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Want To Increase Workforce Productivity? Offer Employees Mobile Device Options

July 27th, 2016 | Posted by Apex Time Solutions in Benefit Accruals | Employee Scheduling | Employee Self Service | Leave Management | Overtime | Time and Attendance | Workforce Management Solutions - (Comments Off on Want To Increase Workforce Productivity? Offer Employees Mobile Device Options)

A recent article by The New York Times titled ‘The Long, Final Goodbye of the VCR’ encapsulates how technology continues to evolve. And, in a world where cloud computing technology has helped made previously mundane tasks easier to complete, many companies are embracing the use of cloud-based solutions, to help them save costs and remain competitive.

In today’s digital era for example, implementing a cloud-based workforce management solution is easier to deploy and provides a rapid return on investment (ROI). And with the added benefits of an on-the-go application that allows employees to punch in/out from their mobile device, they can; request time off, provide their availability, view shift schedules, overtime, hours worked and perform a host of other tasks that previously required a visit to the HR office. This on-the-go application provides managers with real-time reporting capabilities, an intuitive dashboard with workflows and, a messaging centre to review employee requests and respond in accordance.

Want To Increase Workforce Productivity? Offer Employees Mobile Device Options

So, if your company is looking to increase productivity, be sure to deploy a workforce management that can do more than having remote workers tied to a desktop on which to log in their hours of work. Thus, when workers are productive and happy, companies can expect a better return on their people investment and a better customer experience.

To learn about ATS Workforce Management mobile app, go to our website. And, to attend one our weekly webinars register online. To speak to one of our account executives call; 866.294.2467.

 

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An Effective Cloud System Will Prepare You For The Fair Labor Standards Act

July 20th, 2016 | Posted by Apex Time Solutions in Absence Management | Benefit Accruals | Collective Bargaining | Employee Time Tracking | Labor costs - (Comments Off on An Effective Cloud System Will Prepare You For The Fair Labor Standards Act)

The Department of Labor (DOL) has given businesses advanced notice so, they can prepare their organizations in time and being compliance with the upcoming December 1, 2016 when the new overtime rules takes effect. And, to that end, the system you are using should allow you to automatically record overtime for exempt employees at certain salary levels and job profiles. To some extent that may be easier said than done, because we are not referring to spreadsheets here as that mode of tracking of paying employee won’t cut it, especially, if the Department of Labor (DOL) comes knocking on your door.

A Effective Cloud System Will Prepare Your For The Fair Labor Standards Act

When these new overtime rules take effect companies need to ensure they have:

  • Implemented the necessary changes within their time attendance system to accommodate the overtime rule changes. If by chance, your system is archaic to begin with, this might be the perfect time to deploy a solution that not only meets all of those requirements, is robust and flexible enough grow with your organization.
  • Taken the necessary steps to determine the salary threshold and which employees qualify for overtime pay. The U.S. Department of Labor Fair Labor Standards Act has a plethora of information, from which you can glean.  If you are in the hospitality and/or retail industry, for example, you will need to figure out how this is going to impact your organization. Typically, managers in those industries and others work an inordinate amount of hours per week-but with the new rule employers will have to limit workers hours to 40 per week.
  • Used all the available resources at their disposal by ensuring tracking of employee hours is done accurately, hence, those clunky punch clocks and spreadsheets are simply not going to cut it anymore.

An effective time and attendance solution will accurately track employee hours, vacation and other leave management requirements, and provide real-time reporting analytics. Moreover, ATS cloud computing solution can quickly adhere to— work rule compliance, collective bargaining agreements (CBA), and will quickly adapt to the eligibility rules for exempt and non-exempt workers. So, if the Department of Labor comes knocking after December 1, 2016 you will have at your disposal, all required information.

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Best Practice Methodology In Time And Attendance Implementations

July 14th, 2016 | Posted by Apex Time Solutions in Payroll | Software-as-a-Service (saas) Workforce Management Software | Time and Attendance Blog, Workforce Management Software | Time and Attendance Software | Workforce Management Solutions - (Comments Off on Best Practice Methodology In Time And Attendance Implementations)

Implementing time and attendance solution is a time-consuming initiative that requires considerable organizational investment and commitment. While, an occasional delay can occur, and is understandable, it’s the ones that drag on that can become an issue, resulting in costly setbacks, and at times, the pointing of fingers by both parties.

