Renfrewshire Council
ResourceLink and SAP’s BusinessObjects - Renfrewshire create new efficiency and extra planning capability with ResourceLink and BusinessObjects
Organisation description
Renfrewshire Council’s 10,000 employees provide a range of services to some 175,000 residents and businesses, from education and housing to social care and health.
Challenge
The Council wanted to replace several HR and payroll databases and systems with an integrated solution, creating new efficiency and improved reporting capability.
Solution
An integrated solution comprising ResourceLink from NorthgateArinso and SAP’s BusinessObjects intelligence platform.
Benefits
- A single database for HR and payroll.
- Automated task management.
- The ability for more stakeholders to access the system.
- New levels of reporting sophistication, for day-to-day management and a workforce planning programme.
Database consolidation, workflow and networking
One of the initial drivers for investment is explained by Angela McLellan, HR Systems Officer at Renfrewshire: “The Council previously operated seven separate HR databases and a further payroll database. We wanted an integrated system with a central point in which to retain information and provide a range of management information and that’s what ResourceLink has delivered.
“It has made a huge difference because we can now access information from one place. It has also meant that in HR we have been able to move away from the use of numerous individual spreadsheets and use ResourceLink to access and process data instead.”
ResourceLink has given the HR team a tool for generating greater efficiency for its day-to-day administration activity. The workflow capability is used to set up routine tasks, with emails automatically produced to inform the payroll team about new starters, promotions and so on.
The networking capability of ResourceLink is also being put to good use, enabling external organisations working with the Council to access information as appropriate. The imminent addition of the MyView self-service module will further capitalise on the networking options by web-enabling controlled access for managers and staff to selected information, such as attendance records.
Improved reporting and planning capacity
Perhaps one of the most valuable benefits of ResourceLink for Renfrewshire is its application for producing sophisticated management information. Reports are regularly produced to help business units maintain an accurate record of issues including staffing levels and budget expenditure.
But the most impressive use of this reporting functionality is found in the contribution it is making to workforce planning. The HR team is managing an ongoing programme of workforce planning in which they are assessing where the Council will be in five or ten years’ time.
Using ResourceLink and BusinessObjects, detailed reports are being produced to help managers identify where there are issues such as high staff turnover, difficulty in recruiting key skills and the potential for future gaps in resources due to retirement.
Angela McLellan explains further: “Looking at the retirement issue for example, we identified that in a few years’ time several of the Council’s architects will be reaching retirement age. We therefore need to review our service with this in mind now. The reporting tools are helping us identify what sort of candidates we need to attract in order to meet the Council’s needs over the next decade and beyond.
“Underpinning all of this is the ability to not only anticipate events but also to assess the impact of different scenarios and options. It would have been at best incredibly time consuming and at worst almost impossible to have achieved this level of reporting sophistication without ResourceLink and Business Objects.”
Integration for a comprehensive solution
Renfrewshire were clearly looking for an overall solution that would all but remove the use of separate databases and systems. With ResourceLink and BusinessObjects combined, this is being achieved.
“ResourceLink delivers a single comprehensive HR and payroll database,” says Angela McLellan. “The BusinessObjects universe is populated from this database, so we have instant access to routine information required for housekeeping reports covering things like age and gender of workforce, staff grades, locations and contract details.
“Only in a few areas did we find that the information wasn’t available and NorthgateArinso’s consultants quickly carried out some configuration to fill the gaps. They also helped us write some of the more complicated formulae for the most complex reports.”
“With the two solutions integrated we will save a huge amount of time and benefit from the ability to generate the complex reports we need. Both solutions are also very user-friendly and we are extremely pleased with the results of our investment.”
