The UK’s National Nuclear Laboratory NNL, which has been using UNIT4’s l business management software Agresso Business World since 2006, has selected UNIT4’s HR portfolio following a large restructuring which has streamlined its operations into three business areas.
As part of this process the NNL team took the opportunity to further rationalise its business systems - its PeopleSoft HR solution being a key area for review. Reporting was proving a challenge with users finding it increasingly difficult to generate the data needed in a timely and consistent manner. In addition, NNL wanted to review its HR processes which were heavily paper-based and relied on a large amount of manual data manipulation which was both time consuming and error-prone.
Nigel Tinker, Implementation Project Manager at NNL, commented: “Our previous HR solution was proving cumbersome and difficult to use. Keeping personnel records up to date and accurate was often very complex and our people were spending lots of time chasing bits of paper and reconciling information held in different systems across the organisation. As a result it was not able to produce the quality or speed of reporting that we require as a business. So we recognised that we needed to make a change and embarked on an in-depth evaluation of the solutions available on the market. UNIT4’s HR portfolio came out on top.”
NNL already uses Agresso Business World as its core financial and business management solution. Nigel added: “We had the confidence that in selecting UNIT4’s HR solution, the integration between HR and finance would be seamless and require minimal, if any, manual intervention. We knew we would have just one set of data which would really boost efficiency and accuracy and give us a sound platform on which to grow our organisation. So it really was a straightforward decision for us.”
The NNL team is currently implementing the solution and Nigel is confident of the benefits he expects to realise: “Among the key benefits are the workflow functionality and alerts, which are invaluable capabilities that we have not had before. Because of the nature of our work our personnel have to hold valid security clearance certificates and these certificates come with an expiry date. With our UNIT4 solution we can schedule alerts to notify us when the certificates are due for renewal so we can be sure that we reapply in a timely manner, that our paperwork is up to date and that we comply with the legislative requirements governing us.”
The ease of use and self service element of UNIT4 HR will also enable NNL staff to maintain their own records. This combined with the fact that data only needs to be entered once into the system, means that the HR team will spend less time completing simple administrative tasks and spend more time making strategic decisions that will develop and motivate the workforce and the organisation as a whole.
