Hays Specialist Recruitment delivered an engaging, one-stop learning center using PeopleSoft ELM and the new mobile learning capabilities

There are great benefits of delivering a powerful, modern, intuitive PeopleSoft fluid solution. But how do you manage that implementation and associated change in one of the most complex PeopleSoft deployments in Europe?

Background

Hays Specialist Recruitment is a global specialist staffing company that commenced their PeopleSoft journey back in 2008. Hays has a complex PeopleSoft estate with 16 modules across the five products of FSCM, HCM, CRM, ELM, and Interaction Hub. In 2015, Hays successfully completed an upgrade to 9.2 and subsequently implemented an innovative selective adoption and PeopleSoft Test Framework strategy to keep their estate up to date.

Hays subsequently introduced a collaborative business/IT “Model Office” initiative to provide a platform for delivering real business benefits utilizing the capabilities of PeopleSoft 9.2.

The challenge

The benefit of effectively implementing selective adoption and keeping our PeopleSoft estate up to date is that we can leverage the capability of the system to deliver real value to our users. Our philosophy at Hays is to deliver innovative solutions that look modern, are intuitive, drive engagement and minimize the time needed to complete transactional interactions for our busy users. The fluid user interface provided Hays with just that opportunity for our PeopleSoft users.

However, in addition to the complexity and customization of the Hays PeopleSoft estate, in a typical six-month period, Hays will have close to 50,000 unique users of its PeopleSoft system, making the management of any major change program a challenge!

The solution

There are different ways of implementing fluid in an organization—big bang, by feature, by business unit. At Hays we decided to solve unique business challenges using fluid.

The first opportunity was the creation of a survey as part of Hays assessment for the National Equality Standard (NES). The Hays development team created a Classic and a Fluid version for our users to review in our Model Office. The feedback was overwhelmingly in favor of adopting the Fluid version as it provided a far better aesthetic solution. This solution was a small part of the overall NES accreditation effort which resulted in Hays achieving the NES, one of the UK's most rigorous and prestigious accreditations for equality, diversity, and inclusion.

The next opportunity to provide a fluid solution was when the internal Hays Training, Learning and Development team were looking at providing an engaging one-stop learning center. This was a perfect fit for fluid and Hays created a solution that enabled new starters to be directed automatically to a fluid “Learning Center.” The feedback was very positive on the new user experience. The fluid screens have been designed in conjunction with the internal branding team to make sure the screens all adhere to the Hays corporate brand guidelines.

As a result of the two initial fluid use cases, the Hays team were receiving feedback to roll the solution out across the PeopleSoft estate. The decision was made to minimize the potential testing impact for users and to include a fluid and Classic Plus implementation as part of their selective adoption/keep current strategic programs.

The results

Given the volume of users impacted by the move to fluid, an effective change management program has been vital. The Hays Model Office initiative has been a crucial element in ensuring that hands-on demo as well as early hands-on testing opportunities have been provided for users.

Although a broad change program, Hays focused initially on the self-service features of employee and manager self-service. This made the discussions across the power users such as finance a lot easier, as Hays already ensured familiarity with the Fluid screens:

Overall, the feedback has been extremely positive from our users. The Hays PeopleSoft screens mirror the overarching application strategy of providing modern and engaging user interfaces. Adopting fluid has provided opportunities for much easier adoption of other PeopleSoft features. A great example is activity guides, where the very user-friendly activity guide interface has enabled the easy extension of the change program to include fluid activity guides.