HRIS Architecture

To have successful implementation of Human Resource Information System (HRIS) within the organisation, one must think of having the compact and comprehensive system design done for constructing the HRIS software. This unit deals with the entire systems development and implementation process, which needs to be adopted for HRIS.

The focus would be more on HRIS implementation process. This unit will identify different stakeholders, potential users and the type of information that the HRIS will be managing and storing to help decision-makers take effective decisions. This unit will also introduce the technical infrastructure with different options suitable for implementing HRIS within the organisation.

Careful planning, dedicated team, support from senior management and awareness of potential risks and their mitigation plans will make this implementation a success story. The implementation process will further provide opportunities of re-engineering and systematically improving the HR processes, which will ultimately become best practices in HRM.

Following are some of the important points to remember:

• Who will be the customer of data, process and the results, which are generated after processing the data (could be in the forms of decisions that are made to develop the business).
  
  
• Everything whatever is done is a process designed to support organisational strategic goals and HRIS implementation process will in turn help improve the HR processes.
  
  
• Poor implementation of HRIS will result in the failure of meeting the organisational needs.
  
  
• Careful attention to every step in system design process will further lead to the successful implementation of HRIS and will ultimately help improve HR practices to be implemented in the organisation.

---

Definitions

• IS architecture: It is an approach of building the information systems to meet the business needs.
  
  
• Master data: Any information that is considered to play a key role in the core operation of a business. It is basically the reference data and does not undergo frequent changes.
  
  
• Transaction data: Data describing an activity or event and the change as a result of a transaction and is usually described with verbs. User interface: Visual part of computer application or operating system through which a user interacts with software or hardware.
  
  
  
• Graphical User Interface (GUI): The user interface which uses windows, icons and menus and which can be manipulated by a mouse. Tier: Level of structure or any architecture.
  
  
• Server: A computer or computer program that manages access to a centralised resource or service in a network.
  
  
• Client: A client is a piece of computer hardware or software that accesses a service made available by a server.
  
  
• HTML: Hypertext Markup Language is the set of markup symbols or codes inserted in a file intended for display on a World Wide Web browser page.

---

HRIS Architecture

Before understanding the HRIS architecture, we must understand who are the end-users or customers of HRIS and how and what is the importance of data according to them.

Category of HRIS

End-users of HRIS are categorised into two classes:

Employee End Users

Employee end users include managers, analysts, technicians, clerks and employees. We will in detail about each one of them from the HRIS perspective.

• Managers: For people in managerial positions such as Director, GM, MD, CEO, senior managers, etc., HRIS is a handy tool, which can be used anytime for getting accurate and up-to-date data and information from stored databases.
  
  
  HRIS provides them the information in the form of reports on performance management, recruitment and retention, employee management, team management, project management, etc. They use these reports for planning, decision-making, organising resources, controlling processes, etc. These plans and decisions could be like promoting employees, hiring people, increasing salary, taking disciplinary actions, etc.
  
  
• Analysts: They are the critical end-users of HRIS. They collect data from different sources, examine and validate it and provide appropriate alternatives with supporting data to help managers in planning, decision- making, organising, controlling, etc. They make use of data processing and reporting tools like query builders/generators, report generators, etc. Analysts must know the data processing life cycle where they understand how data is collected, how is it verified, processed, updated, stored and presented according to the need of senior management.
  
  
  For example, analysts are asked to generate the list of employees eligible for promotion to managerial positions. Therefore, analysts must know the criteria required to be fulfilled by employee to get promoted as managers and that criteria should be used to filter the data from the employee database and appropriate report must be generated and presented to the requester.
  
  
• Technicians: They are the group of HRIS experts who take care of access authorisation for data and tools usage. They understand the need of all HR team members based on their work profile, roles and responsibilities and accordingly they ensure that these team members get appropriate access to make their work easier. These end-users are highly technical and are competent to write computer programs and scripts to configure the setting of HRIS software. Primarily, in case of new upgrades, technicians help other end-users to work without any challenge.
  
