The announcement of the Plateau acquisition of Nuvosoft has once again sparked the debates on the state of HR Systems providers. Plateau is a leader in the LMS space, why would they acquire a Compensation Management system? Why are recruiting vendors merging with vendors who have Performance Management applications? Why has ADP acquired HRMS solutions for everything from recruiting to benefits administration?
From my point of view, this is all driven by the consumer. We the consumers of HR Technology have been asking our vendors to provide broader solutions.
What I find amusing is that the “point solution” market was created in part because the ERP HRMS providers did not do a good job of providing solutions for the highly specialized processes like Recruiting and Performance Management. Now, we are asking our highly specialized vendors in areas like LMS and Recruiting to provide us solutions for full “Talent Management”. What makes us think that this will work any better than when the ERP’s tried to?
I for one don’t like having all of these consolidations in the industry. I like having options. Some of you may disagree, but I want to have the ability to shop for a solution that best meets my needs. I get nervous when vendor consolidations happen limiting my options of who I can shop with.
Being from Chicago, I was a Marshall Fields shopper. Macy’s bought Fields and changed the name and assortment of goods. It is now a Macy’s store like any other Macy’s store around the country. I lost my ability to have a unique set of products to choose from.
The consolidation of the HR Application industry is not unlike Marshall Fields changing to a Macy’s in that I am loosing my ability to purchase a unique set of tools from a unique provider. This is something that I am not happy about. What about you?
Thank You for “listening” to me today.
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1 comment:
Having options “to shop” and to choose is, indeed, good for the market of HR software as it forces vendors to innovate in order to compete.
Nevertheless, my opinion is that organizations with a straightforward way of thinking and a crystal view of the "ecosystem" know that the only way to compete in the market is to manage "know-how" correctly and to focus it on strategic objectives.
The only way to link this "know-how" from the point of entry of an employee in a company all the way down to the achievement of objectives is by focusing on the motivation of that employee during all his/her life in the organization.
And, this is a very hard mission and challenge for any CEO who, at the same time, need to provide benefits to the shareholders. The only way to manage all this is by using good and fully integrated HR software where competency gaps are clearly managed with training and where motivation is managed smartly with intelligent compensations as well as with other effective compensations.
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