Best Workforce Management Software List
Here’s a shortlist of the best workforce management software—find overviews of each below:
- Deel
Best workforce management platform for global teams
- Papaya Global
Best workforce management analysis & reports
- ADP Workforce Now
Best workforce management software with integrated time tracking tools
- Homebase
Best workforce management software for small businesses
- Paylocity
Best for employee performance management
- Oracle HCM Cloud
Best for mobile workforce management
- UZIO
Best integrated workforce management platform with HRIS and payroll
- SAP SuccessFactors
Best workforce management software for healthcare
- Fuse Workforce Management
Best for self-service scheduling
- BlueYonder
Best for remote workforce management
Workforce management has become a herculean task as HR processes grow, modernize, and evolve. The best workforce management software will include features that address everything from employee scheduling, attendance tracking, leave management, onboarding, benefits administration, call center optimization, HRIS, time tracking, and payroll systems—just to name a few!
In this article, I will outline some of the best, most reliable workforce management solutions to help you with everything from employee engagement to time & attendance management. I will also outline what each workforce HR software solution does best so that you can determine if it's right for you.
What Is Workforce Management Software?
Workforce management software (sometimes called a WMS, and sometimes called WFM software, depending on who you ask) is any digital tool designed to support the day-to-day operations of a workforce. This will most likely include many common human resource management tasks, such as timesheets, labor management forecasting, performance management, absence management, task management, and payroll software.
Some WMS might be a jack-of-all-trades and cover all of the above to varying degrees. Others might specialize in a few professional services only, or in some cases, just one of them.
WFM Software Comparison Criteria
Here’s a summary of my evaluation criteria:
- User Interface (UI): Workforce management needs the UI functionality to support ease-of-use for HR departments as well as intuitive employee self-service when necessary. Therefore, the interface should update in real-time, streamline navigation, and display aesthetic and modern workflows.
- Usability: Large scale WMS training often incurs additional labor costs so it's important for any software to be easy for a mobile workforce and/or HR management to figure out. Training should be timely, thorough, and accessible, and ongoing customer service assistance should be adequately provided.
- Integrations: Workforce management software is usually just one cog in a larger SaaS machine so it must be able to integrate (plug-in or API) with popular apps for staffing, task lifecycle automation, budgeting, employee time and clock in tools, shift scheduling software, and artificial intelligence. Does the software connect with a good variety of third-party apps and services easily?
- Value for $: Workforce management software pricing should be fair, flexible, and transparent for the needs of large enterprises as well as small businesses. Bonus: Does the cost include a mobile app, contact center support, and other perks?
WFM Tools Key Features
- Multi-platform support, including mobile - Workforces may use their own device or have a platform preference so WMS must be OS and device agnostic.
- Real time scheduling and time clock access anywhere - Time management and time keeping on-the-go is increasingly crucial to the mobile, remote, and hybrid workforce of today.
- Automated reporting for crucial metrics - Managers will need ROI metrics and KPIs readily available to save time as they navigate large-scale or remote workforces.
- Remote management oversight - Managers should be empowered to check on, reach out to, and follow up with agents at every level of the company.
- Talent acquisition and ongoing training - The bottom line is that your workforce is an asset to you and you should plan to spend resources in order to develop, train, and promote them.
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Overviews Of The 10 Best Workforce Management Software
Here’s a brief description of each of the workforce management solutions on my list showing what it does best, plus screenshots to showcase some of the features.
Deel
Best workforce management platform for global teams
Deel eliminates borders from your talent pool, enabling you to hire contractors or employees in over 150 countries. Their platform offers workforce management features for both contractors and employees.
For contractors, Deel helps you avoid contractor misclassification with legal-reviewed contracts, and provides multiple withdrawal options for accessing earnings. The platform provides a polished and consistent payments experience, using major payment providers like Wise, PayPal, Payoneer, and Revolut to offer withdrawals in the currency of the contractor’s choice. The company also offers cryptocurrency withdrawals through Coinbase, which Deel reports have been especially popular with contractors in Latin America.
For employees, Deel works as the employer of record handling payroll and benefits so you don’t need to open up a foreign entity. Deel’s full-featured UI also includes features like contract management, expense reimbursements, and off-cycle adjustments.
Deel also integrates with major HR and accounting platforms and complies with SOC2 and ISO 27001 security standards. They also have an Open API solution that allows developers to build their own connections with the Deel platform too.
Deel offers flat rate pricing upon request. You can also book a free demo through their website.
Papaya Global
Best workforce management analysis & reports
Papaya is an automated, SaaS platform that provides an end-to-end global workforce management solution with cross-border payments in 160+ countries. The platform supports all employee options (payroll, EoR, contractors), integrates with popular work management tools, and uses smart technology to ensure compliance and eliminate errors.
Papaya helps you simplify your international workforce management, eliminating spreadsheets and errors with their unified automated payroll solution. They boast 100% local compliance assured.
Papaya creates a highly visible system for tracking payroll spending and real-time business intelligence. You can get insights on who your workers are—by country, cost centers and more; see how well you’re attracting and keeping top talent, and why they chose to leave; and clearly visualize where your company stands in equity of gender, age and pay—by department and seniority structure.
