Fostering Employee Empowerment & Accountability

Antiquated time & attendance system generated substantial administrative overhead

Though Adtalem’s previous time and attendance system was web-based (and thus not a manual system in theory), the payroll team still found themselves spending a substantial amount of time doing manual catch-up work to account for the antiquated system’s frequent errors and bouts of downtime. Because of this, pay period adjustments were a regular concern, among various other errors.

“With the old system, pay period adjustments were a constant problem — to the point where we were spending upwards of 20 hours a week on them,” says Daniela Evans, Payroll Manager at Adtalem.

“Our mission in HR is to go the extra mile to support our employees so they don’t have to sweat the small stuff, and ensuring that pay is accurate and timely is part of that. Frankly, our old system was mostly counterproductive to this aim, so we knew it was time to change to something that better aligned with and supported our values.”

These errors and inaccuracies disrupted not only payroll processes, but also, to an extent, Adtalem’s ability to get a holistic view of their business, and ensure that everything was running smoothly.

“As Director of HR, it’s critical to me that the data is accurate, runs smoothly, and there are no holes in it,” says Bill Lumani, Senior Director of HR Shared Services at Adtalem. “A company of our magnitude and diversity needs to run like a well-oiled machine, so I need to be confident that the data presented in our systems is current and actionable.”

The former system not only functioned poorly, but ultimately looked and felt antiquated as well — another element that didn’t quite fit with Adtalem’s brand and values. With the UX and easeof-use leaving quite a bit to be desired, Lumani and his team began looking for a solution better-suited to fit their needs.

Empowering employees to take charge of their accountability by partnering with Replicon

In integrating Replicon with the rest of their ecosystem, Adtalem was able to become both fully automated and completely paperless from hire to retire for all HR and employee data, and they no longer worry about holes in their data or lapses in their system. In fact, the 20 hours of administrative payroll-related overhead has been almost entirely eradicated, enabling employees to redirect that time into more valuable tasks.

Additionally, as a public company, it’s crucial for Adtalem to run internal audits and remain SOX-compliant — and this process has similarly benefited from accurate employee data and a fully-automated data collating process. For other compliance-related needs, Replicon’s global compliance library is always up-to-date with relevant labor laws (and current updates or changes to these laws), ensuring that remaining compliant is a hassle-free experience.

When Adtalem decides on any solution from a vendor, they emphasize a partnership rather than a transactional relationship, and seek out products that uphold their values, and help them foster a culture of empowerment and accountability.

“Culturally, as an organization, we are constantly striving to drive accountability and autonomy for our employees, which the Replicon system fits into well,” says Evans. “We run our standard audits, but at the end of the day we trust our employees to report their time accurately, and our managers to manage time accordingly, both without excessive oversight or handholding.”

Replicon’s UX plays a critical role in this as well, and Lumani reveals that its clean, easy-to-use interface for both desktop and mobile were an important part of their decision to partner with Replicon.

Adtalem understands that part of emphasizing employee empowerment means investing in systems that offer a clean, easy, and positive experience to the end-user, so they sought out a system that not only had the right look and feel, but also reflected the modernity of their organization by offering Cloud and mobile capabilities.

As Adtalem continues to broaden its global education influence through possible expansion into the United Kingdom and various Caribbean islands, the Replicon partnership will continue to grow alongside it, and play a critical role in the overall structure of the organization moving forward.

“Replicon is a big part of our future as Adtalem grows,” says Lumani, “We’re looking forward to further optimizing the way we use it so we can keep realizing additional efficiencies to every extent possible.”