The document lifecycle of the digital personnel file begins with the digitization of paper documents using a scanner or the creation of electronic documents. Once these documents are stored in the software’s electronic files, the active “life phase” of the personnel file begins: Here, documents and information can be managed, edited, searched, sent in encrypted form (pay stubs), digitally signed, analyzed, and much more. The end of the lifecycle is marked by the audit-compliant archiving of personnel files in connected archives, where they remain for varying lengths of time—depending on the document type and legal requirements—until they are finally and securely destroyed (i.e., completely deleted). The figure below illustrates the workflow and potential range of functions of a digital personnel file.
2.1 Document and Information Capture
Regardless of the form in which the relevant information is received or exists (letters, notes, emails, application forms), it must be stored centrally and in a structured manner in the digital personnel file to serve as the basis for optimal use.
Digitization
Paper documents and faxes must first be digitized upon receipt before being filed. This can be done either centrally (e.g., via a scanning station) or decentralized using any simple scanner at individual workstations.
During digitization, the documents should ideally be indexed immediately, and contact information, for example, should be recognized, classified, and extracted usingOCR.Automatic data extractionshould also be possible from web forms, emails, etc. This data, along with the entire document, is then filed with a content-based reference to the corresponding employee master data.
Abarcode functionis helpful here. Barcodes allow documents to be assigned to different files and registers during the scanning process. If incoming documents contain a barcode, they are also automatically assigned to a process in the document management system and stored in an audit-proof manner in the corresponding electronic file.
Apart from placing the paper documents in the scanner, the digitization process and the transfer of the relevant data are thus carried out completely automatically.
Import and Creation of MS Office Documents and Emails
Most documents relevant to a case are created in companies using MS Office applications or are already stored in these formats on the corporate network. To make these documents quickly available to everyone as part of a case, a digital personnel file should also support common applications such as MS Word, Excel, Outlook, and many others. This enables thequick archivingof one or moreOffice filessimultaneously from any folder in File Explorer or directly from within the Office application.
Care should be taken to use a consistent naming convention for both newly created and scanned documents.
An important feature of a digital personnel file is the ability tostore, manage, and properly archive emails. However, this audit-proof archiving of emails is only effective if the email is archived unchanged—that is, if all formatting, attachments, etc., are preserved. Ideally, the HR software should import emails directly from the email program (e.g., MS Outlook) into the digital personnel file and archive them there—including all text formatting and attachments.
In the event that such elements need to be automatically searchable later on, integrated optical character recognition (OCR) for images, graphics, etc., is helpful.
2.2 The Electronic Personnel File—Functions
The electronic file is at the heart of software for the digital management of personnel files.
By default, an electronic file is maintained for each employee and each process. This file clearly organizes all personnel-related documents and contracts, social security and tax documents, copies of official certificates, and other records.
The structure of the electronic file should be definable centrally for each file or process type. This allows the structure to vary for employees covered by collective bargaining agreements and those not covered, such as retirees or former employees.
To ensure that all necessary documents for a specific process are available, it is also possible to define a minimum number of documents that must be stored in a specific folder. Depending on the process type, not only can the structure of the file be defined differently, but also the organization and number of subfolders, as well as dependencies and the respective validity checks.
In addition to the defined file structure, it should be possible to create any number of additional subfolders as needed.
Temporary Access
Every employee has the right to access their personnel file. A digital personnel file should also support this by allowing parts of the file to be “borrowed” on a self-service basis—for example, by the works council or staff council. To do this, the employee in question is granted temporary access rightsto specific content. This eliminates the need to pre-sort paper file contents that may not be permitted for viewing.
Optimized Document Search
Digitally stored documents that are difficult to “locate” offer no significant advantage over paper filing or storage in the company network’s file system.
A digital personnel file must therefore enablequick retrievalthrough various search functions. To achieve this, documents are automatically and fully indexed upon import or creation—ideally, this should be possible for all formats, whether they are emails, e-forms, PDFs, or scanned documents. Even existing electronic archives can be retroactively recognized in this way, allowing them to be easily searched via full-text search.
Version Management
Whether dealing with paper documents or those stored on a network, it is difficult to ensure that they are not stored redundantly, edited simultaneously, or used in different versions.
For this reason, a digital personnel file should also offer version management, ideally with a“check-in/check-out” function. As soon as an employee edits a stored document outside the file, it is checked out and is no longer available for editing by others until it is checked in. Upon check-in, the edited document is then saved as a new version.
Archived MS Office documents can also be opened directly within the digital file in the respective Office application and edited directly in the file using the familiar Word interface. Versioning occurs automatically upon saving in this case as well.
Another important—and otherwise time-consuming—factor iscomparing document versions. To quickly verify what has been changed in an MS Word or PDF document, a digital personnel file should allow for the comparisonof different document versions and display every change at a glance.
Version control thus makes it possible to trace the development of a document or contract—from the draft stage, through revisions, to the current version—even years later.
