COVID-19 has seen many Councils navigate and adapt many aspects of its operations and none more so than Northern Beaches Council who successfully rolled out several modules in their one-stop human resource system know as People Central – right in the middle of a pandemic!
People Central was envisioned in 2019/20 starting with the introduction of both online performance management, and a learning management system followed by the recruitment and onboarding of modules being added.
In 2020/21 Council went live with the most significant changes including:
• My Time – (UKG Workforce Dimensions) Including a rostering, time and attendance, timekeeping, scheduling and absence management system.
• My HR (SuccessFactors Employee Central) Includes relief duties with delegations, updating bank details and other personal information; and
• My Pay (SuccessFactors Employee Central Payroll) Payroll processing system.
At go-live a small, dedicated change team was supplemented by a large group of front-line staff to form a business readiness crew equipped to advocate, consult, train and provide support for users.
HR also introduced My Help (Whatfix) an in-system training tool providing real time help for its less digital savvy workers, to capture time, change their details, apply for leave and access their payslip.
Workforce and Technology Director Karen Twitchett said it was both the right time and the wrong time to implement such significant changes to the organisation.
“It was always the plan to automate, digitise and go online with HR and payroll functions, but when 100% of our workforce were impacted by the pandemic and working from home or working differently it was certainly a tricky time,” Mrs Twitchett said.
“Six months down the track our employees and managers are still learning and growing their capabilities and we have continued to develop organisational capability to deliver further tech driven changes to meet customer expectations.
“Was it worth it? Absolutely and we’ll happily take on the next big tech change, but maybe once the pandemic has come to an end!”
