SD Worx survey reveals the Power of Payroll

The results of SD Worx’s recent international survey are in! With 1,500 respondents from nine European markets, the survey reveals that up to 87% of business leaders are now asking for employee data to inform business decisions—HR and payroll data is now being regularly used by business leaders.

Out of the surveyed countries, the Netherlands lead the pack with 94% of business leaders likely to use payroll data to inform business decisions, with Ireland (93%) and the UK (89%) not far behind. Historically, payroll has been seen as an administration function, but it’s encouraging to see that, today, organisations are truly beginning to harness the power of payroll.

Alongside this, over half of the surveyed organisations had used payroll data within the last month, and a further quarter in the last week alone. Two thirds of the respondents in France used payroll data for employee appraisals and Ireland (54%), Austria (53%), the UK (52%), France (49%), the Netherlands (49%) and Germany (46%) utilised the power of payroll in providing information for the boardroom on performance, retention and employee churn.

This can only be good news for HR and payroll teams, as it is clear that data empowers not only these teams but their business as a whole, providing useful and strategic insights. HR and payroll data is not just static data: it can be utilised to play a powerful and strategic role in the business decision making process.

The data is certainly powerful for business decisions, yet 40% of HR and payroll professionals surveyed reported that it was ‘difficult’ or ‘very difficult’ to provide the HR and payroll data to business leaders. The survey found the biggest challenges are multiple systems (45%) and compliance (40%), followed by confusing data (31%)—so it’s clear that HR and payroll professionals still face challenges.

However, the changes that the future may bring could reduce these challenges. For example, 61% of respondents think that blockchain will be either important or critical in the HR and payroll industry, and 63% predict that artificial intelligence and automation will also shake things up in the months and years to come.

SD Worx has always understood the importance of HR technology, and the survey has only confirmed the need to embrace technology in order to utilise power of the otherwise static data that the departments can provide. SD Worx is working to help organisations fully embrace digitalisation in HR and payroll to aid the movement of this powerful data into the boardroom decision making process.

 

 

 

For more information on how SD Worx can help your global payroll needs, please contact us here, or for general enquiries email us at WeAreGlobal@sdworx.com.