Workforce Management

Workforce management (WFM) processes and activities, a major focus of investment and optimization efforts for decades, have undergone a huge transformation in recent years. In our view, this is mostly a function of two significant trends: the explosion of technology innovation associated with leveraging AI/ML and embedded analytics in many areas of a business including a range of HCM processes and operations, and a major reframing of the employer/employee relationship stemming from the now universal emphasis on elevating the employee experience (EX). This was becoming more of a strategic focus across most organizations before the pandemic, but the last two years has made delivering a great EX as an essential part of operating a business. In the absence of this, employees tend to become disengaged and many will leave. The same can be true of the customers serviced by those employees.

The EX phenomenon also involves a sea change in management mindset toward hourly workers, specifically around the notion that when these employees’ needs, interests and goals are accounted for in meaningful ways, just as with professional or “exempt” workers, this segment of the workforce will not only be more productive, engaged and committed to results, but incidences of costly turnover — historically comparatively high among hourly (sometimes referred to as “deskless”) workers— are expected to trend downward as a result.

These dynamics have disproportionately impacted organizations with large contingents of hourly workers, including industries such as retail, manufacturing, health care, hospitality services and dining. In these types of industries and organizations, employers have to comply with Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) overtime laws in the U.S. as well as Department of Labor regulations, generally centered around the requirement of tracking hours worked. The subset of organizations concerned with this area of compliance is now changing following a late 2021 ruling by the European Court of Justice (ECJ) that determined all companies operating in the European Union are now legally obliged to track employee work hours for all employees, not just hourly or deskless workers. Obviously, this has had major implications for WFM software vendors, time-tracking hardware device vendors and other technology tool providers servicing customers impacted in Europe. Moreover, legislative and regulatory trends in one part of the world often eventually show up elsewhere.

Aligning the workforce to business goals is the number one priority of organizations as it relates to managing workers. As important as this is, it’s even more important when it comes to hourly employees as the jobs they’re hired into can involve less education, professional experience and independent judgment. Therefore, the activities and tasks worked on often need to be more closely tracked and supervised to ensure that alignment with business goals is clear and as granularly tracked as necessary. When you combine these considerations with the legislative and regulatory compliance issues associated with managing this population, it’s easy to see why technology plays such a vital role.

As an overview, workforce management software typically provides process automation, along with surrounding self-service, communication, collaboration, planning and analysis, and reporting and system security capabilities related to four major WFM automation pillars: forecasting and scheduling work, absence management, time and attendance management, and activity and task management. Ensuring that the optimal number of resources of specific skill types are deployed in the right areas at the right times means an organization is effectively satisfying customer flow and other business demands on a profitable cost basis. This is core to organizational agility, although this very prevalent concern of Chief Human Resource Officers (CHRO) and other executives can take many forms. For example, decision-making in deploying workers when responding to business demands should go beyond relevant skills to also be about actionable insights into optimal team composition, who can back up whom in different circumstances, when it might not be so problematic to be under- or over-staffed, which skills are transferable to other skills required when supply of certain talent is limited, or when gig workers are every bit as viable as a resourcing option. In workforce management, we expect all organizations to identify improving organizational agility as a critical business imperative, and this focus should encompass all worker types including non-employees and gig workers.

The trends of elevating the employee experience for all employees and deploying WFM products infused with AI/ML have given rise to an ever-expanding set of value-driving capabilities offered by leading vendors in this space. Just a sampling of these include the consideration of not just employee skills, training and certifications when scheduling workers, but factoring in career interests and a sense of equity and fairness in how shifts are made available to them; automated time off approvals based on governing rules that are customer-defined; an embedded HR service delivery capability within the platform involving virtual assistants that answer employee questions quickly and consistently; automated shift-swapping across workers based on eligibility rules along with surrounding messaging and collaboration tools; major flexibility around the use of time recording devices such as finger scanning and facial recognition; nudges and alerts to managers when analytics highlight the need to prevent employee fatigue-causing accidents, errors or burnout; and also one of the biggest WFM product advances of them all: labor-demand forecasting based on a wide array of internal and external data points and predictors — even forecasting down to 15 minute intervals for supreme precision.

Naturally, mobile-first product strategies have become the industry standard just as it is with most other enterprise software deployed. In the realm of WFM tools, employees should not only be able to log time and request time off but determine eligibility for different shifts and, ideally, swap shifts as permitted by the organization. Moreover, advanced mobile capabilities in the WFM domain are increasingly connecting employees with targeted learning opportunities in the flow of work if needed to be eligible for certain shifts or jobs. Although critical integrations involving WFM platforms usually focus on passing hours worked and rates to payroll processing engines, the aforementioned “spot learning” functionality tied to core WFM processes and functionality really speaks to the broader integration of WFM software with talent management and other HCM software.

This Value Index report evaluates the following vendors that offer products delivering workforce management solutions as we define it: ADP, Ascentis, Blue Yonder, Ceridian, Infor, Oracle, Paychex, Paycom, SAP SuccessFactors, UKG, Workday, Workforce Software and Zebra Technologies.

Value Index Overview

For almost two decades, Ventana Research has conducted market research in a spectrum of business technology areas. We have also examined the expansion of enterprise software tools and platforms through the use of cloud and mobile computing, and how products such as those found in the workforce management market use collaboration capabilities, social media techniques, and location and region-related functionality. The findings of these research undertakings contribute to our comprehensive approach.

This Workforce Management Value Index is the distillation of an extensive market and product research effort by Ventana Research. It is an assessment of how well vendors’ offerings will address buyers’ requirements for workforce management software. The index is structured to replicate an RFI/RFP process by incorporating all criteria needed to evaluate, select, utilize and maintain technology, and maintain relationships with vendors.

