Manufacturing has had a long association with IT and systems. Business strategies are enabled through IT infrastructure, thus minimizing the latency between supply chain on one side and marketing initiatives and customer feedback on the other. Two questions face the industry.

How can they gain flexibility in the manufacturing facility to respond to changing customer demands? How can they gain efficiencies from inter-plant exchanges of resources and parts?
The overarching goal is to reduce the Fixed Costs in manufacturing and to gain from better operational practices.

The Human Capital Management Software used by the organization can play a vital role here by providing an appropriate environment and platform for people to perform. HR strategies implemented on the floor have to align with the level of automation in the manufacturing facility. When the level of automation is high, HR focuses more on employee training and rewards, process improvements and innovation. When manufacturing is labor intensive, HR focuses on incentivising employees to focus on the target at hand.

It must be noted that manufacturing has always rewarded employee suggestions through continuous quality improvement programs and initiatives like 5S, TQM, Six Sigma, and Lean.

FieldCloud HCM solution

Workforce Management

• Enables you to define manufacturing work centers as distinctive project areas and track them separately
• Permits you to define a role (short term) for the employee at that work center with definitive goals
• FieldCloud Time Management System is tailored for all employment grades and supports shifts and rosters
• Supports contingent and temporary (or contract) workforce
• Employee Relations processes such as Grievances and Disciplinary action enable the automation of employee conduct

Recruitment

• Automates the entire hiring process
• Allows sourcing from multiple channels—internal, job referrals, job sites and social networking sites
• Facilitates onboarding with automated pre and post-joining formalities, enabling an employee to get productive quickly
• Develop a pay-for-performance culture

Talent Management

• The Behavioral Appraisal process allows Talent Managers to capture the results of a surprise check or a formal audit on the employee’s model of conduct

Employee Development

• Captures success and rewards by rotation
• Offers Training Administration that allow users to set up the training calendar and program, enroll employees, monitor their attendance, and capture their performance and feedback
• Allows managers to define how to spot and reward successful performers through the gamification framework and link results to Payroll

Payroll and Benefits

• Country-specific statutory compliances available
• Highly configurable and flexible to take care of Payroll elements, associated with every aspect of manufacturing such as volumes of production, roles performed, risks, legal settlements (unions), previous dues, life events of workers, overtime, and technology
• FieldCloud In-memory Payroll (Minnal) may be harnessed for quicker results, given that Payroll is highly computation-intensive

Employee Self Service

• Comprehensive in scope, and can be deployed from a Kiosk on the shop floor or accessed from the work station
• Extremely easy to use WorkSpaces, specific to common user roles in manufacturing setup, with all the data required for decision-making presented as a chart for quick analysis and action
• Context aware—the software ‘recognizes’ and knows the users from erstwhile usage patterns
• Employee Survey feature allows vital “employee speak” to reach the ears of Talent Managers
• Employee Relations processes such as Grievances and Disciplinary action, enable automation of data related to employee conduct and behavior, and this is an integral part of safety reporting