Efficient Leave Management Using Online Software

Efficiency is one of the most important things to focus on when running a company. Choosing the right leave management software can help improve employees’ performance.

In the modern world, where remote work and flexible working times are becoming more and more popular (according to Forbes), time management is one of the key factors for increasing the productivity of employees. This is true not only for the HR specialists, but everyone in the organization – from CEOs and managers to junior specialists.

Why is leave management software worth introducing?

When thinking of HR management (HRM), the first thing that comes to mind is leave management. Absence tracking solutions indeed make the work of HR specialists easier, but it can also be a powerful tool. When used smartly, it can be a place that unites all employees and allows them to gain important information that can be crucial at some stages of realizing a project.

Besides calculating days-off and automating the process of periodic work time reports, HRM systems can offer amenities such as showing the absence calendar of a team, department, or whole company, providing an easy means for requesting and accepting leave requests with access for employees to their vacation days.

Software like Calamari can also make it easier to organize work in multinational teams where public holidays are often on different days. That information is very helpful when planning projects in time.

Benefits of an absence and leave management tool

HR software can make work in the organization easier and better optimized in many ways. Depending on one’s position, the profits are different. It’s important to know them all before deciding on choosing the right tool for your company.

Benefits for team managers

Managers need to be great planners who can predict many possibilities – such as situations when a crucial team member won’t show up for work when they’re needed. Thanks to management software like Calamari, they can easily check the availability of their employees to correctly plan work on a given project.

This task isn’t so complicated in small companies based in the same place, but it’s getting more and more complex with the company’s growth. Also, when managing a remote team, especially one based in different countries, good planning based on actual and reliable data about employees’ absences can not only prevent time loss, but actually increase income.

Time is crucial, so the process of requesting a day off and the subsequent acceptance process should be as short and easy as possible. When using Calamari, those processes take only a few clicks. When applying for a day-off, the employee can add additional information to requests (files, their spare allocation for the absence time, and the reason for requesting it). This additional data can make deciding to accept a request even easier.

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The support view for managers shows the overlapping absences of other team members, important company events and holidays added to the calendar.

With the possibility of integrating HR management tools with common office software, it’s possible to apply and accept leave days using various methods, like Slack or Google Calendar, so that absences can be visible in Google Workplace.

Benefits for employees

It’s not only managers’ work which becomes easier with a well-suited absence management software. For employees, requesting time off online, without involving the HR department, and with a possibility to see their vacation limits is quick and easy.

Employees can get their answer within minutes. Before requesting, they can check the vacation calendar to see who will be absent at the time they want to take a leave day. In case many people have already booked their leaves, they can choose a different day and save their and their manager’s time.

By using the company’s vacation calendar, employees can also plan their tasks so they won’t have to wait for the absent person who’s needed for the project. To save time, they can plan their weeks in a way that optimizes work time and increases their efficiency without the need to work overtime and get tired.

If leave day records are stored in the HR software, they give both employees and the manager the proof of the exact working time. In case of any inaccuracies, it’s easy to detect the source of the mistake. And, by giving people access to their day-off limits, they can plan their leaves smartly during the year. That gives them a chance to take at least one long vacation, so they can properly rest and not be overworked at the end of the year.

Benefits for HR specialists

The department which most obviously benefits from leave management software is HR. Employees from Human Resources have many responsibilities that take a lot of time to prepare, such as:

• periodic leave days report
• worked time reports
• managing the absence requests

HRM systems were created to help them in their daily tasks, to make the work quicker, and to allow HR specialists to focus more on creating work culture, taking care of employees’ well-being, and recruiting the best specialists.

With automatic data collection about the working time of every employed person in the organization, software like Calamari enables the creation of reports with only a few clicks. The people responsible for preparing those reports can choose which data should be included.

Automation makes it easier to detect various kinds of inconsistencies in work time, employee lateness, and overtime. In case of any ambiguities, it is possible to access the data from any place at any time, which makes it possible for both employee and employer to prove their presence at work.

Giving managers and employees the possibility to plan leave days makes it faster to decide and plan vacations. It is possible because of the access to time-off limits and the leave calendar of the organization. It helps HR specialists save time, which can be better spent focusing on recruitment.

Integration with popular business tools

Creating one internal system where all information easily flows between employees instantly is the best way to increase the efficiency of the whole organization. It makes project planning easier, vacation requests more thoughtful, and takes less time to add corrections into the plan or take care of something unexpected.

It’s a simple way to not only save money but also increase income. That’s why, when choosing leave management software, it’s important to check all the available integrations and get familiar with the API documentation (assuming there is an API shared ). That can make the information flow a lot easier.

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The best example is Slack – an online business communicator with many useful features like channels, statuses, and, of course – integrations. It’s possible to use a Slackbot of the HR software to inform employees about the upcoming events and absences of their colleagues. Additionally, some systems can also offer reminders about the beginning and the end of the workday, as well as birthday reminders so employees can celebrate together.

Using Slack integrated with Calamari, a company can give people the possibility to start and finish their shifts and breaks using the communicator. They can also apply for a leave day and their managers can use the Slack integrations to accept the application.

Among other popular tools that are useful to be integrated with HRM software are:

• Google Calendar
• Jira
• Asana
• Basecamp
• Google G Suite (nom: Google Workplace),
• Microsoft Teams

By integrating the HRM tool with them, all employees can get notifications about the changes in the vacation calendar and stay up to date about the availability of their colleagues.

By sharing API documentation, clients can integrate HRM systems with their internal tools. It is also possible to create a whole new method of clocking in and out of work – like using the company’s ID cards.

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Using mobile apps

Just like in every industry – things evolve and change according to people’s needs. That is why the best HR management software provides mobile apps.

They make using the system more flexible. With the possibility to access data all the time, employees can check their day-off limits and request a leave day using their phones. Of course, managers can also use the mobile version of the time tracking and leave management software to accept or deny the request.

If the mobile app is well optimized, it’s very easy to check the current attendance list, upcoming absences and events.

Mobile access is also very useful in remote work. It makes it easier and faster to request a day off. Using the iOS or Android’s version of HRM software is intuitive, and it’s a great alternative to the web version, especially in the case of those employees who travel a lot in their job and have no access to their laptops all the time.

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Summary

Increasing the efficiency of the organization is the new priority in the modern world. Saving money and time is easy in this process.

Using HR management systems allows companies to optimally use their time in the office thanks to making information available in real-time. The flexibility and potential to be a support tool for every department in the organization makes leave management a tasty morsel for employers who aim for success.

The article was published in cooperation with Calamari. 

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