In this Value Index, Ventana Research evaluates the software in seven key categories that are weighted to reflect buyers’ needs based on our expertise and research. Five are product-experience related: Adaptability, Capability, Manageability, Reliability and Usability . In addition, we consider two customer-experience categories: Vendor Validation, and Total Cost of Ownership and Return on Investment (TCO/ROI). To assess functionality, one of the components of capability, we applied the Ventana Research Value Index methodology and blueprint, which links the personas and processes associated with workforce management to an organization’s requirements.

Unlike many IT analyst firms that rank vendors from an IT-only perspective or consider futures or vision over what is available in the products today, Ventana Research has designed the Value Index to provide a balanced perspective of vendors and products that is rooted in an understanding of business drivers and needs. This approach not only reduces cost and time but also minimizes the risk of making a decision that is bad for the business. Using the Value Index will enable your organization to achieve the levels of efficiency and effectiveness expected and hoped for when investing in workforce management technology.

We use our research-based analytics and methodology to generate the Value Index ratings. We then build them into a set of indicators that we present in both analytic and graphic form, each depicting the value of a specific vendor’s offering in terms of what it can deliver relevant to your workforce management needs.

The Value Index is not an abstraction; we use a carefully crafted best practices-based methodology to represent how organizations assess vendors and products. We have designed the Value Index to ensure that it provides objective research and guidance to organizations looking to assess and evaluate their applications for business and IT needs.

The structure of the Value Index reflects our understanding that the effective evaluation of vendors and products involves far more than just examining product features, potential revenue or customers generated from marketing and sales. We believe it is important to take this comprehensive research-based approach, since making the wrong choice for workforce management technology can raise the total cost of ownership, lower the return on investment and hamper an organization’s ability to reach its performance potential. In addition, this approach can reduce the project’s development and deployment time, and eliminate the risk of relying on a short list of vendors that does not represent a best fit for your organization.

To ensure the accuracy of the information we collected, we asked participating vendors to provide product and company information across the seven categories that taken together reflect the concerns of a well-crafted RFP. Ventana Research then validated the information, first independently through our database of product information and extensive web-based research, and then in consultation with the vendors. Vendors were also asked to participate in one-on-one consultative briefing sessions, after which we requested them to provide additional documentation to support any questions or clarifications needed.

Ventana Research believes that an objective review of specific vendors and products is critical to the selection of workforce management software and applications. An organization’s review should include a thorough analysis of both what is possible and what is relevant. We urge organizations to do a thorough job of evaluating workforce management systems and tools and offer this Value Index as both the results of our in-depth analysis of these vendors and as an evaluation methodology.

Lastly, it should be noted that several WFM vendors included in the evaluation did not fully and actively participate in the data collection process, which, as per our policy communicated to all vendors, resulted in Ventana Research basing the evaluation on any relevant materials found in the public domain. This includes product release notes, sales and marketing collateral, websites, press releases and other newsworthy items. All of this is supplemented by our interactions with buyers and what we’ve come to know about the WFM software providers contained herein through briefings, attending their events or accessing associated recordings.

We urge organizations to do a thorough job of evaluating workforce management systems and tools and offer this Value Index as both the results of our in-depth analysis of these vendors and as an evaluation methodology.

How To Use This Value Index

Evaluating Vendors: The Process

In our view, business improvement efforts should be based on best practices that research indicates deliver value quickly. Our Value Index evaluates business systems and tools in accordance with that belief.

We advocate using the Value Index as part of a structured approach that begins by incorporating these steps into a program document that will both summarize and detail your initiative or project. Then consult the Value Index to ensure you make choices that will yield the results you want.

The steps listed below provide a framework for a technology-driven business improvement project.

1. Define the business case and goals.
   Develop the business case for investment. Define the mission of the business project: What is the purpose, why is it important, what outcome do you want to achieve and how will you measure the project’s success? The goals should be grounded in your organization’s strategy and plans and should make clear the expected outcomes.
   
2. Specify the project’s business requirements.
   What must be done to achieve these goals? Defining the business requirements helps identify what specific capabilities are required with respect to people, processes, information and technology.
3. Assess the required roles and responsibilities.
   Identify the individuals required for the project at every level of the organization from executives to front line workers, and determine what each will contribute.
4. Outline the project’s critical path.
   What needs to be done, in what order and who will do it? This outline should make clear the prior dependencies at each step of the project plan.
5. Develop the technology approach.
   Determine the technology approach that most closely aligns to your organization’s requirements. Then develop a comprehensive list of potential vendors and products that best fit your needs.
6. Establish technology evaluation criteria.
   Define the business and technology criteria that you will use to evaluate vendors. We recommend using the criteria we have developed based on our Benchmark Research and use to build the Value Index: Adaptability, Capability, Manageability, Reliability, Usability, Validation, and TCO/ROI. This step will provide the tools necessary to move from a long list to a short list of vendors and products that you will then evaluate for final selection.
7. Evaluate and select the technology properly.
   Weight the seven categories of technology evaluation criteria to reflect the organization’s priorities. Then evaluate the short list of vendors and products based on your business case, requirements and the technology evaluation criteria for your project.
8. Establish the business initiative team to start the project. 
   Identify who will lead the project and the members of the team needed to plan and execute it. Have them begin by establishing a timeline and allocating resources.

In addition to evaluating existing suppliers, the Value Index can be used to provide evaluation criteria for new projects. Applying our research can shorten the cycle time when creating an RFP.

