The Trend Towards the Cloud Continues

It’s easy to forget that companies are still using on-premise solutions when you see cloud adoption rates over the past few years. In fact, according to Gartner, the traditional deployment model for on-premises software is expected to significantly shrink from 34 percent today to 18 percent by 2017. With this data, we can assume that 82 percent of all software deployments will be in the cloud in the next two years. And if you’re not providing a SaaS-based solution, you’re limiting your company to a fraction of the sales you could be generating.

We’re in the midst of something of a computing revolution. It’s comparable to how products were built and distributed prior to the industrial revolution versus after the industrial revolution. The cloud is continually a topic across the internet and it will not be losing traction anytime soon.

Cloud is constantly being covered as a trend – especially in the small and midsize business (SMB) space. But why?

Because it’s simple.

When we look at cloud vs. on-premise solutions, there are a number of reasons leveraging a cloud, or more specifically software as a service (SaaS), based solution is much easier not only for SMBs, but larger organizations as well.

Here are 7 reasons why cloud-based solutions are helping businesses thrive and how they will continue to do so into the future:

1. Upfront costs are minimal.
   • Outside of an implementation fee, there’s nothing to pay for upfront. SaaS uses the same model as your electric company or cable provider – it’s simply a month-to-month payment for the service you provide, which typically allows customers to cancel at any time. The perpetual license constraints no longer have to be a problem or risk for your prospects.
2. Installation isn’t necessary.
   • Leveraging a new solution no longer has to be the major undertaking it was in the past for customers. As a result, leveraging a new solution can provide an incredibly short time to value for the customer, allowing ROI to be realized much faster.
3. Hardware doesn’t exist.
   • Unless we’re talking about employees clocking in and out on a computer or a time clock, the need for hardware no longer exits. The entire solution is accessible on the web via a browser.
4. Maintenance isn’t required.
   • Security, reliability, availability, performance, and infrastructure, oh my! These don’t have to consume your thoughts and create that stress knot in your back anymore. They’re all covered by the service-level agreement (SLA) guaranteed by the vendor you partner with.
5. Data backups are no longer your problem.
   • The risk of data loss is mitigated with SaaS. With an on-premise solution, if your location was hit by a natural disaster and flooded for instance, the businesses solutions would be inoperable. With SaaS your data is always accessible from anywhere at any time, and if the vendor’s data center is taken down, you can confirm with the SLA that there is a warm standby facility ready to go that mirrors your and your customers’ data.
6. Upgrades are automatic… and free! 
   • Upgrades to the software simply happen with SaaS. You’ll see new features as they’re released typically every one to three months. There’s nothing your IT team needs to do in order to make them available. And the pay-as-you-go model mentioned above means that you’re already paying for you and your customers to get access to the latest and greatest version of the software – there’s no additional cost.
7. IT resources can focus on other initiatives.
   • With the vendor taking care of the software, support, and troubleshooting for you, your IT resources are suddenly freed up to focus more on high-value activities and work on the greater strategy of technology and the role it plays in your and your customers’ businesses.

The cloud and, more specifically, SaaS helps organizations of all sizes to operate more efficiently. Check out more information here or consult an expert at 303-645-4270. 

Time and Attendance – What’s the ROI?

As we continue to hear questions regarding time and attendance return on investment (ROI), we started to think to ourselves “What is the ROI of time and attendance – Does everyone really know?

With payroll typically taking up 50-60 percent of businesses’ operating expenses, companies want to ensure that payroll dollars aren’t being wasted and that the highest return possible is achieved from that investment. This is where automated time and attendance applications, also known as time and labor management applications, come into play… But how do companies quantify the ROI of their on-premise or SaaS-based software purchase?

That’s a great question – thanks to all of you who have brought that up!

There are three core areas in which time and attendance applications return much more than what is paid for them:

1. Control and reduce labor costs

In order to achieve this, the first step is getting insight into exactly where payroll dollars are being invested. Companies need to see which employees are in and out of work – they need visibility into who’s coming or leaving early and late, or who’s absent entirely.

There are several areas of workforce management that can be improved in order to manage labor costs accordingly – here are a few big ones:

• Absence – According to Mercer, the direct and indirect costs of absence alone can make up 34.2 percent of payroll expenses. From planned absences like vacation to unplanned absences like sick time, managing absence in an automated fashion allows companies to track accrued time off accurately and make staffing adjustments to cover for absent employees.
• Overtime – Unplanned overtime can be a huge, and often unforeseen, payroll cost. By keeping tabs on employees’ timesheets and getting alerts for employees who approach overtime, companies can easily reduce this cost by finding alternative coverage for the position.
• Accuracy – There are tons of companies out there that simply pay employees for the time they’re scheduled to work. However, what if they’re continuously coming in late and/or leaving early? How about if they continuously take long lunches? They’re still being paid for that time they are not working, which is a cost that’s easily controlled. By simply automating the collection of time worked, companies can ensure employees are getting paid accurately for the time they actually work – no more, no less.
• Demand – By having the ability to manage a workforce in real-time, companies gain the ability to make staffing adjustments based on the external factors of that business – either proactively or as they happen. For example, companies should be able to plan for historically slow or extremely busy shopping days in retail. And if the forecast calls for inclement weather, and shopping is typically reduced in these instances, schedules can be adjusted accordingly.

2. Improve productivity

Another area companies can track where payroll dollars are being invested is what employees actually work on, and how much work they do. By tracking the departments, jobs, and tasks of employees, companies can get a great understanding of what’s actually being invested in with their payroll dollars. Perhaps they’ll gain insight that sales people are spending more time on administrative functions then they are on actual sales, and be able to address it accordingly from there.

Alternatively, in a manufacturing business, management should be able to track the piece work of each employee (i.e. how many widgets they can produce), which will give them insight into the most effective and productive employees they have. On the flipside, they’ll also see who the least effective employees are and can invest in training for these employees and/or open up new job requisitions to find better talent.

Time and attendance solutions also provide a great avenue to make management and administrators more productive, allowing them to spend less time on manual processes like creating schedules, approving time off, monitoring employee time, etc.

3. Minimize risk of noncompliance

There are virtually endless pieces of legislation that companies must comply with from the FLSA to the FMLA to the ACA. And if there’s one thing that can be said about non-compliance, it’s that non-compliance costs big bucks! The Department of Labor (DOL) has people employed in the agency that are solely responsible for finding non-compliant companies. If accused of non-compliance for the FMLA, for instance, the cost for a company can range from $78,000 to $150,000, and that’s just to get to trial! And then let’s say that company loses the trial, additional fees can include:

• Employee reimbursement for any monetary loss incurred
• Equitable relief
• Attorney’s fees
• Expert witness fees
• Court costs
• Liquid damages

When you think about the cost for automated time and attendance, it seems pretty nominal when you start thinking about the potential ROI. At Mosaic, we also provide an automated system that helps our clients comply with ACA requirements and reporting. Check out our video highlighting all of the capabilities that our ACA Manager can do for your business here. 

Looking for more details on this topic? Hear it from the experts and give Mosaic a call at 303-645-4270 or visit our website at www.mosaices.com