Monitoring Tasks, Appointments, and Deadlines
To design processes optimally and efficiently, it is essential to clearly assign and track tasks, as well as to define recurring, necessary procedures in the form of workflows. This is the only way to ensure that processing and decision-making procedures are followed and that tasks are handled in the most efficient manner.
To-Dos, Deadlines, and Due Dates
Automatic monitoring of due dates and deadlinesis therefore one of thecore functions of thedigital personnel file.
As soon as the lead time for a specific due date is reached, follow-up actions can be executed automatically. For example, an email is sent and/or the to-do list opens for the person responsible for the task, indicating that the task or document needs to be processed. The to-do list thus supports employees in their day-to-day work.
In addition to the integrated to-do list, dates and deadlines for a task can ideally also be synchronized with MS Exchange. Depending on the settings, these then appear as an appointment or task, for example, in the responsible person’s MS Outlook application.
Tasks, Checklists, and Workflows
There are a wide variety of processes related to documents, such as the often time-consuming and labor-intensiveapproval process, which frequently requires several rounds of coordination before a document is finally approved. In many cases, ad hoc coordination is also necessary, which cannot be planned in advance. A solution is provided by a computer-assistedworkflow—ideallyintegrated into the digital personnel file—that makes it easy to manage tasks.
Within the digital personnel file, tasks can be defined for an employee, the file itself, or even individual documents, and these tasks can be assigned to one or more recipients. This is done through the automated generation of emails containing links to the file or document; however, it can also create appointments in Outlook or generate tasks that are transferred to the Outlook system.
Tasks can also apply to more than one person, so that, for example, all members of a specific group can be assigned a task.
For more complex, multi-step tasks, it should be possible to use predefinedworkflow checkliststhat contain several individual activities. The checklist items, in turn, can link to other functions of the personnel file management system or to functions of the connected (SAP) system.
Automated Document Generation
Ideally, a digital personnel file offers integrated document generation. This featureautomaticallygeneratescustomized versionsof all types of documents and forms—as individual letters or mail merges—as well as for bulk generation in MS Office, PDF, or other print formats. It also enables the creation of formatted emails.
Predefineddocument templatesspecify the structure and layout, the respective section contents for the various document types, and their respective validity periods. Additionally, you can define on a case-by-case basis whether users should be allowed to make changes or additions later.
The subsequent creation of documents is simplified in particular by the fact that text passages—in the form of inserted variables and individual SAP infotypes—can be automaticallypopulated with data from SAP systems.
Performance Reviews at the Click of a Button
An integrated performancereviewgenerator also makes it quick and easy to create performance reviews and evaluations for employees. To do this, an authorized HR employee draws on a pool of predefined text passages. The appropriate text module is selected for grading the various evaluation areas. Combined with the existing data from the personnel file, this results in a standardized yetpersonalized reference document.
The generated documents can then be automatically archived via standard mechanisms in Word or PDF format in the electronic file, SAP Folder Management, or any other archive, where they can be stored for future use.
In summary: Automated document generation significantly reduces response times and improves document quality.
Encrypted Email Delivery of Pay Stubs
Paystub processing is a real time- and cost-sink. Every month, HR and payroll data must be printed, bound, and then mailed or distributed internally to employees. But this tedious paperwork can now be a thing of the past, as the digital personnel file offers the option to send pay stubs digitally to employees via email. Of course, the security of this sensitive data must be ensured through high-quality encryption.
Recipients should be able to sign up for the electronic process via an intuitive self-service portal. Here, they also set a secure password to open and save the PDF documents sent via email. An authorized HR employee can flexibly adjust the content, attachments, and send time for the email in the SAP system.
Electronic, encrypted delivery is also conceivable for other HR information, such as certificates or employment references. Thissaves on high postage costsandeliminatesthe need for laborious distribution to mailboxes.
2.3 Audit-Proof Archiving and Controlled Document Destruction
Until their final destruction after the minimum retention period has expired, the documents are securely stored in the digital personnel file. This means they are archived in an audit-proof manner in one or more connected archives.
To this end, allchanges made to a document arereliably documented throughout its entire “lifetime.” This makes it possible—even decades later—to trace who made a change and when.
Optionally, documents can be stored with high-security encryption, ensuring that access is restricted to authorized individuals who can view the information either implicitly based on their roles and permissions or explicitly by entering a password.
Many document types are subject to minimum retention periodsof varying lengths or—for example, in the case of cease-and-desist letters—a maximum retention period. However, retention periods are easily forgotten, or there may be a lack of clarity regarding which individual documents could or should already be destroyed. This can lead to legally undesirable or impermissible situations in data archiving.
A digital personnel file offers various automated features to prevent this. For example, documents can be sent fo organized destructioneither semi-automatically—by sending a reminder to the responsible employee—or fully automatically once the minimum retention period has expired. If this is not technically possible via the connected archive, a logical deletion is performed—that is, access to the document is blocked so that it cannot be retrieved. Thisensures that only the necessary dataisretained—no more and no less.
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