If you are researching HR technology, you are probably doing so for one or two reasons. 1) You need an improvement to the system you currently use and are looking for an employee management app that has more (or better) features than what you are used to. 2) You are a growing business looking to implement employee management software for the first time. Either way, we can help.
Whether you are here to find a new tool or perhaps introducing an employee management system for the first time, this article will help you quickly compare and evaluate the best employee management system along with other human resources software. So let’s dive in!
The Best Employee Management Systems
- monday.com - Best for employee time & task tracking
- SAP SuccessFactors - Best EMS for enterprises
- Workday - Best for business & professional services companies
- PeopleSoft (Oracle) - Best for flexibility & customizability
- 15five - Best for employee performance management
- BlueTree - Best for contract employee management
- Square - Best for employee time tracking
- Saba - Best targeted employee development plans
- Kissflow - Best project & task management for HR
- Bullhorn - Best for employee staffing & recruitment
HR Management Tools Comparison Criteria
What are we looking for when we are looking for HR online systems and tools? Here’s a summary of my evaluation criteria:
- User Interface (UI): Is it clean and attractive?
- Usability: Is it easy to learn and master? Does the company offer good tech support, user support, tutorials, and training?
- Features & Functionality:
- Engagement and Productivity – Are there features designed to encourage employee engagement and monitor satisfaction and other moods? Are there any productivity tools that can be put to use?
- Employee Record Keeping – Is there a functional employee database for record-keeping? Are the employee records easily searchable? Can you search with filters and keywords?
- Surveys & Feedback – Are employees encouraged or enabled to provide some sort of feedback? Is work culture signifiers like mood, conflict, and satisfaction recorded somehow?
- Real-Time Reporting and Analysis – Are the reporting features useful and intuitive? Is there a variety of export and visualization options? Can you easily pull information for top performers?
- Integrations: Is it easy to connect with other tools? Any pre-built integrations? This is not strictly vital for employee management software but is a huge plus.
- Value for $: How appropriate is the price for the features, capabilities, and use case? Is pricing clear, transparent and flexible?
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Overviews of Top 10 HR Management Software
Here’s a brief description of each of the employee information systems that are featured on this top 10 list.
monday.com - Best for employee time & task tracking
monday.com's schedules, timelines, dashboards, and reports give you a birds-eye-view of your employees' work progress so you can spot potential issues or celebrate daily successes.
SAP SuccessFactors - Best EMS for enterprises
SAP SuccessFactor boasts advanced HR tools like the payroll control center sampled above.
SAP SuccessFactor is an engagement-focus HR tool that offers flexible employee surveys, role-based dashboards and reporting, customizable impact reports, event-based triggers, and employee rewards programs.
SAP SuccessFactor scored highly in regards to the Value for Cost criteria. Not only does it have a very reasonable entry price but the software also has a free trial, ensuring potential customers are only paying for a tool they are comfortable with.
There is a bit of a coherence issue with the different modules they offer, which were once separate “add on” products and which still often feel that way. The meshing from one module item to the next is often clumsy, resulting in additional menuing or log-ins.
SAP SuccessFactors starts at $8/user/month and has a free trial.
Workday - Best for business & professional services companies
Track turnover, movement, and other data.
Workday has employee management systems for medium- and large-sized businesses and offers tools to recruit and develop team talent with features like head-count visualization, financial trend analysis, and support for regulations such as probation and notice periods.
Workday is both extremely user-friendly and has a smart, clean interface design. This scored them favorably in both the usability and UX categories of the evaluation criteria.
Reporting functions are a bit lackluster compared to other software in the field; the tool doesn’t do a great job of ingesting equity data, particularly vesting data.
Workday offers pricing upon request.
PeopleSoft (Oracle) - Best for flexibility & customizability
Manage your job listings and related info.
PeopleSoft is an Oracle-owned SaaS solution with tools for absence management, benefits navigation, compensation, a HelpDesk for HR, payroll interface, pension administration, performance and recruiting, and time and labor tracking.
PeopleSoft is superbly easy to get started on, with minimal training required to get the software up and running. Users with low tech skills shouldn’t have a problem adapting. This scored them well in the Usability section of the evaluation.
The ability to edit or delete comments would be an ideal update. Additionally, there can be some issues with frequent downtime and timing out, the latter sometimes resulting in the inability to log back in from the originating browser.
PeopleSoft by Oracle doesn’t list their pricing publicly on their site but, reportedly, they follow a per-user + per-service pricing model. Ie. $185/employee for human resources + $85/employee for benefits + $225/employee for payroll, and so on.
15five - Best for employee performance management
Surveys designed to gauge staff mood.
Used by Spotify and HubSpot, 15five is designed to build an engaging work culture through weekly check-ins, dedicated 1-on-1s, self-review tools, and a recognition system whereby employees can pass along “High Fives” for good work.
15five’s array of mood and wellbeing tests make it stand out as an HR tool with a purpose. The UX is colorful, easy to use, and many functions are gamified, making it ripe for user adoption.
This employee management system lost a few marks in the evaluation section for Features – Reporting, as there was no way to prioritize or sort manager-assigned “High Fives” in order to better draw out top performers.
15five starts at $4/user/month (billed annually) and has a free trial.
BlueTree - Best for contract employee management
Use BlueTree to store employee details and update information.
BlueTree is a contract employee management system (CEMS) designed to streamline the onboarding process with employee onboarding modules that can be configured based on job role, geographic location, or other variables.
BlueTree did well in the Integrations segment of the evaluation criteria, as they promise full connection with leading WMS solutions. Their website lists contract employee-related data, optimized scheduling, and budgeted labour costs as a few of the integration specialties.
This tool is hyper-focused on managing contract workers specifically. Thus, one con of the software is that it may not be as adept at offering features for other scenarios.
