Harvesting HR Tech for Growth
For 50 years, since opening their first market store in Sydney’s west, David and Cathy Harris have championed innovation. With mouth-watering stores that invite customer buy-in, initiatives such as Pick of the Week, Imperfect Picks and Friends of the Farm have established Harris Farm as a leader in fresh food retail and sustainability.
With 2600 employees in 26 stores across NSW, it also has an ambitious growth strategy to increase its store sizes, and workforce 20% year on year and expand into Queensland. To meet this forecast, Harris Farm needed to reimagine and energise internal systems.
Ceridian Dayforce selected to drive unification and innovation of people data and systems
In late 2019, to overhaul its employee experience, Harris Farm embarked on a program to unify their HR, Payroll and Workforce Management systems with the cloud-based Ceridian Dayforce full suite platform. Pinpoint HRM was engaged to support the delivery of the project and ensure fit-for-purpose design and functionality.
Nichol Trueman is Head of People and Culture at Harris Farm Markets. She says disparate HR systems such as a Preceda payroll tool, Litmos for employee learning and paper-based processes for remuneration reviews, and performance management were not up to the business’s strategic plan. Paper-based induction was not finding traction with a younger employee base.
“Younger employees have expectations around technology and expect an employee experience that is mobile enabled to ensure all processes from contracts to bank details to pay slips and rosters are delivered to their pocket.
“We needed to pivot to ensure Harris Farm had the innovative systems in place to provide a competitive edge in attracting and retaining staff and increasing efficiencies.”
Ceridian Dayforce modernises time and pay systems. It combines HR and payroll, benefits, workforce management and talent management in a single application. It achieves real-time HR insights and calculations and increases employee retention rates.
Pinpoint HRM instrumental in the HFM Transformation journey
Pinpoint HRM was tasked to understand the cultural and organisational nuances of the business and manage the internal project team.
“Pinpoint acted as our program manager providing project management, SME, change management strategy and communications support,” says Nichol. “But it was broader than that. With the Pinpoint team’s extensive HR and tech background, they were able to provide advice on how we restructured our existing teams and transformed our operating model.”
James Williamson, Harris Farm’s Chief Financial Officer agrees.
“For us, this project was never just about a technology implementation. It has always been about transforming our HR and payroll functions, and fixing and improving processes, and it was very much a case of ‘you don’t know, what you don’t know’. It was amazing how quickly Pinpoint understood our constraints, how we operate and our cultural nuances.”
And the results to dates?
Twelve months in, employee buy-in is encouraging with over 1,500 staff logging in daily, says Nichol and more than 90% of the workforce using the Dayforce mobile app to clock in.
“Our employees can now access Dayforce on their phone, check rosters, apply for leave, swap shifts, and build their skills by completing online learning modules. Capabilities like being able to swap shifts on the fly on their mobile is really exciting and powerful. It’s made the entire onboarding process smoother for staff.”
Managers are using Dayforce for rostering, and key financial outcomes include the ability for managers to track payroll wages day to day in any one week.
Recognised in 2020 by Human Resources Director Magazine as one of Australia’s most innovative HR Teams, no doubt as a result of the success of this transformation project, Nichol openly admits there is still work to be done.
“Areas such as recruitment and training inhouse need more attention but Dayforce is furthering a culture of innovation that management are keen to build on.”
Thoughts on Pinpoint HRM?
“Pinpoint brought strong governance to the process of executing this project. It adapted quickly to this fast moving, hands on, family owned and run business, understanding what was needed and how it needed to be delivered.” says James Williamson,
Nichol concurs. “It’s honestly been one of the best projects we’ve ever rolled out in the business.” adding Pinpoint HRM will continue to provide ongoing strategic support to Harris Farm Markets to enable the full realisation of benefits from Dayforce and the transformation of HR.
