How Employees Respond to Workforce Management Technology

Across certain industries and professional environments, workforce management technology has become nearly ubiquitous with the modern workday.

Sometimes, technology works in the background, tracking worker data as they move from project to project. Other times, employees engage directly with different types of workforce management technology:

  • They log in via a retina scan
  • They swipe their badges to access a meeting room
  • They enter their four-digit pin when they take a break at a job site

Workforce Tech and Your Employees

How do most workers feel about so much technology involved in their workday? More and more, they’re getting used to it. After all, it’s not as if the workplace is the only environment where technology keeps advancing and folding into our lives.

In many ways, employers are simply following suit with cultural shifts, market demands, and the never-ending clamor to digitize or die.

These days, almost everything seems to have a sensor, mobile application, wireless communication, or some form of biometrics.

  • We’re entering the era of the Internet of Things, and technologies will only continue to expand and evolve rapidly.
  • As they do, costs will likely continue to come down. This may open the door for more employers to jump in and add tools to their workforce management suite.

Still, even in an era when workers don’t seem to think twice about the technologies around them, they are still more likely to be comfortable when employers are transparent about the technology in use.

Below, we’ll take a look at how you can help workers get comfortable with your workforce management technology, including your time & attendance software.

Adding facial biometrics is just one of the ways that stratustime continues to deliver innovative solutions that support organizations and employees. Read the report, “Next-Gen Features for Time & Attendance” to discover more.

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Involving Workers in Tech Decisions

Employers collect and use data for many reasons. They want to find ways to improve employee performance and engagement, boost retention, and enhance the way they recruit.

Workforce management technology can make it easier for employers to track and gather the data and information they want. It can also simplify things for employees.

Thanks to advances in time & attendance software, for instance, workers can:

  • Stop using paper to track their time
  • Keep an eye on their PTO easily
  • Sync up personal and professional schedules on their own mobile devices

And, there are plenty of ways that workforce management technology supports workers and employers, which folds back into workflow and morale:

  • Syncing calendars can make it easier for employees to swap shifts and schedule their vacations, while giving managers a better view of potential staffing issues they’ll need to solve.
  • Advances in facial recognition can help create greater accuracy in regard to things like punches in and out. And, this type of biometric functionality can help to do away with issues when workers lose employee badges, or forget an access code.

Still, are these benefits enough to get employees excited about the steady increase of workforce management technology around them?

Workers at all levels want to know what type of personal data is being collected, and how employers are using it. Among their chief concerns are:

  • having questions, but not getting answers about certain types of software
  • worrying about their personal information being compromised

How can HR help alleviate these concerns? One of the most powerful ways is to be as transparent as possible about the workforce management software you’re using, or planning to use. Here are three tips to help you get started:

1. Communicate your company’s practices related to adding new technology.

When you’re using or adding new workforce management software, you want to make sure you’re protecting your employees’ personal information, while minimizing your organization’s risk of liability.

No doubt, any software decision will be vetted with members of your legal and security teams. On HR’s side, you can take the lead when it comes to communicating this message to managers and employees.

  • One potential strategy is to discuss changes with managers first, and have them carry the conversation forward with staff members.
  • You can also facilitate discussions among work groups to answer questions, and help alleviate concerns.

2. Highlight the benefits that the technology will bring to employees.

As we mentioned earlier, some workers won’t bat an eye when you’re rolling out new technology. Still, any change can cause challenges or raise concerns.

  • If you’re updating time & attendance software, speak to the ways it will benefit employees. These can include things like better scheduling, intuitive punches in/out, or new features that will make it easier to work remotely.

3. At the same time, communicate any workplace issues appropriately.

If your new workplace management software is meant to curtail or eliminate a workforce problem, highlight this in a way that keeps employees at ease, and avoids accidentally lower morale.

  • For instance, advanced biometrics such as facial recognition can drastically curtail buddy punching. However, if buddy punching hasn’t been an issue at your workplace, be sure to let workers know that this is to help prevent issues in the future, and not about correcting something now.
  • Doing so can help keep workers from feeling like they’re being punished in some way.

Any time you introduce a new tool, especially software, employees are bound to have questions and expectations. By keeping them in the loop, and highlighting the positives, you can give them more reasons to get behind the change.

Is your time & attendance software taking full advantage of next-gen technologies? Contact stratustime, and discover how we can help you enhance the way you manage your workforce.

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