HR teams have long dealt with an immense amount of administrative work. From processing resumes to onboarding newcomers, most of HR’s tasks have required manual effort, and lots of it. But the arrival of automation and AI is changing how HR gets its work done in every area of the profession. Nowhere is this trend more obvious than in leave management.
A decade ago, leave management involved calculation charts, color-coded calendars, and a long and winding paper trail. HR had no choice but to intake, certify, and track leave by hand.
Today, HR has lots of options when it comes to leave management, thanks to technology. Automation offers HR the chance to say goodbye to manual processes and usher in a new era of leave management. In this article, we’ll discuss the drawbacks of a manual approach and explain how you can leverage intelligent automation to optimize your organization’s leave program.
Why a Manual Approach Can’t Keep Up with Today’s Leave Management
These days, manual doesn’t necessarily mean analog. Most teams taking a DIY approach to leave aren’t using printed calendars or sticky notes. They get by with digital tools like spreadsheets and databases. This strategy may be functional, but it creates risks and costs employers must recognize.
Too Many Laws. Too Many Steps. Not Enough Time!
When HR manages leave on its own, it’s responsible for carrying out every step of the leave process. What’s more daunting is that the team is also responsible for knowing which leave laws apply in any given situation.
This responsibility is impossible to fulfill, even for the most dedicated, knowledgeable, and practiced HR pros. When an employee needs to go on leave, HR must consider their eligibility under federal, state, and local laws, in addition to company policies.
Due to the rise of remote work, HR doesn’t just have to worry about the laws in the state where its company operates. It must also consider laws maintained by the state where the worker lives.
As HR tracks more and more entitlements, the workload balloons. The team must satisfy the paperwork, processes, and deadlines required by each applicable law. As HR’s to-do list lengthens, they lose precious time that could be spent offering personalized support to employees.
With Manual Management, Mistakes are Inevitable
Without a leave management solution, HR teams must rely on themselves to meet mandated deadlines, file the correct paperwork, calculate eligibility, untangle intertwining laws, oversee evolving cases, and more. These tasks are not just items on a to-do list. They are legal obligations with specific standards enforced by the law. Failing to complete these steps correctly can cause companies legal exposure that’s avoidable with modern workflows.
Non-compliance isn’t the only risk manual leave management creates. When HR gets overwhelmed, the employee experience suffers. A missed deadline or an incorrect calculation may result in someone’s leave getting delayed or incorrectly denied. Communication lags and paperwork confusion can cause employees extra stress, even when HR is trying its best.
How AbsenceSoft Uses Intelligent Automation to Transform Leave Management
Employers don’t have to settle with a manual approach to leave management. Platforms like AbsenceSoft are harnessing technology to automate leave, improving compliance, boosting efficiency, and providing personalization along the way.
AbsenceSoft leverages intelligent automation to streamline the leave process from beginning to end. Our platform automates repetitive processes like leave calculation, communications, and reminders to save HR time and ensure consistency. We build in plenty of opportunities for human review, ensuring important decisions are accurate and communications are compassionate.
How to Easily Track the FMLA, ADA, PWFA, and 200+ Other Laws
Leave laws change often, and most HR teams don’t have the time or expertise to track every update. The AbsenceSoft Compliance Engine (ACE) takes that burden off your plate.
ACE provides instant, accurate eligibility determinations, supporting over 200 federal and state laws, in addition to your custom company policies. Maintained by in-house legal and compliance experts, it keeps federal, state, and local laws current, automatically applies eligibility and entitlement rules, and ensures your company policies are applied consistently.
Workflows and Packets: No Follow-Up Needed
Our platform transforms leave processes into workflows, which are predefined sequences of tasks or processes that are executed automatically. This is the technology behind the ACE Packet Generator, which automates the process of providing employees with all the necessary documents, forms, and communications related to their leave.
The Packet Generator, for example, can instantly find and attach the FMLA’s Notice of Eligibility and Rights & Responsibilities (FORM WH-381) to a pre-generated email after an employee’s leave request is approved. Our forms are automatically updated as legislation changes, so everything you need is generated instantly and accurately.
The Packet Generator handles more than standard forms, however. ACE can also provide custom templates, generated to touch on the specifics of each employee’s case. These templates can be built around every message your team needs to send, from informing employees about their eligibility to sharing entitlement decisions. The templates ensure communications are clear, accurate, and compliant, while remaining on brand and compassionate.
