Stephanie Keaton
March 16, 2014
Human Resource Information Systems - HRM 520
Dr. Lawrence Green, Instructor
Assignment #5 – e-Compensation Assess the advantages and disadvantages of using a Web-based compensation toll versus a client-server based or stand-alone PC-based system and then give your opinion on which system would provide the most value to an organization’s stakeholders. Include three (3) facts to support your opinion. e-Compensation represents a web-enabled approach to an array of compensation tools that enable an organization to gather, store, manipulate, analyze, and distribute compensation data and information. “The flurry of innovation from HR technology vendors has created useful tools in many areas of HR, and compensation is no exception” (Creelman, 2006). The advantages of using a Web-based compensation tool versus a client-server based or stand-alone PC-based system include the automated approach that replaces tedious manual processes to make any compensation program easy to manage and virtually error free. Web-based compensation tools do not require installation and updating which saves a lot of administration work and can be accessed from anywhere with the Internet. The data in Web-based compensation tools is stored remotely and requires little disk space. Also, it becomes extremely important that Web-based compensation tools are cross-platform and work on different Operating systems. Whereas using a client-server based or stand-alone PC based system would need an administrator to administer, maintain, develop, and implement policies and procedures for ensuring the security and integrity of the client/server database, and resolves any database issues. “Now, an estimated 70 percent of companies in the U.S. use Excel for compensation management” (Creelman, 2006).
Web-based compensation tools have some serious disadvantages. The most important problem is their poor user experience, because of the
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