Study: More Using HR Apps on Mobile Devices

ADP, which serves 620,000 clients in more than 125 countries, revealed in a new study that 37 percent of registered mobile users access their pay information via mobile HR applications, compared with 23 percent who use desktops and laptops.

Because “mobile is becoming more and more the preferred channel for employees,” said Roberto Masiero, vice president and head of ADP’s Innovation Lab, HR professionals should expect more HR companies to begin providing apps to satisfy the changing times.

According to Aruba Networks, 86 percent of respondents worldwide have two or more connected devices (those with the ability to connect to the Internet), and 64 percent own three or more connected mobile devices.

“The prevalence and effectiveness of tech devices is affecting the way we choose to work, in and out of the office,” networking vendor Aruba stated in its report Are You Ready for #GenMobile.

Members of the “behavioral demographic” known as #GenMobile not only insist on flexible work locations over higher salaries, they also prefer nontraditional work hours and Wi-Fi instead of 3G, 4G or wired connections.

Those expectations will continue to affect HR’s ability to obtain and retain talent.

“The human resources function is a key asset in today’s business mobility landscape because of its ability to connect and inform the workforce in an easily scalable way,” Masiero said. He and other experts say it only makes sense that everyone be able to access relevant work information at any time and from any place. Especially when you consider, as Aruba reports, that 70 percent of people prefer flexibility in their work schedules “with an early finish on Fridays.”

The impact of mobile technology on all organizations is already significant. More than half of adults in the United States own a smartphone, and many are using them at home and at work, ADP reports.

What’s more, by 2015, more people will access the web through mobile devices, according to data released last year from Simply Hired, a California-based technology firm that operates job search engines worldwide.

Migrating HR functions from kiosks to desktops to laptops to apps is the natural evolution of HR functions, experts said. “The HR department now has this phenomenal channel to communicate [with] and engage the workforce,” Masiero said, eliminating the need for employees—whether construction workers or office personnel—to be “tethered to a physical location.”

For example, ADP Mobile, an app employees can access from their mobile phones, allows users to:

• View pay and tax statements
• View and request time off
• Track time and attendance
• Punch in and out
• Create timesheets
• Send late arrival or absence messages
• View benefit plan information
• View retirement savings accounts and
• View spending accounts

More than 2 million people worldwide have downloaded the app, available on iTunes, Google Play and Kindle, Masiero said. Less than 2 percent of its customers have opted out of using it.

Aliah D. Wright is an online editor/manager for SHRM Online.