Workflows can also be configured to alleviate HR from the burden of following up. Your team can schedule automatic reminders to be sent out to employees eight days after receiving their packet, and again 15 days later. When an employee responds with the necessary paperwork, the workflow automatically kicks off the rest of the certification process.
Real Results of Modern Leave Management from Real Teams
Automation isn’t powerful just in theory. AbsenceSoft has created wins for organizations of all shapes, sizes, and industries.
174% Increase in Caseload Capacity
Leave managers at one of the largest national healthcare providers in the U.S. struggled to keep up with increasing requests. Their manual processes limited each full-time member to managing a maximum of 250 cases a year, which wasn’t enough considering the organization’s 30,000-person workforce.
The team exploded its efficiency by switching to AbsenceSoft. With our platform in place, each team member now handles about 685 cases a year — a 174% increase. Here’s what that looks like in practice:
- 16,000 letters
- 47,000 case management tasks
- 3,084 total cases
Prior to AbsenceSoft, the team spent over 19 hours a week manually completing a leave request. Today, those same tasks are done in fewer than five hours a week. By automating manual tasks, AbsenceSoft gave the team a better way to keep up with growing leave requests while spending more time supporting colleagues.
Purdue Saved Six Hours on Reporting Alone
Purdue University also benefitted from automation via AbsenceSoft. For many years, the Purdue leave management team used internal spreadsheets, a database, and an antiquated system workbench to manage and track its leave process.
As leave requests got more frequent and more complicated, the University knew it needed to upgrade its manual approach. The team chose AbsenceSoft, a change that saved the team an immense amount of time on leave management tasks. Before AbsenceSoft, for example, the case intake specialist had to manually load the database, prepare a hard copy packet, and place it in US mail for every single request. With AbsenceSoft, the data is preloaded, and the packet is generated in seconds.
This kind of efficiency applied to other processes. The team can now generate monthly reports in just 15 minutes — a process that took six hours before.
A Better Experience for Employees and Managers
Automation doesn’t just save time and money for businesses. It also allows HR to create better leave experiences for employees and managers. With intelligent automation, HR can optimize communications, streamline paperwork, and equip managers with the information and tools they need to support both employees and business operations.
When a leave of absence is handled well, employees notice. In our research, 55% of employees said they returned to work more motivated when the experience was clear, timely, and supportive. But the opposite is also true. A poor leave experience can have a lasting impact on morale, productivity, and whether someone chooses to stay.
In fact, 42% of employees told us they returned feeling less motivated. Another 40% either started job hunting or didn’t return at all. These numbers reflect a larger trend: Leave has become a defining moment in the employee experience. With automation, HR can make sure it’s a positive one.
Self-Service Portals Reduce Back-and-Forth and Confusion
The AbsenceSoft platform offers a self-service portal where employees can create a leave request from any device, at any time. It guides users through entering all the pertinent details in a few easy steps. Once the request is submitted, HR can immediately see the case in the platform to review it.
The self-service portal makes the first steps of the leave process both convenient and clear. Employees can easily submit a request, even if they’re in the midst of an emergency. HR, meanwhile, gets the information it needs, as the platform prompts employees to provide the right details. Auto-populated forms ensure a repeated process, reducing confusion, and eliminating the need for extra communication.
Managers Can Track Leave and Plan Coverage Without Calling HR
A centralized intake process with a self-service portal gives HR and managers immediate visibility into the leave process. This access is helpful to managers, who need to keep track of many moving details. Managers must consider:
- Which employees are going out on leave.
- Who will cover for workers while they’re out.
- When each employee is coming back.
Without access to a self-service portal, managers are often in the dark, relying on HR to fill them in on the necessary information. The right solution makes this easier. The AbsenceSoft platform automatically notifies managers when an employee has requested leave and when they’re headed back to work.
Ready to Move Beyond Manual Leave Management?
Manual leave management is challenging and slow. If that doesn’t convince you to take a more automated approach, consider this: it’s also risky and expensive. The most hardworking and expert HR teams are prone to serious mistakes when they manage leave by hand and at scale.
But there’s another way. With the right technology, HR can process thousands of cases quickly, efficiently, and compliantly. Automation allows HR to spend more time with employees, offering them personalized support in moments of need.
AbsenceSoft helps HR teams transform their leave process end to end. With centralized case management, automation, and built-in compliance rules, it becomes easier to reduce errors, save time, and deliver a more consistent employee experience. To learn how your team can redefine its approach to leave management, book a demo with AbsenceSoft today.