Total compensation software allows your team to manage the direct and indirect ways employees are compensated. But not all software is the same. In this blog, we look at 11 must-have features for total compensation software.
Total compensation is a holistic approach to compensating employees. It combines direct compensation (like salary and bonuses) with indirect compensation (health insurance, career development programs, etc.) to create an overall compensation plan that helps to engage and retain employees.
Statista found that 38-percent of job seekers consider overall compensation when looking for a job. That’s important for organizations to keep in mind as 44-percent of workers are looking for new jobs.
But simply having a total compensation package isn’t enough. You have to communicate it, too – and that requires the right total compensation software features. Otherwise, employees may be left in the dark about what’s included in their compensation plan and how it’s calculated.
One-third of American employees don’t understand the benefits provided by their employers. That’s a major problem for two main reasons:
1. You’re spending money on compensation your employees aren’t using.
2. Your employees may feel like your organization doesn’t care because they aren’t seeing their overall compensation.
Therefore, it’s imperative to have total compensation software that highlights an employee’s compensation and explains where the numbers and decisions come from. However, not all software has the same features, so we came up with 11 must-have features to take your organization to the next level.
11 Essential Features for Total Compensation Software
1. Total Compensation Planning
In order to offer a complete compensation package to an employee, proper planning is necessary. This can be accomplished with a total compensation planning tool that allows you to define, oversee and control the entire compensation cycle. That way, you can ensure your total compensation plan remains competitive in today’s job market.
2. Automated Plan Distribution
Your organization has too many employees for your HR team to manually distribute every compensation plan cost-effectively. Save yourself time, money and headaches by investing in total compensation software that automatically distributes plans to all employees at the push of a button.
3. Complex Award Calculations
It can be a nightmare to manually calculate everything when you have award programs that use different rules and budgets with varying performance values and goals-based ratings. Thankfully, total compensation software handles the numbers so you can focus on the people who make your organization successful.
4. Global Pay Requirements
Keeping track of global pay requirements can be challenging. For example, some countries have mandatory salary increases, while other countries have no such requirements. Then there are other types of compensation, such as profit sharing or vacation pay, that change depending on the country. The right software will have global pay requirements readily accessible, so your team can be informed at all times.
5. Centralized Planning Dashboard
Planning your total compensation is much easier when you have a centralized dashboard to see everything in one place. This single source of truth keeps your HR team on the same page as they go through the compensation planning process for each employee.
6. Review & Reporting Tools
Reviews are important for letting employees know how they are performing. But reviews without data to back them up can leave an employee feeling disconnected. It’s better to use total compensation software that offers both review and reporting tools so your managers can provide accurate feedback based on an employee’s actual performance.
7. Auditable & Compliant Processes
Maintaining auditable and compliant processes for your employee total compensation plans can be hard if you use spreadsheets because you open yourself up to scalability problems, security liability and other issues. With user-friendly total compensation software, you empower your team to make decisions that can automatically be tracked for auditing and compliance purposes.
8. Automated Budget Controls
Whether you are hiring a new employee or giving a current employee a raise, it’s vital to keep your budget in mind to ensure you remain profitable. But with so many compensation decisions happening simultaneously, keeping your budget under control can feel daunting. Luckily, there are total compensation software solutions that offer automated budget controls so you can focus more on your employees and less on the numbers.
9. Manager Decision Support
Managers are in a powerful position because they are the ones who help oversee merit, bonus and equity awards. But for them to make decisions effectively, they need proper support. This can come in the form of reports and data that prove an employee is meeting expectations. Empower and engage your managers by giving them a solution that guides them through the process.
10. HRIS Integration
You shouldn’t have to ditch your existing human resources information system (HRIS) to improve your compensation process. Instead, look for total compensation software that integrates with your HRIS and other HR software. That way, all your data works together to give you accurate information on each employee’s compensation package.
11. Flexible Budgeting Process
Budgeting is complex for any business, but it can be even more challenging if you rely on spreadsheets or outdated systems that don’t allow for flexibility in the budgeting process. Utilize total compensation software that offers calculated budgets or top-down cascaded budgets and powerful budget modeling capabilities. That way, you have the flexibility to make smarter budgeting decisions.
Conclusion
Total compensation software makes managing how employees are compensated easier. However, not just any software will do. The ideal solution offers a variety of features to make compensation decisions simple, from a centralized planning dashboard to a flexible budgeting process.
With the right features in place, you can effectively compensate your employees with competitive wages, fair bonuses and so much more. When that happens, your employees are more likely to stay because they feel respected and engaged with their compensation.
HRSoft’s total compensation software, COMPview, makes it easy to handle all your employee compensation tasks. See how it works by requesting a demo today.