BlueTree offers pricing upon request.
Square - Best for employee time tracking
Use your phone/tablet to clock out for breaks.
Square, known for flexible selling tools, now offers HR functions. Employees can clock in and out right from the device. Paid and unpaid breaks are tracked, overtime is automatically calculated, and Timecards are accurately totaled.
One of the major pros of using Square is its huge assortment of integration options within their marketplace: WooCommerce, GoDaddy, Xero, Quickbooks, OpenCart, Chargify, Appointy, Sku IQ, Craver, GoGoGuest, Homebase, Tsheets, JotForm, EventOffice, Eventzilla, Mailchimp, and many more.
Due to a reliance on smartphones and other portable devices, Square may not be appropriate for high-risk industries due to security concerns. This is one con of the software.
Square is free to use, though they keep a portion of each payment you collect.
Saba - Best targeted employee development plans
Staff reviews and compensation notes.
With over 33 million users to date, Saba is an HR solution that focuses on ways to decrease turnover, optimize the workforce organization, prepare succession planning, and build the employer brand in a way that attracts top-quality talent.
Saba scored well in the Usability section of the evaluation, simply because of the vast number of resources they offer for training and learning. They have eBooks, guides, templates, checklists, webinars, product tours, How-Tos, and case studies.
Software navigation is not entirely intuitive. For example, user data is split into multiple centers in the backend, the User Center and the Appraisal Process, which can be a bit confusing.
Saba offers pricing upon request and has a free demo.
Kissflow - Best project & task management for HR
Field vacation requests digitally.
Kissflow is a project management tool with plenty of features specific to HR, like time tracking capabilities, a task activity stream, applicant tracking, onboarding, performance management, leave requests, and attendance management.
Integration options are a strong point of the software, evaluating favorably in that regard. Connection possibilities include Quickbooks, Google Suite, Dropbox, DocuSign, WebMerge, SAP, Oracle, Salesforce, and more.
A few points were lost due to the price of this software, which is a bit high comparatively and might discourage small-to-mid-sized companies from giving it a try.
Kissflow starts at $360/month for up to 30 users and offers a 14-day free trial.
Bullhorn - Best for employee staffing & recruitment
Easily review candidates for job openings.
Bullhorn has a whole range of items useful for HR management built for staffing firms, like recruiting and applicant tracking tools, middle and back-office support, onboarding software, and their “Pulse” relationship intelligence feature.
Bullhorn scored well in the integration segment of the evaluation criteria, as it promotes a dedicated solution for VMS and ATS integration. Bullhorn can connect with the likes of Fieldglass, Beeline, IQ Navigator, and at least 40 other options.
Internal search capabilities were a bit weak, making the database a bit of a slog to navigate. It’s mostly built for staffing agencies and may not be appropriate for companies just looking for internal HR.
Bullhorn starts at $300/month.
Best Employee Management Systems Software Summary
Other Employee Management Systems
Here’s a few more that didn’t make the top list. If you need additional suggestions for handy HR systems, check these out.
- ConnectTeam – All-in-one employee management app with time clocks, scheduling, task management, and communications. Free for up to 50 users.
- Remote – Free basic contractor management platform with paid upgrades for employee benefits, payroll, and IP & invention rights.
- Peakon – Measure and improve employee engagement with personnel surveys, advanced segmentation, and targeted questionnaires.
- Bamboo HR – Tools for hiring, onboarding, preparing compensation, and/or building culture with robust data collection and analytics.
- Hubstaff – Employee monitoring software with the ability to track app/URL activity and capture activity levels based on keyboard and mouse usage.
- ActivTrack – Generate insightful reports and trends for employee performance and discover who on your team is disengaged or headed that way.
- Lanteria – Human resource software based on SharePoint and Office 365 with org charts, employee profiles, and out-of-the-box reports.
- Gusto – Billed as HR software for small business, this tool features full-service payroll, benefits management, and time tracking.
- Lattice – A people management platform with features around feedback/reviewing, collaboration, team agendas, and goal setting.
- Zoho People – HR management with a new hire portal, customizable workflows, checklists status-view reports, and an attendance tracker.
- Ultimate Software – Managed HR services like payroll, benefits, tax filing, wage-attachment disbursement, check printing, and more.
- Litmos – A training platform that automates communications and tracking, as well as provides built-in reporting and dashboards.
- Namely – An award-winning people operations platform with tools for engagement, onboarding, payroll, and analytics.
Worker Management Software FAQ
Have some questions about employee management systems before we dive into our summaries and reviews? Start here.
Employee management focuses on the employee to ensure they are performing their best in order to achieve bigger organizational goals. In doing so, teams can capitalize on employee strengths and needs to maximize on a functional and efficient workplace.
Employee management systems are useful for running a smooth organization, especially organizations of scale. It assists HR personnel to keep track of employee information such as salary details, medical information, attendance/leave records, overall performance and more.
A leave management system is a type of worker management software that allows automated leave requests to be processed. This activity tends to be a time-consuming task for the HR department to ensure a sufficient amount of staff within the organization at all times. This system makes the process painless for both managers and employees.
Human Resource Information System (HRIS) is a valuable process that allows businesses to organize and streamline all data in consolidated hr software. This saves time, resources, and budget to simplify work and efficiency within organizations. Information such as departments, pay rates, benefits selection, and employee job information can be utilized in an HRIS system.
What’s Your Top Employee Management System?
Any of the tools above can be of help to employees managers, it’s just a matter of deciding which one is best for you. Have you tried out any employee management systems listed above? Do you have an HR tool that you would add to the list? Let us know in the comments.
Looking into a more comprehensive solution such as ERP Software or maybe a less comprehensive solution? Check these lists out:
