This is an interesting aspect and a difficult research to carry out, for a supervisor.
The needs might be similar for a Supervisor and a HR Manager but their approach and working style may differ in lot of aspects.
We will try to provide a good software solution which can help the supervisor in
his day-to-day functional activities and will also try to find out some similarities
and differences in work of HR than that of supervisors. This comparison will lead
us to achieve desired software solutions.
Similarities between the work of supervisor and HR Manager
1. Both deals with the Human Resources: Supervisors mainly deal
with the daily workers or workers on wages while HR deals with salaried employees.
2. Both keep the record of attendance: HR Managers keep the record
of attendance to calculate salary whereas Supervisor uses it to calculate wages.
HR might be using automated system as fingerprint reader, timesheet or other kind
of software to perform the task while supervisor may be using semi-automated approach
or might be doing it manually with the help of pen and paper.
3. Both are responsible for employee appraisals: It is the HR Manager
or Supervisor whose feedback is required for the appraisals of wages or salaries
and their performance rating for people directly corresponds towards it.
4. Both have to handle the grievances: In terms of HR we say grievances
which he needs to manage and resolve for smooth functioning of the business and
in case of Supervisor it becomes workers issues or problems but he also has to solve
in similar manner as done by HR.
5. Both have to manage and prepare the related documents: In case
of HR Manager, he has to keep records of documents like appointment letter, reliving
letter, pay slips and other related documents and have to prepare them in formal
language. While in case of a Supervisor the type of documents might be different
like daily hourly work record, recording of advance payment, identification details
of the worker and similar other documents.
Differences between the work of Supervisor and HR Manager
1. Supervisor have to keep a check and control over tasks assigned to the worker
while in case of HR manager he is not responsible for completion of any task, as
it has to be handled by the Project Manager.
2. HR manager do not have to manage the employees while supervisor needs to manage
the employees.
3. HR Manager only deals with the Human Resources while a supervisor might need
to manage the Human resources as well as materials, suppliers, transport, equipment
and work performance.
4. HR Manager usually deals with the skilled employees while supervisor might have
to deal with un-skilled work force.
What should a software Solution contain to suit both, Supervisor and HR Manager
Needs?
1. Should have the ability to manage the documents which gives the functionality
for storing and retrieval of documents easily.
2. It should provide a feature to manage attendance: The attendance
management is tricky task as it has various things to consider like full day attendance,
half day attendance, hourly attendance, overtime, leave, holidays and other parameters
which directly affect the payroll of the employee. So having a good attendance system
and easy navigation is a plus in the software.
3. Feature of assigning and managing tasks should be available; it is not required
for HR Manager but required for a Supervisor. This is not the mandatory feature
because it is done by Project Manager in case of HRs and supervisor doesn’t
use it much as supervisor deals with tiny or small set of tasks, unlike the project
managers who have large list of well defined and changing tasks.
4. Employee or worker information management: This is the basic
and core of any software solution which deals with employee or workers as without
this it is not possible to work on the system. This helps in quick retrieval of
information at any time so you do not miss out any information of employee or worker.
5. Grievance recording and its handling: This is often required
to verify the mistakes done in past by employee and helps in finding out the critical
person. The software can provide the facility to record reasons, people involved,
troubleshooter details and its occurrence date and other related things.
So we suggest you to always look for a software solution as per your needs and the
position you are holding for managing employees’ and workers’ information.
Try out our HR Cube; may be you like it.