How do you ensure a safe transition when outsourcing your HR processes? Cognizant’s expert Anne Maibauer is called on when companies want guidance on how to improve existing HR processes or when starting new solutions and projects.
Anne Maibauer holds eight years of experience from Cognizant’s Global Center of Excellence for HR, situated in Norway, and is supporting several of the largest businesses in the Nordics. Her title is Solution architect HR which means she’s a central part of the team when clients want help analyzing, restructuring, and improving their organization and processes. For example, when processes are being transferred to Cognizant or when larger projects and concepts are being kicked off.
“Before we start, we always have a thorough and detailed plan. That covers all details down to weeks and days and describes what processes that are to be transferred, how we achieve process knowledge, when processes are being transferred, and what it takes to do it,” Maibauer says.
Shadows the client’s employees
How Maibauer and her colleagues go about the project depends on how mature the processes are and to what degree they are standardized.
“It’s important to know if a client has a centralized or distributed HR function and what kind of experience they have with outsourcing processes.”
To achieve knowledge about a process, Cognizant uses tools like shadowing client employees when they work on the processes at hand.
“It is critical to understand how the processes work because every business and department is unique and have their way of solving tasks. We don’t take any risks with important matters like salary, laws, and regulations,” Maibauer says.
When the Cognizant team has the knowledge it needs, the team will start working on the process flow and ways of improving things to secure quality and efficiency.
A clear governance plan
As a foundation in all client agreements, there is a thorough governance plan, put together with the client’s experts in the respective fields.
“The plan is the recipe for how our assignment is to be solved and secures rapid action if there are any kinds of deviances,” says Maibauer.
Maibauer exemplifies with a large industry vendor where Cognizant committed to delivering consistent cost savings over five years. An important prerequisite was a thorough project start and how the team was put together with specialists within salary and automation, and strategic HR experts.
“The process of handing it over to us took about three months and we now have a model to use where time is increasingly reduced for each new client.”
Can offer much more
Maibauer believes it is an advantage for the clients that Cognizant knows all the processes in the value chain. Cognizant also holds the experience of advising about the positive and negative consequences that arise with important changes.
“We can show up with experienced resources in everything from strategy to deployment in all countries. We have a global team and are present where the clients need us.”
Also, Maibauer says the collaboration between different professions within Cognizant makes it possible to put together teams with experts within automation, integration, tech solutions, and finance.
“This gives better support when we are working on digital change. We free up the client’s time so they can focus on strategic areas like recruiting, further educating employees and creating the best user experiences surrounding their services. Besides, we invest heavily and develop technology so that our clients can access tools and solutions that they otherwise wouldn’t have been able to finance themselves.”
No need for several vendors
The latter is also what Maibauer believes is Cognizant’s main strength. Clients don’t need several different vendors. Instead, they get one collaborative partner that drives their process improvement and anchors HR closely to the other departments and divisions.
“We are the digitalizing partner that assists clients in using new technology and works across all departments in a company. That’s what makes us stand out. We do what we promise and give advice about what clients should do to achieve their strategic goals to become even better,” says Maibauer.
Global businesses are experiencing major disruptions driven by digitalization, and the HR departments are at the front line. What will HR of the future look like? Will operational tasks to be taken over by robots? How can outsourcing of HR processes empower a more strategic approach? Download our whitepaper with a focus on HR in the Nordics.
