Your Guide to HR Document Management

As an HR professional, managing all the necessary paperwork can be a living nightmare. Towering file cabinets. Endless manilla folders. And papercuts — ouch!

If this strikes too close to home, it’s time for your organization to wake up and modernize its document-managing practices.

On the face of it, the answer seems simple: store HR documents in a safe and accessible place. But when you consider the scale of HR documentation (everything from employee enrollment to workplace events), the difficulty of the task compounds. 

In this guide, we’ll explore the ins and out of digital document management, helping turn your HR nightmare into paperless bliss. 

What is Digital HR Document Management?

Digital HR document management digitizes every aspect of your document library. Wave goodbye to unorganized filing cabinets. Instead, everything is stored in a centralized cloud-based location where HR professionals can:

• Store important employment events (e.g., resumes, performance reviews, acknowledgement documentation)
• Control access to sensitive files
• Organize and tags documents in a searchable database

But digital document management offers a host of benefits for you and your organization beyond just centralization. Let’s explore.

What Are the Benefits Digital HR Document Management?

HR document management solutions are more than just a slick interface with a search bar. The benefits can have a ripple effect across your entire organization.

Smoother and More Reliable Processes

Keeping physical copies of documents seems like an easy solution but can quickly become more trouble than it’s worth.

And as HR documents start to pile up this problem only becomes worse. Paperwork can easily get lost or put in the wrong place, leaving you empty-handed when you need quick access.

With a digital HR document management system, situations like these are less likely to arise. Every file is just a few clicks away.

And if your document management system is a part of an all-in-one HR solution, you can even integrate documents into automated HR workflows. Easily prompt the capture and storage of necessary files for common tasks.

Ensure Compliance and Security

Certain federal and state laws specifically require the storage of employee documents, especially if they contain sensitive information. Not only do manual filing systems risk misplaced documents, they also pose a security risk.

Compliance isn’t something you want to take chances with, and the right document management system is a check to ensure those requirements are met.

As an added security measure, most digital document storage solutions allow for access configurations based on role. This allows you to prevent unauthorized users from viewing sensitive documents.

Better Preparation for Physical Disasters

You can’t predict disasters. They happen — and sometimes with devastating consequences. If there’s a large fire in your office and you don’t have backup copies of your documents elsewhere, you’re sunk. 

Having digital copies stored in the cloud helps to reduce that risk of loss. Even against virtual disasters, such as a server crash. Cloud servers are backed up across multiple locations, so if one goes down, another kicks in.

Legal Safeguards

In addition to federal compliance lawsuits, audits, and other legal proceedings will require quick access to documents.

As we’ve explored, manually getting the documents you need can be tricky. A document management system helps you stay prepared for any potential legal action.

Advanced Search Capabilities

Due to its analog nature, you can’t make use of metadata (i.e., assigned data that provides contextual information about a file) with printed documents. Fortunately, metadata is table stakes in the best digital document storage.

For example, a simple search query can pull up all employee I-9s in seconds, drastically reducing the amount of time an HR professional spends digging through cabinets.

Or perhaps you need a certain group of employees to complete a training or sign a disclosure document. You can create a query that segments the required employees and identifies which ones haven’t completed the requirement. Easy!

Boosted Productivity

Manual HR document management can slow the productivity of your business in many ways. Onboarding and offboarding is more tedious to track. Tax and payroll documents take longer to fill out or change — the list goes on.

With a digital library that keeps track of requirements and provides easy-entry fields for forms, you can avoid many of these issues. Instead, you have near-instant access to the files you need, allowing you to complete more tasks in a fraction of the time.

Saved Space

Let’s not forget the space saved by not needing so many filing cabinets. Not only are these expensive, but they also clutter up your office.

And let’s be frank — filing cabinets and drawers aren’t exactly compatible with a streamlined modern office environment.

What Records Are Included in a Digital HR Document Manager?

Digital document managers can easily meet that challenge by covering several file types, including:

• Hiring records: Files relating to the intake of new employees. This includes onboarding forms, contracts, and any supporting documents.
• Payroll records: Files ranging from time sheets to paystubs to tax returns.
• Training records: Any materials needed to facilitate training, as well as records of completed training. 
• Disability records: All documents that relate to employees with disabilities and the accommodations made for them.
• Recruitment documents: Archives of documents involved in the recruitment process (e.g., job postings, applications, submitted resumes, etc.).
• Personnel records: Documents relating to different aspects of an employee's role(s), tenure, performance, etc.
• Safety documents: Reports on any aspects of safety in the workplace. This could include accident reports, worker’s compensation requests, and safety assessments.
• Leave records: Any files relating to employee turnover, such as exit interviews.

The best document management solutions will be integrated with an all-in-one human resources information system (HRIS), that automatically captures necessary documentation when you need it.