Traditionally, outsourcing business functions has been perceived negatively and associated with the assumption of job losses and a drain on the economy. However, many miss to recognise the financial benefit of outsourcing basic functions and the career progression opportunities created as a result of doing so.
By outsourcing a business’s payroll function and using technology to streamline HR employee workflow processes, the employees who previously performed these tasks are given the scope to move from generating data, to creating the insights and actions based on this data. This effect is compounded if your company is located in more than once country.
Back to the future
The big data revolution has arrived, affecting payroll more than any other part of an organisation. The ability to drive efficiencies within an organisation is valuable, though a company could better use the skillset of these payroll professionals in drawing out insights and actioning these across the entire organisation.
An important factor in successfully transitioning staff to new roles within a business is ensuring alternative roles that complement their existing knowledge and skill base. A natural progression for the traditional payroll professional, is into insights and analytics positions of finance and human service departments.
A company must be borderless
Outsourcing creates the ability to access specialised knowledge centres, no matter where in the world you do business. In an environment where businesses need to be able to operate seamlessly between countries, it is becoming increasingly difficult to stay across regulations and legislation – not only do these changes based on geography, but also on the whim of the government of the day. Avoiding the significant penalties that result from non-compliance can be a very expensive and time-consuming exercise or a threat to our business operations.
Organisations should choose to outsource to specialists familiar with the intricacies across the region. Not only does this provide the peace of mind of knowing you’re compliant, but it also frees you and your employees up to focus on tasks which add value and create revenue for your business.
A single view of your workforce
Even with experts in each country, different reporting standards and timelines between countries can make it extremely difficult to assess, compare and improve various aspects of your business. Organisations benefit from consolidating the view of their workforce into one single platform, allowing comparison across a raft of critical metrics, benchmarking over time, and strategic overview of the organisation as a whole. Ask of yourself what critical and strategic overview does payroll deliver today?
You need not take the view that outsourcing or using technology to automate is bad for local jobs and the economy – it has the potential to allow employees to transition from more transactional tasks to ones that have the opportunity to create real strategic value for the company.
Mark Samlal is the CEO of ASX-listed PayGroup, the holding Company of wholly owned subsidiary for PayAsia. PayAsia will be at the 2018 Payroll Association Conference at the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre on 25 October 2018.
