files to be viewed “for manager’s eyes only”. Data is vulnerable to alterations, and as files get passed down through the email chain, they are more susceptible to being corrupted.
2. To human is to err
When managing complex calculations for sizeable organisations on spreadsheets, you are bound to be prone to human errors. Especially when spreadsheets are managed by several people, the scope of manipulation is high.
3. Slows down decision-making
Analyzing data on spreadsheets can take an excessively long time to manage. With the duties of data extraction, processing information, preparing reports , and making analysis, the process gets too time consuming and is an unsuitable path towards quick decision-making.
4. Doesn’t support automatic reporting
Delivering standard reports on a regular basis can only be handled through manual intervention. Sending tedious emails are the only way to get the information into the right hands.
5. Unreliable for scalability and accuracy
Too many HR personnel can spoil the data broth. As business operations expand and HR management becomes more collaborative spreadsheets become an unsustainable and unreliable database for accurate information.
But the fact is that free, readily available and easily manageable spreadsheet tools have been an immense support for small businesses, which has consequently led to its extensive use. However, the comfort of familiarity offered by spreadsheets can only lead to suffering for the organization. It is not geared to face the challenges of a growing organization with evolving HR processes, even more so with entire workforce working away from the office.
HR needs to step up their processes. As they once shifted from paper records to spreadsheets, the time has come for cloud-based people analytics solutions to take over.