Supervisors Need All of the Help They Can Get

June 23, 2008 · Filed Under Learning and Living 

I know you may be tired of me hawking this supervisor handbook software from Gradience but you have to understand: this software seriously saved me about a weeks worth of time (40 hours) working on something that I absolutely loath. The problem is, I can put it off more and more but that only creates more work for me as the supervisors don’t know what’s going on.

So this is my review of the software as I plunked out the manual. Here a screenshot from the final product in Microsoft Word:

Supervisor Screenshot 300x233

So here it is, the moment you’ve all been waiting for.

Pros:

  • Great interface. It is very intuitive and needs little instruction.
  • Includes almost everything you can think of (and more). The only thing it doesn’t include are those specific company policies
  • Industry and state customizable. It is preloaded with all 50 states, a couple handfuls of industries and a wizard interface to determine whether you qualify for FMLA coverage or Affirmative Action.
  • Exports into Word or PDF format. Exporting into Word is especially helpful.
  • Lots of little things you don’t think of. Like inserting the HR manager’s name, phone number and e-mail address in every instance if you want it.
  • Save a ton of time trying to get information from a bunch of places into one tidy manual
  • Written in an easy to read format. Less legalese for our supervisors to interpret.

Cons:

  • Difficulty adding company specific policies outside of the pre-selected areas. The software is robust in its coverage but I did have some company specific sections I wanted to add. I know the software is capable but it was easier to just add it to the exported product
  • Formatting of the final product is basic and plain
  • For multi-state companies, you have to make complete handbooks specific for each state

The cons were pretty much fixed by the fact that you can export it to Word and add and format to your heart’s content. For the multi-state issue, I made a non-state specific supervisor’s handbook and took the necessary elements from each state and added it to a state supplement that would go along side of the supervisor manual.

Overall, the software is a great time saver. The content is generic (though customizable based on industry/state) and the formating basic but this is obviously to appeal to their wider audience. In my case, I was just happy to save myself 40+ hours of content creation in favor of a half to full day of editing and adding bits and formatting it to my heart’s content. In the HR software world, there are a lot of applications for employee handbook creation but one for supervisors is hard to find.

So now that I have saved myself from the nights and weekends of working to complete this, I can blog at you more often. Lucky you!

This post is sponsored by Gradience Software

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Comments

One Response to “Supervisors Need All of the Help They Can Get”

  1. Michael Williams on June 26th, 2008 10:42 am

    One headache (out of many!) in HR is the absence planning process, especially at medium to large sized organizations. Spreadsheets are the most common way companies are tracking and planning employee absences which can be very frustrating, confusing and most of all, time consuming.

    TimeTECH’s Absence Planning Module can automate this process and manage your employee’s absences.
    APM (Absence Planning Module) is a powerful planning tool that gives supervisors and department heads a complete picture of employee absences. It helps them to evaluate how personal entitlement to time off can be balanced against future operational needs. In terms of operational needs, the module supports defining “Coverage Groups”: Any group of employees can be defined as Coverage Groups e.g. a department, team or even people (from separate departments) with a certain field of expertise. Individual employees can be associated with multiple Coverage Groups. Thus, intelligently decide whether to approve, decline or offer alternative dates.

    Some benefits of using Absence Planning Module:

    •Managers see the “entire picture” before they approve/decline a scheduled absence. No more “last minute surprises”!
    •Integration with Absence Tracking and Benefit Accruals allows real forecasting based on actual corporate policies and the employee’s seniority (if applied).
    •Integration with TimeKeeper ensures no unnecessary duplication of data.
    •Easy to Use
    •Straight-forward “Drag & Drop” schedule interface
    •Coverage and negative balance alerts pop-up dynamically

    The Absence Planning Module can be one of many modules TimeTECH can implement when automating your workforce management/time and attendance practices.

    [Reply]

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