Here are some critical implementation best practices to consider when deploying a workforce management solution:

Always Gain Support and Commitment from Internal Resources
Implementing a time and attendance solution requires support and collaboration from the departments that the solution will affect. Getting buy-in from your company executives, will likely increase the chances of success with your implementation. After all, if company executives understand the rationale for the change and agree that the return-on-investment will help streamline costs and boost productivity, you can expect their full approval and commitment.

 Expectations should be realistic
Assign a project manager to oversee the planning and implementation of the time and attendance solution. If that person is your HR or payroll manager assign some of their regular duties to someone else so they can focus on the project.  A time and attendance solution can streamline processes, improve visibility and reduce costs—but this is not going to happen overnight. Therefore, planning is crucial and needs to be carefully thought-out. If the intent is to accelerate the implementation process, make sure your project is scoped and tested properly. ATS has a wealth of knowledgeable time and attendance experts who will guide you through the process with a proven methodology plan.

Importance of training and support
The value of quality training and support should never be underestimated and that should never be an area where you cut costs. ATS solution experts are highly skilled—with extensive experience in both operations, and technical areas. Our solution experts will provide hands-on knowledge to ensure the most efficient utilization of ATS time and attendance solution.

A time and attendance implementation is a major undertaking, but the process doesn’t have to be drawn out and painful.  If planned and executed properly the implementation can be a smooth process. For example, you can begin this initiative by having each department define the goals they want to achieve. Then with the help of your vendor develop a realistic and strategic plan around accomplishing those objectives.

Best Practice Methodology In Time And Attendance Implementations

To learn more about ATS Time and Attendance implementation best-practices, you can download a white paper. And to view a demonstration, go to our website.

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Paper-Based Time Tracking Persists Despite Cost Savings Through Automation

July 12th, 2016 | Posted by Apex Time Solutions in Benefit Accruals | Cloud Time and Attendance | Employee Self Service | Hosted Time and Attendance Solution | Labor costs | Workforce Management Solutions - (Comments Off on Paper-Based Time Tracking Persists Despite Cost Savings Through Automation)

It has been said that small and mid-size businesses are the lifeblood of North America, because they keep the economy humming by creating jobs. However, a despite the advantages to automation, some of these companies still use paper-based and other forms of manual methods to manage their business.

A recent article by Tom Starner, contributing editor for HRDive titled “Employers using paper-based benefits administration strategy see money fly out the window” provides a business case for why manual systems are hampering the productivity of small and mid-size businesses. It reads in parts:

“It may be hard to believe, but some HR departments (mainly smaller businesses) are still processing the benefits enrollment process using paper — much to their financial detriment, according to an expert writing at Employee Benefits News.

Andrew Brickman, director of Benefits Administration at Corporate Synergies, an employee benefits and insurance broker, says employers still relying on paper, rather than automating the process, should understand that they are letting dollars slip out the door.

Apart from potentially missing valuable data, storing paper documents also is very expensive (filing cabinets, paper, printer ink and maintenance costs). Instead, Brickman writes that a far better option is moving to a benefits administration platform for automating the process, ensuring both time and money savings.”

Paper-Based Time Tracking Persists Despite Cost Savings Through Automation

 

Many of today’s small and mid-size businesses have endured through economic slow downs and remain focused on their operations and profitability, but need 21st century tools to help them keep their competitive advantage, and remain lean while increasing productivity.

If your small or mid-size business happens to be one of those that have been contemplating automating your time tracking process, it’s not too late. ATS TimeWork On Demand for small and mid-size businesses helps your entire operation, by giving you interconnection between all locations and departments of all processes. ATS TimeWork OnDemand is easy to use and includes workflows with intuitive user dashboards, real-time reporting analytics and adapts to workforce and regulatory compliance rules.

Want to get rid of your paper-based time tracking system? Download a demonstration or attend one of our weekly webinars on how ATS cloud solution has helped a small to mid-size business like yours.

To arrange an onsite visit in your region, call us at 866.294.2467.

