Build HRIS specifications that really work for you

HRIS specifications: the feature list is the classic trap

Most HRIS specifications take the form of a three-hundred-line table, each line marked mandatory or desirable. The document is reassuring, it structures the consultation, and it regularly leads to choosing the wrong tool. Because a vendor can tick three hundred boxes and still be unsuited to your organisation.

What the list does not say

A ticked box says nothing about how the feature is used, what it costs to configure, or whether it talks to the rest. Two solutions can both answer yes to “leave management” and differ radically: one applies your collective agreement, the other requires custom development for each specific rule.

The table captures features, never workflows. Yet it is in the workflows that day-to-day work happens: a booked absence must block time entry, a review must feed the training plan, a departure must close access and stop the balances.

Start from your pain points, not from a template

Useful specifications start with a short list: the five situations that cost you the most time today, described concretely. How many requests per month about leave balances. How many hours to prepare variable pay items. How many reminders to get timesheets in.

These situations then become scenarios to walk through in a demo, on your own rules. A vendor who walks through your real case in a demo teaches you infinitely more than a table filled in by a presales consultant.

The questions that really make the difference

A few questions separate solutions far more effectively than a list of features. Does configuration require custom development, or can you do it yourself? Who can build a report: an administrator or any user? Where is the data hosted, and what does the vendor allow itself to do with it?

One last question, often forgotten: what happens when you want to leave? Reversibility and permanent access to your data are checked at the time of choosing, not at the time of leaving.

The question of scope

Many specifications include payroll because it is the most visible topic. It is a common assembly error: payroll is a regulated profession, with its own constraints for keeping up with the law. An HRIS that prepares and transmits the data to specialist payroll software often serves you better than a solution that claims to do everything.

Nicoka HRIS does not calculate payroll and produces neither payslips nor declarations. Variable pay items go to your payroll software through predefined interfaces. See HR finance.

Key takeaways

• A vendor can tick three hundred boxes and still be unsuited to your organisation.
• The table captures features, never the workflows between modules.
• Start from your five quantified pain points, not from a specifications template.
• Have your real cases walked through in a demo rather than filling in a questionnaire.
• Check reversibility at the time of choosing, not at the time of leaving.

Nicoka HRIS is developed and hosted in France. To go further: all features, the stages of an HRIS project, security and compliance page.