Most people would think that entrepreneurs end their days like this:
When most of the time, it’s probably like this:
As a small business owner, you have a lot on your plate. You’re wearing more than one hat and besides your daily hustle, you have to think about your employees’ welfare to keep them happy.
Luckily, we live in the 21st century.
There are a few HR online platforms designed to replace the old processes so you can focus on building productivity. We were given access to try out one called Swingvy and after dabbling around a bit, these are the 6 features that stood out to us.
1) Combining the HR & payroll system into one platform.
It’s not uncommon to find smaller enterprises using different systems for different things. But just like how founders wear many hats, having a platform that can juggle a variety of processes can simplify things.
Swingvy combines the admin and payroll functions, so you can manage it all on one platform.
Some of the things that can be done are sending payslips to your staff, which they can access whenever and wherever.
If you need to see a detailed summary of the payrolls, you can go to the Pay Run tab which breaks down all the funds each employee gets.
We are all subject to human error. The Automated Payroll Calculation adds that extra relief knowing that any mistakes can be minimised, so long as you ensure the initial figures are correct.
You can also check any additions and deductions like claims or allowances for each employee to make sure they’re accounted for.
By the end, you’re pretty much handling it on your own without needing a third party or an agent—which could cost you more time and money. Swingvy’s payroll is automated so the payroll generation is instant.
Just leaving this here: a payroll agent on average charges RM60 per employee while Swingvy costs RM8.50 per employee. So you do the math.
2) Having an Automated Statutory Form Generator.
Paperwork can be such a hassle, especially when they’re required in a specific format or template.
Since Swingvy runs on automation, it takes the calculations and details of these relevant statutory forms and generates them for submission. Your job is just pressing the submit button or saving the files and it’s done.
It’s the same for the bank files. And since everything is online, you can say adios to paperwork.
3) Highly user configurable according to company policies.
Some companies might have their HQ based in KL but have other branches in different states, which makes things difficult when deciding on policies. Malaysians love our cuti, but it can get confusing when our cuti is on different days.
Swingvy lets you manage your team’s details, like customising their working days according to where their office is and automatically showing the respective public holidays for each state.
So no cheating, even if you orang KL but you work in Johor, you follow Johor holidays.
A bonus configuration is the leniency with the job roles. Your team member might appreciate seeing their title as “Chief Of All The Money” instead of just “Chief Financing Officer”.
4) Keeping employees connected all the time.
When you get an average of 50 emails a day, it’s easy for some to fall between the cracks. We’ve overlooked emails from HR before.
Instead, you can try updating staff about internal affairs on the News tab. Daily reminders, meetings, announcements for birthdays or holidays can all go there.
There’s also no excuse of “I didn’t get the message” anymore because the timeline and calendar feature shows everything happening in the month.
But more importantly is the Goal tab. A young business is usually a lean team but that’s even more reason to make sure we’re all working hard towards the same goal.
It could be a personal one; you could add a sales target that will refresh monthly, or a team effort. For example, our editorial team could use a pageviews target. Many of us are naturally competitive anyway and having our progress clearly measured in a goal bar can be a powerful motivator.
5) Having an intuitive and user-friendly interface.
It’s proven that a user-friendly interface helps companies decide which software to use. A practical and simple user interface can prevent common mistakes, speed up daily activities and ensure new procedures start off right.
If you’re already managing massive amounts of data, you probably don’t want bulky designs and unnecessary features getting in the way.
Swingvy’s interface is easy to navigate. All the tabs are labelled clearly and each feature is listed according to its function. Most of the features work on automation so that saves a lot of time, which is what most of startups need.
6) Accessing the platform on-the-go
Entrepreneurs are always on the go (there’re people to meet and things to do!), but it’s not practical to be lugging laptops around all the time. One thing you can bet gets carried around 24/7 though is the humble smartphone.
Swingvy has a native app where the team can check payslips, look at the calendar for any upcoming events, and apply for leaves.
The Leave tab shows an overall calendar to see the amount of leaves taken by each employee. For your staff, everything’s laid out there in the open.
It’s pretty much instantaneous instead of them having to wait for weeks to even know whether the leaves are received or not, as the ye ole method would look like.
For the bosses, it’s as simple as signing in. You’ll get notified immediately when a request comes in and choose to approve or reject it on the spot.
The app also notifies you whenever there are updates within the app via push notifications so staying connected all the time isn’t an issue.
So is this platform startup-proof?
We don’t like pushing products to people (and not many will believe us after a few too many recommendations), so here are the facts for you to make the decision for yourselves.
Swingvy does makes things simpler, so you can focus on being productive. With all the features combined on one platform, it’s convenient and saves users from subscribing to multiple services.
If you don’t want to use the payroll module, the platform is free for unlimited users with unlimited time.
So with those quick facts listed above, we think you’re well able to tell for yourselves if a platform like this is a good call for your business.
Sign up for Swingvy today to experience effortless modern HR!
This article was written in collaboration with Swingvy.