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Want To Challenge The Status Quo? Get A Millennial In Your Corner

July 7th, 2016 | Posted by Apex Time Solutions in Software-as-a-Service (saas) Workforce Management Software | Time and Attendance Blog, Workforce Management Software | Web-Based Time and Attendance Software - (Comments Off on Want To Challenge The Status Quo? Get A Millennial In Your Corner)

There has been so much written about this generation of millennials with arguments about them being social media obsessed and range of other stereotypes . Regardless of whether your company welcomes them with open arms or not, they are not going away and so some companies would be wise to see the value in hiring them. After all, they are the future CEOs of industry and government. Here at ATS, we are fortunate to have leaders who wholeheartedly believes in the hiring of millennials and also encourages them give feedback to their superiors in order to enhance the organizational improvement in all areas of the business.

In a recent article, contributor to inc.com Ryan Jenkins, wrote an article titled “How Millennials Can Save Your Company From Irrelevance” One of his poignant statements in this article reads in part; “An organization left unchanged will conspire against the effectiveness and relevance of itself. The people, habits, or structure of an organization can get in the way of the growth of the organization if the status quo remains unchallenged.”

Society is filled who challenged the status quo and came out on top, despite the naysayers. Elon Musk for example, took the almighty car industry to task and succeeded in selling cars directly to consumers and, Steve Jobs ignored what the so called experts said could not be done and reintroduced the world to mobile computing in a way that it had not been done before with crowds lining up for many blocks to purchase an iPhone. Despite these examples and many others that include; cloud computing and a range of other disruptive technologies, the naysayers persist, in large part, because, doing it the way it has always being done, is the safest way, at least in their minds.

Want To Challenge The Status Quo? Get A Millennial In Your Corner

Another sentence from the article reads in part; “Who’s best positioned to challenge the status quo? The next generation of leaders…the Millennials.”

Many of today’s Millennials are ambitious, and they are also keen on having a job, but may not want to be tethered to a desk for eight hours every day, and frankly, with advancement of technology who would want to?  They grew up in an era of social media so it should not come as a surprise that it’s their mode of communication with friends and colleagues. Of course, not all Millennials are perfect but, then neither are the very people who they will someday replace. Change is tough and it happens regardless of the roadblocks that appear to be in its way.

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Ye Shall Practice And Embrace Lean Manufacturing

July 5th, 2016 | Posted by Apex Time Solutions in Business Intelligence | Cloud Based Time Management Solution | Labour Analytics | Labour Forecasting | Payroll | Time and Attendance Blog, Workforce Management Software | Web-Based Time and Attendance Software | Workforce Management Software - (Comments Off on Ye Shall Practice And Embrace Lean Manufacturing)

The term “Lean” is well known in manufacturing circles and has been adopted across various disciplines including; Lean Healthcare and Lean Accounting to name a couple. A brief description of lean principles in Wikipedia states in part;

“Lean manufacturing or lean production, often simply “lean”, is a systematic method for the elimination of waste (“Muda”) within a manufacturing system. Lean also takes into account waste created through overburden (“Muri”) and waste created through unevenness in work loads (“Mura”). Working from the perspective of the client who consumes a product or service, “value” is any action or process that a customer would be willing to pay for.

Essentially, lean is centered on making obvious what adds value by reducing everything else. Lean manufacturing is a management philosophy derived mostly from the Toyota Production System (TPS) (hence the term Toyotism is also prevalent) and identified as “lean” only in the 1990s. TPS is renowned for its focus on reduction of the original Toyota seven wastes to improve overall customer value, but there are varying perspectives on how this is best achieved. The steady growth of Toyota, from a small company to the world’s largest automaker, has focused attention on how it has achieved this success.”

Ye Shall Practice Lean Manufacturing

Today, several organizations have formal Continuous Improvement methods that leverage the “lean” process –but may leave others to chance or perhaps feel it’s not as important. ATS Cloud Workforce Management for Manufacturing was developed with lean thinking from its original inception and as such has many built-in capabilities to support your lean initiatives. “You can’t improve what you don’t track or measure.” This in and of itself is one of the tenets that have shaped the ATS Workforce Management for Manufacturing with a robust database, embedded with sophisticated user dashboards, and business analytics.

For example, users can extrapolate reports in real-time to measure payroll costs, through a set of forecasting tool and workflows–and compare key performance indicators (KPIs) against goals to clearly measure on-going improvements. Now, that’s taking the holistic approach to “Lean Manufacturing.”

To learn more about ATS Cloud Workforce Management for Lean Manufacturing go to our website and download a demonstration. And to reach us by phone, call: 866.294.2467.

Ye Shall Practice Lean Manufacturing

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