Products Evaluated

Vendor	Product Names	Version	Release Month	Release Year
ADP	ADP Workforce Manager	R8 Update 1	September	2021
Ascentis	Ascentis Time	21.7	July	2021
Blue Yonder	Workforce Management	2021.1	May	2021
Ceridian	Dayforce	60	May	2021
Infor	Infor Workforce Management	7.1.0	June	2021
Oracle	Oracle Cloud HCM	13.21 B	May	2021
Paychex	Paychex flex	-	May	2021
Paycom	Paycom Time & Attendance; Beti	- Ver 1	June  September	2021
SAP SuccessFactors	SAP Success Factors Time Tracking	v2105	First half	2021
UKG	UKG Dimensions Suite	R8	April	2021
Workday	Payroll & Workforce Management	R2	September	2021
Workforce Software	Workforce Suite	20.3	September	2021
Zebra	Reflexis One	ESS42	July	2021

 

The Findings

All of the products we evaluated are feature-rich, but not all the capabilities they offer are equally valuable to users or support everything needed across the entire lifecycle of use. Moreover, the existence of too many capabilities may be a negative factor for an organization if it introduces unnecessary complexity. Nonetheless, you may decide that a larger number of functions is a plus, especially if some of them match your organization’s established practices or better support a new initiative that is driving the purchase of software.

Factors beyond features and functions or vendor assessments may become a deciding factor. For example, an organization may face budget constraints such that the TCO evaluation can tip the balance to one vendor or another. This is where the Value Index methodology and the appropriate category weighting can be applied to determine the best fit of vendors and products to your specific needs.

Overall Scoring of Vendors Across Categories

The Value Index for Workforce Management in 2022 finds UKG first on the list with Workforce Software in second place and ADP in third. Companies that place in the top three in any category earn the designation Value Index Leader. Oracle and SAP have done so in four of the seven categories, Ceridian and Workday have done so in two categories, and Ascentis in one.

The overall representation of the Value Index below places the rating of the Product Experience and Customer Experience on the X and Y axes respectively to provide a visual representation and classification of the vendors. Those vendors whose Product Experience have a higher weighted performance to the axis in aggregate of the five product categories place farther to the right, while the performance and weighting for the two Customer Experience categories determines their placement on the vertical axis. In short, vendors that place closer to the upper-right on this chart performed higher than those closer to the lower-left.

The results from our research have placed vendors into one of four overall categories: Assurance, Exemplary, Merit or Innovative. The vendors that did well in both Product and Customer Experience were placed as Exemplary. Those vendors that perform quite well in Customer Experience but did not perform as well in Product Experience, such as Ascentis, are providing Assurance. The opposite is for those vendors with good performance in Product Experience such as ADP and Ceridian that did not perform as well in Customer Experience. This representation of the Value Index helps organizations better classify vendors to how they could use them in the organization.

Exemplary: The categorization and placement of vendors in Exemplary (upper right) represent those that performed the best in meeting the overall Product and Customer Experience requirements. The vendors awarded Exemplary are: Ceridian, UKG, Oracle, SAP, Workforce Software and Workday.

Innovative: The categorization and placement of vendors in Innovative (lower right) represent those that performed the best in meeting the overall Product Experience requirements while not meeting the highest level of requirements in Customer Experience. The vendor awarded Innovative is: ADP.

Assurance: The categorization and placement of vendors in Assurance (upper left) represent those that performed the best in meeting the overall Customer Experience requirements while not meeting the highest level of requirements in Product Experience. The vendor awarded Assurance is: Ascentis.

Merit: The categorization for vendors in Merit (lower left) represent those that did not surpass the median of performance in Customer or Product Experience and did not surpass the threshold for other three categories. The vendors awarded Merit are: Blue Yonder, Paychex, Infor, Zebra and Paycom.

We warn that close vendor placement should not be taken to imply that the packages evaluated are functionally identical or equally well suited for use by every organization or for a specific process. Although there is a high degree of commonality in how organizations handle workforce management, there are many idiosyncrasies and differences in how they do these functions that can make one vendor’s offering a better fit than another’s for a particular organization’s needs.

Product Experience

The process of researching products to address an organization’s needs should be comprehensive. Our Value Index methodology examines Product Experience and how it aligns with an organization’s lifecycle of onboarding, configuration, operations, usage and maintenance. Too often vendors are not evaluated for the entirety of the products; instead, they are evaluated on market execution and vision of the future, which are flawed since they do not represent an organization’s requirements but how the vendor operates. As more vendors establish a Chief Products Officer role, it is essential for them to be more engaged in the product experience that they and their organization represent.

The Workforce Management Value Index, based on the methodology of expertise and research, identified the weighting of Product Experience to 80% or four-fifths of the total evaluation. Importance was placed on the categories of Usability (25%), Capability (20%) and Reliability (15%), Adaptability (10%) and Manageability (10%). The importance of such weighting impacted vendors rankings in Product Experience and resulting overall ranking in this Value Index. The ranking of UKG, Workforce Software and ADP as Value Index Leaders is a result of their decades-long commitment to technology for workforce management. Additionally, rankings for Oracle and SAP show how they also continue to meet a broader range of enterprise requirements. The research found that vendors’ commitment to Usability matters significantly, with Ceridian and Oracle having higher placement through continued focus on broader needs across the enterprise. Vendors such as ADP, UKG, Oracle and Ceridian who have a higher placement in Capability and Manageability continue to advance an array of functionality designed to make workforce management support a broader set of requirements for organizations.

Customer Experience

The importance of a customer relationship with a vendor is essential to the actual success of the products and technology. The advancement of the Customer Experience (CX) and the entirety of the journey an organization has with its vendor is critical for ensuring inevitable satisfaction in working with a vendor. Thus, a vendor’s offering is not just about technology and should be evaluated using a lens that ensures the proper assessment and selection of a vendor. Technology providers that have Chief Customer Officers are most likely to have greater investments in the customer relationship and the focus to their success. These leaders also need to take responsibility for ensuring the marketing of their commitment is made abundantly clear throughout the buying process and customer journey. Our Value Index methodology examines Customer Experience to represent the framework of commitment to the relationship and the derived value. The two evaluation categories are Validation (10%) and TCO/ROI (10%) and are weighted to represent their importance to the overall Value Index balanced with the Product Experience.