  
  If, for example, there is a change to be implemented in the current performance appraisal system, these technicians first undergo the training of how it has been technically done and then they convert that into simple language and help all appraisers to work on this new change without any problem.
  
  
• Clerks: They are just like analysts who handle most parts of HRIS, but not like analysts who need in-depth data analysis knowledge. Clerks work only on the process, which has been in place while interacting with the HRIS. They are given periodical tasks, which they have to work on given frequency and will have to report to their seniors.
  
  
  For example, some of them are responsible for data backups every weekend; some of them are responsible for generating special category of reports for every week, etc.
  
  
• Employee: An individual employee is also treated as an end user of HRIS, as he or she will have to deal with it to enter routine transactions like reporting attendance, submitting leaves applications, submitting resignations, other service requests, etc. This ‘access to employee as an end user’ will reduce the job of the team of clerks, who in turn will enter the details requested by an individual employee.

Non-employee End Users

Non-employee end users include candidates and agents or business partners.

• Candidates: They are the end-users who have got very limited access to HRIS of an organisation. They interact with only one part of the system where they can enter their resumes or profiles for job-seeking purpose. They will be given temporary login ID and password to enter the profile and submit and track with some number, if any.
  
  
• Agents or business partners: They are the external agencies who help the organisation in talent search, delivering specialised trainings, etc. They also will have very limited access to HRIS where they can upload their candidates’ resumes, trainer profiles, etc. and keep interacting with the teams associated through this access.

Types of HRIS Data

HRIS provides primarily three types of data:

• Master information about employees and related aspects like roles, responsibilities, core competencies, etc.
  
  
• Master information about the organisation like jobs, openings, hierarchical structure, compensation and HR policy based information, etc.
  
  
• Transactions, which are generated by first two master information components, for example, employee assigned job details to work on, employee travels to different client sites, etc.

HRIS Architecture Components

So, HRIS Architecture generally has the following major components:

• User interface, which includes forms/data entry screens, menus to select the options to work on and various reports generated.
  
  
• Application processing like processing the data captured through user interfaces such as leaves approved and balance updated, incentive calculations based on performance ratings, pay processing based on monthly transactions reported by employee and approved by senior management, etc.
  
  
• Data storage is the capability to store the data captured through user interfaces and data processed through application processing in the form of database. This deals further with data security and safety to keep it validated and for long run without any loss of data. Access to this data is always controlled and recorded for audit purpose.

Types of HRIS Architecture

Single-tier architecture

Single-tier architecture where user interface, application processing and data storage, all three components reside on one single machine or in single environment like IBM Mainframes, Microsoft environment, etc.

In this type of architecture, user interface, application processor and the database, all components are developed by using the tools belonging to the same environment or technology, so integration of it with other application components does not become the major challenge.

Microsoft Integrated Development Environment (IDE),for example, provides wide range of Graphical User Interface (GUI) tools like Visual Studio through which excellent user interface can be developed and integrated with its own strong database like MS SQL server and VB scripting can be done to process the data according to the business rules set up while developing the application.

Two-tier HRIS Architecture

Two-tier architecture where user interface (tier 1) will be developed independently by using suitable GUI tools, which may not be from the same technology environment and database and application processing logic (commonly called tier 2) which could be developed by the tools from the same technology environment.

This architecture is also known as client server architecture. The user interface is generally installed with all clients and server has a set of application running in client server mode with very strong active database, which gets updated in real-time mode.

Let us take an example of ATM applications; we have lot of terminals across locations where customer can use the interface to operate their bank accounts. There are centralised servers, which work according to the instructions given by these clients or terminals by the authentic customers. The account database is immediately updated as soon as transaction is completed. This is called realtime processing. Most of the applications run on these ATMs are developed using Client Server architecture (two-tier).

Three-tier Architecture

Three-tier architecture, where the server plays two roles: a database server and an applications server.

With the development of two and three-tier architectures, HRIS professionals still manage user interface but the focus is more on processing demanding applications through application server, which is the middle layer in this type of architecture.

If, for example, two recruiters updated the same job position at the same time, a transaction processor would ensure that both updates were entered into the database. This allows several users to access the central database simultaneously.

