Reference Story Dienste für Menschen gGmbH

Dienste für Menschen gGmbH accelerates and automates centralized document management with d.velop

(Dienste für Menschen = Services for People)

Digital personnel file offers quick access to up-to-date digital data

Dienste für Menschen gGmbH is a diaconal elderly care organisation based in Esslingen in Baden-Württemberg. Around 2000 employees look after senior citizens in care homes, day care centres, outpatient care services, diaconal wards and residential homes in Baden-Württemberg, Bavaria and Saxony. Services for People cares for around 1700 people in 26 care homes. 10 outpatient care services and diaconal wards ensure quality of life and safety at home. Day care, family care and short-term care provide relief for relatives. In 280 assisted living flats, service contracts ensure a self-determined life into old age.

Customer had no option to digitize personnel files by themselves

Files should always be up-to-date and instantly available. This is especially true for the documents pertaining to your own employees. After all, they are a company’s most important asset. This also applies to the Dienste für Menschen gGmbH with its 2000 employees in numerous facilities. The company is decentralised and has branch offices in BadenWürttemberg, Bavaria and Saxony. Because the company was unable to scan new documents for the personnel files itself and attach them to the personnel files, the old digital personnel file solution finally had to be replaced.

Dienste für Menschen gGmbH started by digitalising the Accounts Payable invoice process

The company decided some time ago to initiate far-reaching digitalisation measures. “We started with accounts payable invoice process,” explains Ron Sliacky, Head of IT Management at Dienste für Menschen gGmbH. Management wanted to successively digitize all administrative processes. In a second step, the digital personnel file would follow.

Cumbersome transport and lengthy upload of files

“The initial project went very well, so we then continued with the digital personnel file.” There was already a legacy solution in place, but with a slow and cumbersome procedure for making documents available: “Once a week, a scanning service provider drove up and took a box of documents with him. These were then scanned at the service provider and uploaded to the personnel files.” The problem was that it took 3 to 4 weeks “until we had the things in the system,” Ron Sliacky summarizes. “And that was just too long.”

d.velop as a random hit: Internet search for invoice processing

Ron Sliacky came across d.velop simply by typing “digital invoice processing” into Google. d.velop was at the top of the search results, so Sliacky gave them a chance. “I had a good gut feeling,” he recalls, “and what I saw on the website, I thought d.velop could be a good fit.” In short order, a team from d.velop visited on site and presented the software. “It quickly became clear that we would tackle the project together.”

Digital personnel file follow a succesful AP invoice processing project

After the positive experiences during the invoice processing project, the head of IT once again turned to d.velop and asked about the feasibility of a digital personnel file. The objective: to be able to digitize documents on their own, add them to personnel files and make them instantly available in a central repository. However, the new software would need to meet some key requirements. The most important one: “The software should be easy to use for our HR department, especially in terms of having an intuitive interface,” explains Sliacky.

Need: Use data and be able to derive processes from it

This is one of the reasons why the choice once again fell on d.velop. “We have all our document management applications in one interface,” says the IT specialist, “and from there we also have access to all our specific functional applications.” Sliacky had no idea at the time that d.velop would soon take on an even more central role in the digitization of Dienste für Menschen gGmbH. In addition to just the archiving of personnel documents, another issue was particularly important to the geriatric care provider: “We want to be able to derive things from the data we have, for example, processes,” says Ron Sliacky. “A training contract can, for example, be linked to a residence permit, which creates deadlines and information obligations that can be mapped in a process.”

Dienste für Menschen gGmbH praises good, fast cooperation with d.velop

He describes the cooperation with d.velop as very good. “There is great communication and everything harmonized between us right away,” he praises. “We are absolutely on the same wavelength.” What he particularly likes is that he has only one contact person at d.velop. “That was a prerequisite for me. I said I didn’t want to talk to 10 people.”

Speed is the greatest added value of the digital personnel file

The digital personnel file has now been in use at the geriatric care provider for a year. Since then, the personnel documents have been sent from the branch offices directly to the HR department in Esslingen, where they are scanned and placed in the files. “The biggest added value is speed. In most cases, the documents are in the system after just one day and central access to them is possible,” says Sliacky.

d.velop process studio: automated personnel application process

Currently, Dienste für Menschen gGmbH is busy planning some further optimization of the solutions in place. Ron Sliacky gives an example: “In the future, a batch manager will ensure that documents flow automatically into the digital dossiers.” They have also started to use the d.velop process studio to automatically steer a personnel application through a process. “After going through the process with the relevant responsible parties, the application finally lands in the personnel file.”

Digital personnel file goes down well in HR department

The switch to the new digital personnel file from d.velop has gone down pretty well in the HR department. “Even after the presentation, our colleagues were very positive and enthusiastic”, says Ron Sliacky. “When they realised that the implementation also worked relatively quickly, the last scepticism was gone.”

Involve the people who are really affected in the process

It is important to the IT specialist: “We only involve those who are affected in such projects. With the digital ERV, it was only the accounting department, with the digital personnel file only the HR department, and now when we introduce digital contract management, only the legal department is at the table. In this way, we are trying to pick up the people who are really affected and ensure acceptance.” He explains: “When I see that 30 people are sitting in some meetings, 10 of them because they have to or want to, then I don’t think that’s effective.”

Training courses bring digital personnel files closer in just a few hours

A total of six people in the HR office work with the digital personnel file. With all the branch offices, there are another 100 managers with access to the data and documents. d.velop provided the initial training and explained the functionality to the HR department within a few hours until there were no more questions. After a week in the test system, a second training session followed to clarify any remaining questions. “Then there were two or three more requests for optimisation before things really got going,” says Sliacky, looking back. The HR administrators in the field offices were then trained internally in a separate session.

Positive approach to large projects is important

A positive approach is a basic requirement for Ron Sliacky. “You also have to take away people’s fear of such big projects,’ he emphasises, ’it can also be simple, you don’t always have to make everything complicated.”

d.velop becomes the standard at Dienste für Menschen gGmbH

Dienste für Menschen gGmbH is currently looking for a new billing programme for its outpatient service. “There are a few providers on the market, and my first question is always: Do you have an interface to d.velop? That’s our standard, that’s what we build on.” They don’t want to adapt to the other providers, but have to work the other way round. “Our documents are here, that’s our foundation, and digitalisation means there are interfaces and the others should dock onto them.”

Further cooperation and expansion of the d.velop system firmly planned

Further collaboration with d.velop is therefore firmly planned. “At the same time, we are currently introducing the contract file with d.velop,” says Ron Sliacky, “we already have a construction file with all the plans.” With the help of the d.velop process studio, the investment application will also be digitally mapped, “so that the investments automatically go through a process.” In addition, there is the internal knowledge management that is to be mapped via d.velop, which still runs via another software. Ron Sliacky summarises: “The d.velop system is simply good because it works. The cogs mesh perfectly.”