The collaboration cheat sheet for IT and HR
HR and IT teams have a lot in common…
But they can also have very different ways of working. As great employee experience becomes celebrated as HR’s secret sauce for 2023, they need to work more cohesively. When it comes to working closer, what do both departments wish the other knew?
We spoke to IT and HR professionals from JumpCloud, who develop and support the leading open directory platform, to find out what we can do to drive great employee experience as a unified force. Use this new guide to:
check Improve collaboration between HR and IT teams
check Deliver world-class onboarding and offboarding
check Enhance employee experience through IT
Want to instantly improve your shared processes? Check out our powerful integration with JumpCloud for seamless user provisioning, deprovisioning and employee journeys.
How to improve collaboration between
HR and IT teams
Where do we tend to go wrong? And what’s the solution?
Mistake #1:
You’re not aware of each other’s pain points
IT should try to broaden their understandings around:
The importance of employee experience
How it feeds into the success of the organisation
The role of employee engagement and motivation
Insight #1: Focus on the foundations
Whether in HR or IT, you need to focus not only on each other’s needs, but on the needs of your workforce. Don’t assume a one-size-fits-all approach for every single employee. Set each individual up for success from the outset. Think about what each individual or group of individuals need, while also improving your collaboration with each other’s department.
HR should try to broaden their understandings around:
IT’s reliance on the standardisation of processes
How to use the right naming conventions, defined roles and titles
Service level agreements between both departments
Pro tips:
Familiarity with technology is key:
Build a hybrid-proof culture by ensuring that employees are comfortable with the equipment they are provided.
Prepare employees for productive work:
Selection of hardware and accessories should happen as early as possible. Application access should also be established before first login.
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Mistake #2: You don’t enable “digital coherence”
IT is in the core position to enable HR (and other functions) to create “digital coherence”: effectively getting a team together regardless of location by leveraging technology.
Insight #2:
Provide personalisation and early access
Although the employee journey starts before day one, onboarding is the first opportunity to really impress. Ensure a smooth onboarding experience from first contact. IT and HR play a crucial role here in providing employees with early access.
Easy ways to enhance employee experience through IT
Why does it matter?
As employees continue to be more globally dispersed than ever before, our age-old method of simply optimising employee experience in-office doesn’t cut it any longer. HR and IT professionals need to create a company culture that employees can log in and connect with, from anywhere in the world.
1. Use automation to simplify work
Improve employee experience by eliminating delays from your employees’ daily work. Integrate your HR system with an open directory platform so that access to systems is automatically and securely provided or revoked when employees onboard or offboard. See where you could add automated workflows such as:
1. Converting candidate profiles into employee files
2. Organising everything needed for onboarding
3. Marking employees absent in calendars and messaging apps
4. Creating detailed HR reports on key metrics
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2. Build layered onboarding
Never assume that every employee knows the exact ins and outs of the tools your organisation uses. This ensures that your onboarding doesn’t overwhelm, because it happens in distinct user-friendly phases. For this, provide three layers:
1. Provide training in their first few days on organisation-wide tools
2. Build easy-to-follow how-to guides to get them up to speed
3. Assign one of their team to onboard them on team-specific tools
How can Personio help to simplify onboarding?
Automated workflows tag IT and HR with pre-onboarding tasks.
Pre-onboarding emails can be scheduled and sent in bulk.
New hires get a clear overview of all of their onboarding tasks and receive automatic reminders for incomplete tasks.
Find out more here.
3. Provide continuous development opportunities
Your employees should stay up to speed on product updates. Ideally there should be a ‘tool owner’ for each to communicate these. Consider providing dropin training on best practices at least once a year on organisation-wide tools.
If you’re not sure where to start, ask employees (anonymously or otherwise) on where technology is holding them back. You can ask specifically about:
• What’s preventing them from feeling connected to their colleagues?
• What’s slowing down their productivity (e.g. is there too much ‘noise’?)
• Which tools would they like to learn more about to grow in their roles?
Similarly, as Forbes says, performance management is “the most important process in a company”. Without it, there’s no clear feedback, your employees won’t know what’s expected or what they need to achieve.
Performance management software enables you to automatically kickstart review cycles, gather meaningful feedback, standardise how performance is measured and set up bonuses attached to goals.
4. Use self-service technology to
eliminate admin
Did you know that HR professionals spend an average of 3.5 hours a week on employee enquiries but 84% of employees wait longer than a day for a response?
For many organisations, experience starts with empowerment. Seek out ways to enable employees to check things like their remaining annual leave, download payslips, see benefits, update personal details and more with digital employee files. Leverage employee self-service to save your teams time.
Smart tips to deliver world-class onboarding and offboarding
Why is it so important?
Onboarding is arguably the most essential process IT and HR share. When done wrong, it can have far-reaching consequences – turnover can be as high as 50% in the first 18 months. With only 12% strongly agreeing that their organisation does a great job of it, there certainly exists room for improvement.
What can we do to improve these processes?
1. Balance your pre-onboarding plan
Great onboarding starts before day one. Don’t share job material until the first day. You don’t want them working unpaid, but connecting with their team and culture.
Pro tips:
Start pre-onboarding programs, especially for long notice periods.
Keep a regular flow of communication and create networking opportunities.
Follow the onboarding program your HR team has created for the new hire, gather and share feedback. Are any materials out of date or not relevant?
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2. Create clear expectations for everyone
Once candidates start, communication is vital. New hires need to understand next steps, emails to look out for and who they are able to contact if they need help.
Pro tips:
Ask managers to determine which IT resources new hires need access to.
Don’t ‘overprovision’ - only give users access to what they need.
Use automation and persona types to avoid human error.
3. Get them in the driver’s seat ASAP
New starters are eager to start, so capitalise on that. Empower them to start doing their actual job with support. Send pre-hire emails as early as possible.
Pro tips:
Implement a 30/60/90 day programme plan for managers.
Be sure they have the tools and guidance to do their job well.
Create a comprehensive checklist of what employees need access to.
4. Don’t forget first days can be nerve-racking
Sometimes remembering experiences you didn’t enjoy helps you understand what needs to be prioritised. Simple touches can make a real difference here.
Pro tips:
If you’re in the office, meet employees at reception.
Show them their desk and where the bathrooms are.
Ensure they have a ‘buddy’ to feel comfortable asking questions.
Don’t forget: departing employees deserve great experiences too
During offboarding, if there is a delay in communication about an employee’s departure, this can also lead to security risks and data breaches. Automation is key – if HR systems feed into IT systems, application and device access will be shut off automatically.
Ready to bring your HR and IT teams together?
Connect your HR and IT processes instantly with our integration with JumpCloud, the open directory platform for identity, access and device management.
Alternatively, speak to one of our HR experts today about our all-in-one HR software and the 150+ integrations we have available to automate your people workflows.
Book your free demo