The vendors that rank the highest overall in the aggregated and weighted Customer Experience categories are Value Index Leaders SAP SuccessFactors, Workforce Software and UKG. The category leaders in Customer Experience provided an impressive level of information to communicate their commitment to workforce management. Vendors such as SAP SuccessFactors and Ascentis that were not Overall or Product Experience Leaders also demonstrated their commitment to Customer Experience.

There were many vendors that have not made this a priority, and provide little to no information through their website, presentations and in our evaluation. Many have customer case studies to promote their success but lacked the depth of commitment to an organizations’ journey regarding workforce management. This makes it increasingly difficult for organizations to evaluate vendors on the merits of their commitment to customer success. As a result, many of the vendors did not rank as well in Customer Experience though it does not mean their products will not provide workforce management capabilities. As the commitment to a vendor is a continuous investment, the importance of supporting customer experience in a holistic evaluation should be included and not underestimated.

Adaptability of the Product

This category assesses the degree to which products and technology can be adapted to an organization’s specifications via configurability and customization while still maintaining integrity of integration across the worker, device, business, processes, application and data. Adaptability is also related to the ability to readily integrate with other internal and external systems — for example, integrate employee profile information securely with worker and work-related information in workforce management — and support bidirectional data flows to support synchronization and migration. It also examines the investment by the vendor in resources and improvements.

The Value Index for Workforce Management in 2022 weights Adaptability at 10% of the overall rating. Oracle, Ceridian and SAP are the top three vendors and are classified as Value Index Leaders in this category.

The majority of vendors evaluated quite well in this category and are highly competitive in the rankings. Since workforce management tools need to adapt to the people and processes of an organization, the ability to use them across activity workflows as well as embed them continues to grow in importance. This category did not always provide sufficient depth in vendor evaluations and we recommend that organizations make workforce management a priority, and ensure the tools they choose meet the broader set of enterprise requirements.

Capability of the Product

The Capability criteria is designed to assess the products across a broad range of workforce management capabilities, including workforce operations and management needs, scheduling, absence management, activity and task management, analytics, time and attendance support, timeclock support, mobile and collaboration-specific support, integration-specific support, management and manager, worker analyst and administrative and IT-specific support, business continuity and investment. Ventana Research evaluates more than 180 evaluation points in 18 different categories to assess these capabilities.

The Value Index for Workforce Management in 2022 weights Capability at 20% of the overall rating. In this category, ADP, UKG and Workforce Software are the top three vendors and are classified as Value Index Leaders.

This Value Index has a significant in-depth evaluation framework for workforce management, thus providing a more substantive challenge for many vendors. Those vendors that have more breadth and depth in the broader requirements for workforce management and support the entire set of needs fared better than others. Some vendors who specialize in specific areas such as scheduling, timeclock, and time and attendance did not perform as well as the others. The Value Index also evaluates a larger focus on essential persona-related roles such as workers and managers in an enterprise. In addition, the examination of collaboration and mobile-related support in products has increased in significance and is critical to support everyone in the organization who now have a role in using workforce management.

Manageability of the Product

Manageability is evaluated by how well the products can be managed technologically and by business, and governed, secured, licensed and supported in a service level agreement (SLA). Also important is the flexibility of the privacy and security provisions built into the technology with respect to user identity, role and access, how effective that security is, to what extent it supports auditing and compliance, and what licensing or subscription is available from the vendor. It also examines the investment by the vendor in resources and improvements.

The Value Index for Workforce Management in 2022 weights Manageability at 10% of the overall rating. Oracle, Workday and UKG are the top three vendors and are classified as Value Index Leaders in this category.

The majority of vendors evaluated well in this category and reflect the significance of supporting business and technology administration across roles in the organization. In addition, the growing level of importance to information security is essential with the insights and knowledge of an organization being available in the data within these systems. Simplifying manageability is critical and should be a priority for all vendor evaluations.

Reliability of the Product

For workforce management processes to operate efficiently and for workers to engage the applications, the software on which they run must reliably deliver the necessary performance and scalability using existing architecture. The criteria include the extent to which the product supports access by web, remote and mobile users, how quickly it performs server processing, how well it scales in terms of number of users, volume and complexity of data, server demand and what investments are required to ensure reliability.

The Value Index for Workforce Management in 2022 weights Reliability at 15% of the overall rating. Oracle, Workforce Software and Workday are the top three vendors and are classified as Value Index Leaders in this category, providing the highest level of confidence they can operate at any level of expectations 24 hours a day.

Most vendors evaluated continue to improve on providing the business continuity and resilience to workforce management. Evaluating the performance and scalability readiness of workforce management software is not always easy. These platforms require in-depth analysis of the products and information provided by the vendor. Some vendors lack the ability to provide this level of information, which should be more readily available from their product organization.

TCO/ROI of the Vendor

The TCO/ROI category applies evaluation criteria designed to assess how effective the vendor is in demonstrating the business case, including the product’s strategic value, total cost of ownership and total benefit of ownership. The criteria also include the tools and documentation provided to enable customer evaluation of TCO and ROI, and what the vendor cites as its investment and support services. It also examines the investment by the vendor in resources and improvements.

The Value Index for Workforce Management in 2022 weights TCO/ROI at 10% of the overall rating. Workforce Software, SAP and Ascentis are the top three vendors and are classified as Value Index Leaders in this category.

A small number of vendors evaluated quite well in providing buyers and customers with TCO/ROI-related materials and tools so they can effectively help with the business case and get funding for workforce management technology initiatives. However, our analysis also found that the majority of vendors struggle significantly to make available the tools and information on product benefits and costs necessary for organizations to make a sound buying decision.

