HR document management: Streamlining processes for HR teams and employees

From offer letters and job descriptions to benefit enrollments and performance reviews, HR teams manage hundreds – if not thousands – of critical documents.

Creating, sending, tracking, and safeguarding these files, which often contain sensitive or confidential information, is a lofty task for HR professionals.

That’s why document management is absolutely necessary for teams of all sizes.

So, let’s take a closer look at how document management simplifies HR processes and helps teams organize the chaos.

What is HR document management?

HR document management is the process of organizing and storing human resource and employee documents, so they’re easily accessible to the right people when they need them.

Access is restricted to the necessary team members to maintain security and compliance.

Why is HR document management important?

No matter the size of the organization or HR department, every team member should know where to access the documents they need.

HR document management ensures everyone stores, tracks, and sends documents from the same centralized place.

“In Human Resources, we manage and store a huge variety of documents from policies, reviews, contracts, offer letters, references, and more,” Leanne Talbot, Manager, HR Business Operations at PandaDoc, says. “So we have to make sure we have a process and tools in place to be compliant and efficient.

Leane shares the key reasons document management is essential for HR teams:

1. To remain legally compliant. While team members are employed and even for a period of time post-employment (timeline depends on location), we must have all documents stored, and they will be pulled up on audits.

2. Efficiency. By having proper HR document management, we can easily find the information when needed for inquiries or audits. We have thousands of documents, so this one is really important.

3. Employee experience. We need to be able to access information quickly and efficiently to help answer any employee questions.

As file folders and hard-copy documents have become obsolete, document management solutions provide a scalable solution to save paper, time, and employee sanity.

What is an HR document management system?

An HR document management system is a software platform where HR teams can store and organize the files they need for employees, including onboarding paperwork, resumes, company policies, contracts, and more.

Benefits of an HR document management system

Implementing user-friendly HR software with document storage functionality provides several benefits to help your team transform from cluttered chaos to organized operations.

Enhance security and compliance

Keep company and employee data safe. Document management systems offer security features, such as role-based permissions, that allow you to assign different access levels to team members depending on their roles.

These permissions let you offer self-service functionality for team members to access the files they need. Plus, audit trails allow you to monitor access to documents and see who modified or shared them.

HR document platforms use data encryption and cloud-based storage and security protocols to protect sensitive information.

Compliance tools ensure your documents meet regulations based on GDPR, HIPAA, or other local labor laws.

Increase efficiency and organization

No one wants to waste time searching for documents. HR document management systems let you easily store and retrieve HR files and employee records.

Whether an employee is in the office or remote, new or seasoned, they always know where to find what they need.

“It can be a really time-consuming process collecting a lot of documents and also having so many people attached to them, from hiring someone until the start date, the documents will be collected by a variety of people and go through multiple approvals,” Leanne says. “Finding documents can be a real task, and we have to look into multiple platforms to find them if people don't all have the same access, you need to rely on one person.”

Boost productivity

Searching for documents is one thing, but what about recreating the same documents over and over?

HR document management software like PandaDoc offers pre-made templates to help you save time creating professional-looking documents.

PandaDoc customers have increased document creation time by 50% and increased completed docs by 87% per month.

Reduce manual tasks through automation

With so many files coming in and out, manual tracking documents can be a nightmare. HR document management systems help you configure automated workflows to reduce time spent on manual, tedious tasks.

You can create approval processes to ensure documents are reviewed in a timely manner, enable notifications and reminders for when items need to be sent or ensure team members don’t miss deadlines for signing or completing documents or tasks.

With Workflow Automations in PandaDoc, you can set up automated reminder emails, approval workflows, and integrations to manage the document lifecycle in one place.

This ensures that nothing slips through the cracks with employees or team members.

Improve employee onboarding

A high-quality document management system can improve the onboarding experience for HR teams and new hires alike.

HR teams can store all relevant documents in one place and create automations to send required forms to new hires.

New hires can access all the files they need, including employee handbooks, training materials, and benefits enrollment info, from a secure, central location.

Document management systems with eSignature capabilities let new hires sign forms securely without switching between applications.

PandaDoc Rooms can make the employee onboarding process easier and faster.

With PandaDoc Rooms, HR teams can:

• Build a welcome page to introduce new hires to your company and add videos and other media to showcase your company culture.

• Create clear onboarding paths with task lists for new hires to follow. Plus, upload documents and send documents for signing, like NDAs and employee handbooks

• Send paperwork and agreements and provide a central location where new hires can access everything they need before they start their new role.

• Organize specific items like training videos in folders to make them easily accessible

Simplify HR document management

File management shouldn’t be a headache. HR document management makes life easier for everyone.

When everything is organized and accessible from one secure location, no one has to waste time searching for files or tracking down paperwork.

HR teams can focus on strategic initiatives and employee development instead of tedious admin tasks.

Discover how our HR document management software can help you streamline HR tasks, automate processes, send and track employee files, improve employee experience, and more.

Contact us to schedule your personalized demo.