This type of software, which perform tasks between the client and the database server is known as middleware − software that manage data and transactions before they are saved to the database. There are a couple of drawbacks with both 2-tier and 3-tier systems. First, a large amount of information has to move from the client computer across the network to the server to execute database transactions quickly, which necessitates the use of significant bandwidth or the ability to move lots of data quickly between computers.

Secondly, all clients need to have the user interface installed on their machines along with drivers to access the database from database server. The corollary issue of this requirement is that employees need to be trained on this application. Therefore, HRIS access is possible only within the organisation; that is, only those residing within the local area network of the organisation. This is typically called an intranet where HRIS can easily be installed and made available to all the employees of the organisation with suitable access controls.

For example, an organisation having 10,000 employees will be given those many accounts through which they can access the applications from the applications server and data from the data server, process it at the client side and save the processed data back to the data server.

Suppose an employee wants to apply for leave, he will access leave management application from the application server, run it on the client with suitable user interface, see the leave balance data from data server and submit the online leave form with leave details needed. Once it is approved by his manager, data is updated in database on server and the employee will get an alert about leave approval or rejection. Manager (approver) here will also get an alert on his machine when his team member applies for any leave. This also works in the same fashion as explained above.

N-tier HRIS Architecture

N-tier architecture works in a very complex and multiple platform environment. There will be multiple locations and multiple hardware and software environment within the organisation where applications servers, database servers and web servers transactwith each other on controlled manner.

In this type of architecture, all other components work as they function in earlier three types of architectures but in N-tier architecture, we have an additional component called web server/s. The internet browser communicates to one or more web servers through Hyper Text Markup Language (HTML). The web server manages various client sessions to accommodate many users at the same time. The web server passes requests to the application server, where the business logic for the application is executed.

Generally, Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) applications run on these types of architectures. Here HRIS, if works in this type of architecture, will also interact with other business applications installed on applications servers and help transact the entire business accordingly.

For example, when Payroll is run, these financial-related transactions need to be registered in the company’s General Ledger (GL) application. Typically, GL exists within the Financial/Accounting component of large ERP systems from SAP, Oracle and Microsoft. Therefore, GL transactions must be interfaced between Payroll and these systems.

---

System Implementation of HRIS

A project team has the main responsibility to ensure the organisation, groups and individuals accept and adopt the implementation of Human Resource Information System. Project implementation focuses on installing the newly built or purchased HRIS in the organisation. The implementation process requires a tactical plan that follows certain milestones from development and testing to the final product in use. The implementation of HRIS can follow one of the three approaches. These approaches are categorised as:

Each of these approaches has advantages and disadvantages which make it suitable for a certain project. Choosing the correct way of implementation of HRIS has a vast impact on the project to be successful or failure.

Direct Cutover

Direct cutover means that the project has a go live on an agreed date when the old HRIS is shut down and the new HRIS is turned on. This is the most effective way if the old HRIS is giving a poor performance or no HRIS exists at all, which requires an instant launching of the new HRIS.

It is critical to evaluate that the failure of the implementation does not heavily impact the organisation. The HRIS has to be tested thoroughly before using it. Direct cutover is quick but has problems as well associated with it. There is no way of going back if the old HRIS is shut down and the new one is not working. The organisation can suffer major delays, lose revenues and miss deadlines.

Parallel Implementation Approach

Parallel implementation approach allows the old HRIS and new HRIS to run concurrently for a certain time. This approach is handy if the new HRIS has problems and failures, which have a huge impact on the organisation.

This allows both HRISs to run at the same time when the organisation can compare the outputs of both systems. A parallel approach allows the organisation to see the functionality and proper performance before the old HRIS is turned off. This can be stressful for employees because entering data in two HRISs and comparing them requires more man-hours.

Phased Implementation Approach

Phased implementation approach allows accomplishing implementation in different parts. The first step is to implement employee information, secondly the objectives and finally performance management. This approach allows the project team to learn from the experiences during the implementation so the later implementation steps go smoothly. A phased approach implementation might take more time but it might not be so risky. Project management is easier for the project team.