Usability of the Product

Usability is necessary for meeting the varying business needs of executives, management, workers and analysts, along with IT, and others involved in the workforce management process. Products are evaluated on the user experience, intelligence, accessibility, and the support they provide for the diverse competencies of an organization’s workers. Usability criteria also include the sophistication of the product’s support of mobile and web technologies, and the extent to which the product design enables its use by workers of varied skill levels, including conversational experiences using chat and voice. It also examines the investment by the vendor in resources and improvements.

The Value Index for Workforce Management in 2022 weights Usability at 25% of the overall rating. Ceridian, Oracle and Workforce Software are the top three vendors and are classified as Value Index leaders in this category.

The growing importance of Usability and the experience of software has been increasing and is evident in our market research over the last decade. The requirements to meet a broad set of roles and responsibilities across an organization’s cohorts and personas should be a priority for all vendors. Many technological advancements in applying machine learning and natural language processing remain possible to provide a universal, intuitive experience in being able to hear, read and talk to systems. Most vendors are not fully embracing the value of Usability as a critical element in product experience, and as a result, they did not perform well in our assessment. They have not addressed Usability for all roles and have not invested in areas such as mobile accessibility or intelligence.

Validation of the Vendor

The Validation category assesses the vendor’s ability to support a customer through the journey of working in workforce management with its products. It examines the vendor’s commitment to the customer experience from leadership, processes and systems, and evaluates a vendor’s ability to assess its customer experience across front and back office and the marketing and communication of it. The viability of a vendor from financial growth, management, and customer growth are evaluated, as are customer references and studies on the vendor’s website, and the use of feedback to improve the vendors operations. The Value Index for Workforce Management in 2022 weights Validation at 10% of the overall rating. ADP, UKG and SAP are the top three vendors and are classified as Value Index leaders.

The majority of vendors evaluated well in the validation of their company and the commitment to this category and related customer-centric processes. However, our analysis found not all vendors have embraced these important processes, which has impacted their evaluation. As the market for software has shifted to subscription and continuous investment, the importance of supporting customer experience in a holistic evaluation should not be underestimated.

Vendors Evaluated in This Value Index

Vendors that were included in this Value Index research are highlighted in this section. For each, we provide its own description taken from its website. These company and product profiles do not represent Ventana Research’s opinions; our assessment can be found directly afterwards. Our assessment represents each vendor’s performance on the value scale overall and for each category. Value Index Leaders are those vendors that have earned a performance rating among the top three either overall or in the individual evaluation categories.

ADP

Company and Product Profile

“For over 70 years, ADP has led the way in defining the future of business solutions. ADP is a comprehensive global provider of cloud-based human capital management (HCM) solutions that unite HR, payroll, talent, time, tax and benefits administration, and is a leader in business outsourcing services, analytics and compliance expertise. ADP’s unmatched experience, deep insights and cutting-edge technology have transformed human resources from a back-office administrative function to a strategic business advantage.”

“ADP’s Workforce Management software features: 100% mobile access for improved productivity, AI-assisted decision-making and forecasting, dashboards with up-to-the-minute visibility and expert consultation on wage and hour compliance. More than just time and attendance — ADP Workforce Management software integrates everything from scheduling and absence management to compliance, payroll, and analytics.”

Ventana Research Evaluation

ADP was categorized as an Innovative Vendor, and tied for second overall in this Value Index evaluation. It ranked sixth in Product Experience, where it was designated as a Value Index Leader in Capability, and fifth in Adaptability. It ranked eighth in Customer Experience and was a Value Index Leader in Validation. Its overall performance was impacted by its lower rankings in TCO/ROI and Usability, which represent 30% of the weighting in the overall Value Index.

Our assessment finds that ADP could perform better in TCO/ROI, where it ranked seventh, in the area of cost transparency, specifically providing in the depth of information and tools it provides to organizations. In Usability, where it also ranked seventh, it could examine opportunities to improve depth of accessibility for using varying methods to access the system. ADP actively participated in the Value Index process.

Ascentis

Company and Product Profile

“For 30+ years, Ascentis has been an industry-leading full suite human capital management (HCM) technology platform. Ascentis’ suite of workforce-driven technology provides a customizable way to automate the most complex processes involved with keeping your hourly or challenging work environment compliant and consistently productive. With more than 4,700 clients, Ascentis’ sole purpose is to enable workforce-reliant companies to streamline processes and remain compliant with full-suite HR technology.”

“Ascentis Time goes beyond traditional time and attendance solutions to ensure you only spend seconds tracking hours and can put an end to manual timesheet entry tracking. With Ascentis Time, your complex work environment has the power of a comprehensive, automated solution designed to meet the specific needs of the employer for all union and non-union employees. Ascentis Time also features a mobile app that gives your workers the ability to perform the most essential tasks on the go and from any work site and complex hardware options to put you in complete control with minimal effort.”

Ventana Research Evaluation

Ascentis was categorized as a Vendor of Assurance, ranking ninth overall in this Value Index evaluation. It ranked 11th in Product Experience where it performed best in Adaptability. It ranked fifth in Customer Experience and performed best in TCO/ROI. Its overall performance was impacted by its lower rankings in Capability and Usability, which represent 40% of the weighting in the overall Value Index.

Our assessment finds that Ascentis could perform better in Capability, where it ranked 11th, in the areas of analytics and collaboration for workforce management. In Usability, where it also ranked 11th, it could examine opportunities for depth in the accessibility like embedding HR service delivery or virtual assistants. Ascentis actively participated in the Value Index process.