Papaya costs from $20/employee/month and comes with a free trial.
ADP Workforce Now
Best workforce management software with integrated time tracking tools
ADP is a well-known and trusted HR software company with over 70 years of experience. Their cloud-based ADP Workforce Now product is a modern HCM solution that combines core HR functions with payroll processing, time and attendance tracking, talent management, benefits management, performance management, a recruiting system, and hiring and onboarding tools. Their Workforce Now product is designed specifically for small to medium-sized businesses, but can be scaled up to one of their more robust offerings as your business grows.
Their flexible time tracking and attendance module includes useful features like automated alerts, overtime calculation rules, and timecard approvals. They also have a mobile app for employees where they can view work schedules, swap shifts, request time off, or clock in and out using their geo-location. Their time and attendance module also links employee working hours directly to payroll, removing a lot of unnecessary (but common!) administrative wrangling that your team will happily leave behind.
ADP Workforce Now is available in 140 countries, and integrates with many popular software systems, including Absorb LMS, Avionte, ClearCompany, Clockshark, Deputy, Dolce, FinancialForce, Infor, JazzHR, Oracle, PayActiv, PlanSource, QuickBooks, Replicon, Sage Intacct, SAP SuccessFactors, Sapling, TempWorks, Wave, When I Work, Workday, Xero, ZipRecruiter, 7shifts Restaurant Scheduling, and many more.
ADP costs from $160/month for up to 49 employees and offers a 30-day free trial. You can currently get 2-months free when you sign up for payroll processing.
Homebase
Best workforce management software for small businesses
Homebase's workforce management software helps businesses optimize their employee work schedules and ensure that all employees are in sync. Homebase allows employers to build a schedule using their templates and auto-scheduling functions, then share it with their workforce.
Employers can send reminders for upcoming shifts through automatic text messages, and adjust schedules in real-time, when necessary. Any schedule changes or updates are made visible to employees through automatic alerts, with an up-to-date schedule always available through their built-in calendar.
Homebase’s employee scheduling features also come with functionalities to send alerts to avoid overtime, post available shifts for employees to claim, track availability to avoid scheduling conflicts, add notes and reminders for specific instructions, and track labor costs associated with work hours.
In addition to its scheduling features, Homebase also includes features to improve workforce morale and operations in general. These other features include PTO tracking & time off requests, shoutouts to celebrate employee wins, employee feedback collection, and in-platform communication tools for employees to coordinate shift trades.
Integrations are available with a handful of popular HR platforms, including ADP, Gusto, Paychex, Quickbooks, Rippling, Square Payroll, and SurePayroll, as well as with several point-of-sale providers.
Homebase is an ideal workforce management software for small businesses since many features are available in their Basic plan for free. Paid plans cost from $20/month per location, with payroll services available as an add-on for $6/employee/month plus a $39/month base fee.
Paylocity
Best for employee performance management
Paylocity is an HR and payroll provider with reliable solutions for taxes, expenses, recruiting, onboarding, employee development, compensation management, and benefits administration. Their mobile-friendly experience is great for modern employees who want access on-the-go with any smart device. They have an extensive apps marketplace and API library for easy integration opportunities.
Paylocity gamifies performance management, giving it a “social media” feel where users can pass kudos to one another for specific tasks, actions, or behaviors. They provide a built-in social hub to foster community in a way that breaks down departmental silos. Peer recognition and feedback survey tools help teams to feel engaged with the process of ongoing performance management.
Paylocity costs from $45/month plus an added $4/user/month. They offer a free demo.
Oracle HCM Cloud
Best for mobile workforce management
Oracle Workforce Management connects time, labor, and leave management with payroll, financial, and personnel data in a single system solution. Managers will be able to navigate global absences while enabling local customization, configure rules and policies, and track absence trends and areas of low employee productivity. They also have Oracle Mobile Workforce Management (MWM), their highly functional, fully featured smartphone app companion.
Like all things Oracle, the platform comes with a bit of a learning curve but is well worth investing time into to unlock the potential of the full feature set. You’ll have access to assets like self-service compensation charts for employees, profitability and cost management dashboards, and easy incident reporting. Oracle offers many first-party digital solutions that, wholly integrated, can handle most of your business needs without leaving the platform.
Oracle Workforce Management costs from $13/user/month for a minimum of 1000 employees. They offer a free demo.
UZIO
Best integrated workforce management platform with HRIS and payroll
UZIO is an all-in-one platform for your HR needs from onboarding to off-boarding. The modules in the premium suite (hiring, documents, communication, compensation, and paychex flex) integrate with each other and any information that’s changed gets updated across the platform in real-time. UZIO also provides a self-service platform for your employees to check their own pay stubs, benefits status, vacation accrual, and other quality-of-life details.
UZIO equips you with all the HR, payroll, and benefits management-related tools, including legal protection and compliance, and their customer service team that will set it all up for you. Pick between payroll, HRIS, time tracking, benefits administrations, or some/all of the above to fully customize your workforce management solution.
