Spanish
Can you imagine looking up your pay slip on your mobile device while sunbathing on the beach? Imagine requesting more holidays from your manager from the very same position? Mobile applications in HR software are opening up a new field of possibilities—unthinkable several years ago. Thanks to these, both managers and employees can manage their time with even more flexibility and freedom to take a variety of actions that were only accessible via the computer before. Be it to find out in real time when your paycheck came through and to check it from anywhere, or be it to communicate any kind of incidence like sick leave.
This isn’t just about making things easier for us when we aren’t working. Developing these mobile applications is already a need, given the high volume of companies with offices in different countries and where many of their employees spend much of their time working outside the office. In fact, IDC calculates that this year, the number of “mobile” workers (without a fixed place of work) will exceed 1,200 million, 35% of the world population, this implies “that the global mobile data traffic will grow at an annual rate of 108% between 2012 and 2014, as all these people demand access to corporate resources and applications anytime anywhere, regardless of the device used” (source: Byte).
Using human capital mobile applications will also make things easier for the HR department in their daily activities. Little by little, space and time barriers will erode in workforce communication, avoiding unnecessary and unproductive wait times while cutting costs. For instance, every time there’s a new training programme, they will be able to notify employees who are travelling, and these will not lose their place; or when HR needs to tell the manager about a new hire, who has come onboard in a department, the manager will recieve real-time notification.
Not only will notifications be sent out more smoothly, but Hr can also better communicate on issues that require approval or consultation, for example, follow up of hires with managers as they can manage the process right from the mobile if they don’t have access to a computer. This scenario is far more common than you’d think; they don’t have to be abroad, but simply in an event that takes all morning and they haven’t taken the computer with them.
On the other hand, we can say that this technological change frees up the desktop as a centre of activity. José Tolovi, Global Director of Great Place to Work recently declared, “Growing cities, heavier traffic with the ensuing transport difficulties and technological facilities will take us in the next 20 years to a work environment that is far more geographically dispersed, but one in which we will be far more connected in terms of personal interactions.” And of course, if one could request days off from the beach and have your boss approve it in a snap and miles away right from your mobile, that’s a game changer.
You can already access “Mobility and HR – Part II: The Challenges”