Blue Yonder

Company and Product Profile

“For over 30 years, Blue Yonder has been the world leader in digital supply chain and omni-channel commerce fulfillment. Blue Yonder’s intelligent, end-to-end platform enables retailers, manufacturers and logistics providers to seamlessly predict, pivot and fulfill customer demand. With Blue Yonder, you can make more automated, profitable business decisions that deliver greater growth and re-imagined customer experiences.”

“Blue Yonder’s Workforce Management (WFM) helps businesses simplify the complex task of managing employees in today’s challenging environment. It includes everything from accurate time and attendance and creating daily schedules to long-range labor planning. Using the industry’s most accurate forecast, it creates optimized labor schedules that are compliant with labor laws and corporate policy, as well as aligned with employee preference. Plus, it provides the flexibility to adjust schedules mid-week if things change. Employees can view schedules, swap shifts, request time off, and more from any mobile device. The solution provides a 12-month outlook on labor needs and recommends cross-training and recruitment opportunities to cover gaps.”

Ventana Research Evaluation

Blue Yonder was categorized as a Vendor of Merit, ranking eighth overall in this Value Index evaluation. It ranked eighth in Product Experience, where it performed best in Adaptability, and eighth in Usability and Capability. It ranked ninth in Customer Experience and performed best in Validation. Its overall performance was impacted by its lower rankings in TCO/ROI and Reliability, which represent 25% of the weighting in the overall Value Index.

Blue Yonder could perform better in TCO/ROI, where it ranked ninth, in the depth of information it provides to organizations and the tools it provides. In Reliability, where it ranked 13th, Blue Yonder could have more depth in the information related to its investments in this category. Blue Yonder partially participated in the Value Index process.

Ceridian

Company and Product Profile

“Ceridian, founded in 1992, is a global human capital management (HCM) software company. Ceridian's 2012 acquisition of Dayforce marked its expansion into the software market. Ceridian Dayforce is an integrated (SaaS) HCM application that contains modules for time and attendance, workforce management, core HR, payroll and benefits management. Ceridian also provides services such as payroll and benefits outsourcing, tax filing, corporate wellness programs and pre-employment screening. Ceridian provides solutions for organizations of all sizes, from small businesses to global organizations.”

“Ceridian Dayforce is a global HCM software platform that transforms the employee experience. It unifies data from across the entire employee lifecycle to enable better decision-making at every level. Dayforce is a comprehensive cloud platform that combines HR, payroll, benefits, workforce management, and talent management in a single application. The scalable HCM software is built with a single, flexible rules engine combined with real-time updates and calculations that help address complex regulatory requirements.”

Ventana Research Evaluation

Ceridian was categorized as an Exemplary Vendor, ranking fifth overall in this Value Index evaluation. It ranked first in Product Experience where it was designated as a Value Index Leader in Usability. It ranked seventh in Customer Experience, performing best in TCO/ROI. Its overall performance was impacted by its lower rankings in Capability and Validation, which represent 30% of the weighting in the overall Value Index.

Our assessment finds that Ceridian could perform better in Validation, where it ranked eighth, in the areas of customer case studies and references for this category. In Capability, where it ranked fifth, it could examine its depth in collaboration support and worker specific functionality. Ceridian partially participated in the Value Index process.

Infor

Company and Product Profile

“Infor, founded in 2002, is a global leader in business cloud software products for companies in industry specific markets. Infor builds complete industry suites in the cloud and efficiently deploys technology that puts the user experience first, leverages data science, and integrates easily into existing systems. Over 65,000 organizations worldwide rely on Infor to help overcome market disruptions and achieve business-wide digital transformation.”

“Infor Workforce Management strategically enhances workforce planning, execution and analysis with engaging, industry-specific, enterprise workforce management software. Infor Workforce Management was built on a proven technology platform and delivers time and attendance, demand-driven scheduling, workforce scheduling, and absence management tools. Infor’s Workforce Management supports multifaceted integration data exchanges and uses machine learning to promote the aggregation of more and better data with broader labor models, deeper flexibility and forecasting algorithms.”

Ventana Research Evaluation

Infor was categorized as a Vendor with Merit, ranking 11th overall in this Value Index evaluation. It ranked 10th in Product Experience, where it performed best in Manageability, and eighth in Reliability. It ranked 10th in Customer Experience and performed best in Validation. Its overall performance was impacted by its lower rankings in TCO/ROI and Adaptability, which represent 25% of the weighting in the overall Value Index.

Our assessment finds that Infor could perform better in TCO/ROI, where it ranked 11th, in the depth of information it provides for organizations in this category. In Adaptability, where it ranked 12th, it could explore opportunities for the depth in its integration of workforce management with other HCM applications. Infor partially participated in the process by providing its product information and roadmap.

Oracle

Company and Product Profile

“Oracle, founded in 1977, is a cloud technology company that provides organizations around the world with computing infrastructure and software to help them innovate, unlock efficiencies and become more effective. Oracle also created the world’s first — and only — autonomous database to help organize and secure customers’ data. Oracle Cloud offers a complete suite of integrated applications for Sales, Service, Marketing, Human Resources, Finance, Supply Chain and Manufacturing.”

“Natively built for the cloud, Oracle Cloud HCM is a complete solution connecting every human resource process from hire to retire. This provides consistent experience across devices, enables one source of truth for HR data to improve decision-making, and empowers you with market-leading innovation to address your needs today and into the future. Oracle Cloud HCM allows you to forecast labor and workload demand, define and assign schedules to meet business objectives, capture time worked, absences and other labor data, track adherence to schedules and productivity, and adhere to labor laws and pay rules.”

Ventana Research Evaluation

Oracle was categorized as an Exemplary Vendor, ranking seventh overall in this Value Index evaluation. It ranked third in Product Experience and was designated as a Value Index Leader in Reliability. It ranked fourth in Customer Experience where it performed best in Validation. Its overall performance was impacted by its lower rankings in Capability and TCO/ROI, which represent 30% of the weighting in the overall Value Index.