UZIO costs from $4/user/month per module. They offer a demo and a 30-day free trial.
SAP SuccessFactors
Best workforce management software for healthcare
SAP stands for “Systems, Applications, and Products in Data Processing” and was founded in 1972 in Walldorf, Germany. Originally specializing in enterprise resource planning, they now do workforce management as well, including features for employee development and internal promotions. According to their site, 7 out of the top 10 hospitals in the world currently use SAP for workforce management where ongoing learning and lateral movement is particularly useful.
SAP SuccessFactor can connect natively to a whole host of first-party SAP digital product offerings, like financial planning systems, accounting, supplier management, and core HR and payroll. This is ideal for customer-centric healthcare solutions that could benefit from streamlined vendor management for the sake of data security, if nothing else.
SAP SuccessFactors has solutions that start at $2.18/user and has software packages starting from $1000+/package. The tool offers a free trial.
Fuse Workforce Management
Best for self-service scheduling
Fuse Workforce Management is a cloud-based human capital management (HCM) solution with a suite of management features, real-time analytics about your workforce, ACA management tools for compliance, time-tracking and absence systems, and payroll. They boast a marketplace of third-party tools for high customizability. Their self-service workforce scheduling tool stands out, as it is super intuitive, mobile-friendly, and feature-rich. Change and PTO requests can be handled right in the portal.
Fuse WM helps you manage the entire employee lifecycle with their cloud-based HR services. You can leverage administrative process automation, ready-to-go hiring and training workflow templates, and applicant tracking tools to keep things running smoothly. They also offer built-in notifications and alerts that flag issues around potential employee scheduling conflicts.
Fuse Workforce Management costs from $18/user/month and offers a free demo.
BlueYonder
Best for remote workforce management
BlueYonder is a workforce management solution with engagement and employee productivity at the forefront of its design. If you have a full- or partially-remote workforce in today’s day and age, you are going to want a modern, collaborative, user-friendly, and colorful platform like BlueYonder at your fingertips. They have the sleak UX of modern workforce apps while still boasting robust features for skill-based scheduling, volume forecasting, and detailed service reporting.
While most of the WMS on this list can handle remote teams to some degree, BlueYonder Workforce Management does it especially well. They prioritize multi-source analytics on an all-in-one dashboard, extreme user friendliness for onboarding remote teams, and an excellent data and document management solution built right into the platform.
BlueYonder Workforce Management offers customized pricing upon request.
Best Workforce Management Software Summary
Tool | Free Option | Price | ||
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Deel Best workforce management platform for global teams | Free demo available | From $49/user/month | Visit Website |
2 | Papaya Global Best workforce management analysis & reports | Free trial available | From $25/employee/pay cycle | Visit Website |
3 | ADP Workforce Now Best workforce management software with integrated time tracking tools | 30-day free trial | From $160/month for up to 49 employees | Visit Website |
4 | Homebase Best workforce management software for small businesses | Freemium version available (unlimited employees) | From $20/month (payroll add-on is $6/user/month + $39/month) | Visit Website |
5 | Paylocity Best for employee performance management | Free demo available | From $45/month plus an added $4/user/month | Visit Website |
6 | Oracle HCM Cloud Best for mobile workforce management | Free demo available | From $13/user/month for a minimum of 1000 employees | Visit Website |
7 | UZIO Best integrated workforce management platform with HRIS and payroll | 30-day free trial | From $4/month/employee | Visit Website |
8 | SAP SuccessFactors Best workforce management software for healthcare | Free trial available | From $2.18/user and has software packages starting from $1000+/package | Visit Website |
9 | Fuse Workforce Management Best for self-service scheduling | Free demo | From $18/user/month | Visit Website |
10 | BlueYonder Best for remote workforce management | Not available | Pricing upon request | Visit Website |
Other Workforce Management Software
Here’s a few more workforce management systems that didn’t make the top list:
- Alvaria Workforce Engagement Suite
Best workforce management dashboard
- SumTotal Workforce Management
Best workforce learning app
- Verint Workforce Management
Best for contingent workforce management planning
- Calabrio Workforce Management
Best workforce management software for call centers
- SwipedOn Pocket
Best for location-based workforce management
- Rippling
Best all-in-one workforce management platform for HR, payroll and IT functions
- ClickUp
Best workload visualization tool for workforce management
- Remote
Best global workforce management for international teams
- injixo
Best for cloud-based contact centers
- When I Work
Best free workforce management software
Related Read: 10 Best Succession Planning Software To Develop Future Leaders In 2023
Similar Software
Workforce management software is similar to these other tools if you’d like to check out the comparison articles on these:
- Staffing software
- Benefits administration software
- Performance management
- Employee management systems and similarly, talent management systems
Which Workforce Management Software Do You Recommend?
What do you think of the workforce management tools on this list? Do you currently use any workforce management systems? What core HR ERP would you add to this list? Let me know in the comments.
Need Expert Help Selecting The Right Workforce Management Software?
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Not sure if your organization is ready for a workforce optimization tool yet, but you still need help with payroll management? Here's an article on how you can Keep Your Payroll On Time, All The Time.
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