Our assessment finds that Oracle could perform better in Capability, where it ranked seventh, in depth of support for activity and task management and the collaboration with workers. In TCO/ROI, where it ranked sixth, it could provide more information on the cost of ownership framework and the tools it provides organizations. Oracle fully participated in the Value Index process.

Paychex

Company and Product Profile

“Paychex is a leading provider of integrated human capital management software solutions for human resources, payroll, benefits, and insurance services. By combining its innovative software-as-a-service technology and mobility platform with dedicated, personal service, Paychex empowers small- and medium-sized business owners to focus on the growth and management of their business. Backed by 50 years of industry expertise, Paychex served more than 710,000 payroll clients as of May 31, 2021, across more than 100 locations in the U.S. and Europe and pays one out of every 12 American private sector employees.”

“Paychex Flex is a human capital management solution that's designed using web-based modular technology and a dedicated service center to help meet the HR needs of employers of any size and industry. Built on a central platform, using a single data profile for each employee, Paychex Flex tracks information in real-time and across customizable applications. With a single login, users can manage applicant screening, electronic onboarding, job and labor costing, garnishment payments, drag-and-drop visual scheduling, and automatic compliance testing.”

Ventana Research Evaluation

Paychex was categorized as a Vendor of Merit, ranking 10th overall in this Value Index evaluation. It ranked ninth in Product Experience where it performed best in Usability and ninth in Capability. It ranked 11th in Customer Experience and best in TCO/ROI. Its overall performance was impacted by its lower rankings in TCO/ROI and Validation, which represent 20% of the weighting in the overall Value Index.

Our assessment finds that Paychex could perform better in TCO/ROI, where it ranked 10th, in the depth of information on its support for organizations in this category. In Validation, where it ranked 11th, it could have more depth on the references and product for workforce management. Paychex did not participate in the Value Index process.

Paycom

Company and Product Profile

“Paycom digitally transforms businesses with comprehensive HR and payroll technology that empowers employees to manage their own data within the single, easy-to-use cloud-based software. From recruitment to retirement, the entire employee life cycle can be managed with tools that work together seamlessly, including talent acquisition, talent management, HR management, payroll, and time and labor management. Paycom ranked as one of Fortune’s fastest-growing companies in 2020 and ranked No. 1 on Oklahoma’s Top Workplaces list in 2020.”

“Paycom’s Time and Attendance software maintains all time data in one application, so reporting is made simple. Product features include flexibility to accommodate your business’s specific needs by tracking attendance with easy search functionality for timecards with missed punches, time-off hours, bonuses or comments, batch-editing to enter a punch or hours for any number of employees and rounding rules, shifts crossing midnight, bonuses, shift and weekend differentials, holidays worked and more. With Paycom’s Time and Attendance software you can enjoy peace of mind with it’s seamless flow to timecards and payroll.”

Ventana Research Evaluation

Paycom was categorized as a Vendor of Merit, ranking 13th overall in this Value Index evaluation. It ranked 13th in Product Experience, where it performed best in Manageability, and 11th in Reliability. It ranked 13th in Customer Experience where it performed best in Validation. Its overall performance was impacted by its lower rankings in TCO/ROI and Validation, which represent 20% of the weighting in the overall Value Index.

Our assessment finds that Paycom could perform better in TCO/ROI, where it ranked 13th, in the depth of information on its support for organizations in this category. In Validation, where it also ranked 13th, it could have provided references and have more depth in the services it provides. Paycom did not participate in the Value Index process.

SAP SuccessFactors

Company and Product Profile

“SAP is one of the world’s leading producers of software for the management of business processes, developing solutions that facilitate effective data processing and information flow across organizations. SAP established the global standard for enterprise resource planning (ERP) software. Now, SAP takes ERP to the next level by using the power of in-memory computing to process vast amounts of data, and to support advanced technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning.”

“SAP Success Factors Time Tracking is a new cloud-based solution that provides organizations with simple, innovative tools to record, approve and monitor the time of their workforce. Built with an intuitive user interface, SAP SuccessFactors Time Tracking enhances the employee experience and helps ensure people are paid accurately, on time and in accordance with local regulations. The solution integrates with the SAP SuccessFactors Employee Central and SAP SuccessFactors Employee Central Payroll solutions and on-premise payroll software from SAP as well as with clock terminal integration services. This enables organizations to share relevant data across multiple systems to help ensure accurate payments.”

Ventana Research Evaluation

SAP SuccessFactors was categorized as an Exemplary Vendor, ranking fourth overall in this Value Index evaluation. It ranked fourth in Product Experience where it ranked best in Adaptability and fourth in Usability. It ranked first in Customer Experience and did best in TCO/ROI. Its overall performance was impacted by its lower rankings in Capability and Validation, which represent 30% of the weighting in the overall Value Index.

Our assessment finds that SAP SuccessFactors could perform better in Capability, where it ranked sixth, by helping customers fully optimize the end-to-end forecasting and scheduling process. In Validation, where it ranked 3rd, it would have performed even better with depth of case studies and references. SAP SuccessFactors partially participated in the Value Index process.

UKG

Company and Product Profile

“UKG was built from a merger that created one of the largest cloud companies in the world. UKG believes organizations succeed when they focus on their people. As a leading global provider of HCM, payroll, HR service delivery, and workforce management solutions, UKG’s award-winning Pro, Dimensions, and Ready solutions help tens of thousands of organizations across geographies and in every industry drive better business outcomes, improve HR effectiveness, streamline the payroll process, and help make work a better, more connected experience for everyone.”

“UKG Dimensions helps create meaningful, connected work experiences for all your people. From timekeeping to scheduling, mobile to AI-driven insights, and everywhere in between, UKG Dimensions provides embedded analytics and personalized visualizations that provide real-time visibility into compliance issues, artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning functionality that analyzes data and provides best-fit recommendations, and modern cloud technology infrastructure to seamlessly integrate with foundational applications.”

Ventana Research Evaluation

UKG was categorized as an Exemplary Vendor, ranking first overall in this Value Index evaluation. It ranked second in Product Experience, performing best in Capability and ranking third in Manageability. It ranked third in Customer Experience and performed best in Validation. Its overall performance was impacted by its lower rankings in Capability and TCO/ROI, which represent 30% of the weighting in the overall Value Index.

Our assessment finds that UKG could perform better in Capability, where it ranked second, by having better collaboration and integration specific support with other applications for workforce management. In TCO/ROI, where it ranked fifth, it could provide more support for the tools it provides to calculate TCO/ROI of its WFM offering. UKG actively participated in the Value Index process.

Workday

Company and Product Profile

“Workday is a leading provider of enterprise cloud applications for finance, HR, and planning. Founded in 2005, Workday delivers financial management, human capital management, and analytics applications designed for the world’s largest companies, educational institutions, and government agencies. Organizations ranging from medium-sized businesses to Fortune 50 enterprises have selected Workday.”

“Workday Payroll and Workforce Management optimizes the time, talent and energy of your people. With innovations that keep pace with change, the Payroll and Workforce Management enables you to visualize workforce costs and trends, identify the root cause, and take action — all in one place. A people-first experience for all. Workday provides personalized experiences and flexibility for workers to get paid when they want — so you can support your hourly, salaried, and part-time workers in the way that meets their needs.”

Ventana Research Evaluation

Workday was categorized as an Exemplary Vendor, ranking sixth overall in this Value Index evaluation. It was ranked seventh in Product Experience, where it performed best in Manageability, and third in Reliability. It ranked sixth in Customer Experience and ranked best in Validation. Its overall performance was impacted by its lower rankings in Capability and TCO/ROI, which represent 30% of the weighting in the overall Value Index.

Our assessment finds that Workday could perform better in Capability, where it ranked fourth, in the area of activity and task management for what is assigned to worker to work on during their shift. In TCO/ROI, where it ranked seventh, it could provide more depth in the information on the business case and tools it provides to organizations to support TCO/ROI analysis. Workday did not actively participate in the complete Value Index process.

Workforce Software

Company and Product Profile

“WorkForce Software is the first global provider of workforce management solutions with integrated employee experience capabilities. Workforce Software is helping some of the world’s most innovative organizations optimize their workforce, protect against compliance risks, and increase employee engagement to unlock new potential for resiliency and optimal performance. Whether your employees are deskless or office workers, unionized, full-time, part-time, or seasonal, Workforce Software makes managing your global workforce easy, less costly, and more rewarding for everyone.”

“Workforce Software’s Workforce Suite is interface-ready for a seamless business experience. The extensive integration with leading Human Capital Management (HCM) and Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) solutions means you no longer have to sacrifice functionality for an all-in-one HCM or ERP solution. The Workforce Suite makes integration easy with embeddability within 3rd party solutions, an extensive set of RESTful and SOAP-based APIs, file-based interfaces using popular formats like CSV and XML and single sign-on with options for multi-factor authentication.”

Ventana Research Evaluation

Workforce Software was categorized as an Exemplary Vendor, ranking second overall in this Value Index evaluation. It ranked fifth in Product Experience, where it performed best in Reliability, and ranked third in Usability and Capability. It ranked second in Customer Experience and was a Value Index Leader in TCO/ROI. Its overall performance was impacted by its lower rankings in Adaptability and Capability, which represent 35% of the weighting in the overall Value Index.

Our assessment finds that Workforce Software could perform better in Adaptability, where it ranked seventh, in the area of business integration to other processes. In Capability, where it ranked third, it could similarly examine the integration specific support with relevant HCM and talent management systems and tools.

Zebra

Company and Product Profile

“Zebra empowers organizations to thrive in the on-demand economy by making every front-line worker and asset at the edge visible, connected and fully optimized. With an ecosystem of more than 10,000 partners across more than 100 countries, Zebra serves customers of all sizes — including 94% of the Fortune 100 — with an award-winning portfolio of hardware, software, services and solutions that digitize and automate workflows. Recently, Zebra announced that it has completed its acquisition of Reflexis Systems, Inc., a privately-held, leading provider of intelligent workforce management, execution, and communication solutions for organizations in the retail, food service, hospitality and banking industries.”

“Zebra’s Reflexis ONE is a cloud-based platform of real-time store operation, task management, and workforce management solutions enables retailers to simplify work for stores. It also unleashes the power of store associates so they can provide a seamless omni-channel shopping experience. Reflexis execution and labor operations solutions can be implemented individually or as an integrated suite. Retailers can coordinate corporate planning, optimize workloads, schedule labor, and streamline communications.”

Ventana Research Evaluation

Zebra was categorized as a Vendor of Merit, ranking 12th overall in this Value Index evaluation. It ranked 12th in Product Experience, where it performed best in Reliability, and ranked 11th in Adaptability. It ranked 12th in Customer Experience and performed best in Validation. Its overall performance was impacted by its lower rankings in TCO/ROI and Validation, which represent 20% of the weighting in the overall Value Index.

Our assessment finds that Zebra could perform better in TCO/ROI, where it ranked 12th, in the area of services, specifically the depth in how it helps organizations in calculating TCO/ROI. Validation, where it also ranked 12th, Zebra could have performed better if customers were provided to survey and provide feedback. Zebra did not participate in the Value Index process.