There are countless tools for managing human resources. It is usually important that they are easy to implement and can be used by all employees in HR management as quickly as possible. But new tools usually require onboarding, training or additional know-how. But what if your company already uses Jira? Then it makes sense to use the flexibility of Jira in the area of human resources or applicant management as well.
Overview:
- Automation: notifications, ticket transfer
- Data protection and security
- Reporting & OKRs
- Integrations and plugins: Job Portals, Microsoft Teams, Slack, HubSpot and own websites
Jira - The all-purpose weapon in process and project management
In companies, a large number of tools are usually used. These usually not only tear a hole in the monthly budget, but must also be able to be used by employees. Due to the complexity of all the apps used, it often makes little sense to introduce new tools for each area.
But what if your company already uses Jira or Jira Service Management for project management or the digitalization of business processes?
You already know what Jira can be used for and your employees and teams use it every day and know how to use it.
This is exactly when it makes sense to consider using Jira or Jira Service Management as a tool for managing all HR-related processes.
The question that arises is: Does Jira offer all the necessary functions to map and manage my human resources processes and projects?
Why is Jira perfect as a human resource management tool?
Jira software was originally launched as an IT project management tool and continuously expanded with additional options. From a tool that was mainly used in IT, a tool has finally emerged with the help of numerous plugins, integrations and updates with which pretty much any type of projects and processes can be mapped.
Automations: Save time on repetitive tasks
In Jira or Jira Service Management, you as an HR manager can easily create a project (e.g. applications) and configure it according to your needs. Surely you already know Kanban or SCRUM boards in which you can display different statuses of project steps.
Automatic notifications - email, Slack, Microsoft Teams
Now, when a new application comes in, a simple automation can be used to send a notification to the applicant via email, and you as the HR manager will receive a notification in your favorite internal communication tool like Slack or Microsoft Teams.
Manual mails are now a thing of the past. The cool thing is that the mails can be saved as templates and personalized with your branding.
But wait. That's not all that's possible with automations. For example, if the applicant forgets to enter his or her salary. You can simply give the Jira ticket the status "salary unknown" and the applicant will receive a notification and a request to provide their salary request.
What kind of automatic notifications can be created:
- Acknowledgement of receipt of the application
- Answering open questions
- Status dependent mails: received, rejected, open questions, invitations to interview etc.
- Reminder / Follow Up Mails
- Notification of the HR Manager if applications are not processed
Automatic change of responsibilities and the associated project in the event of a status change
Of course, the application process is only a small part of human resources. After that, there are usually onboardings, employee satisfaction surveys, offboardings, etc.
These processes can also be organized and digitized with the help of Jira. For example, the moment the applicant has successfully gone through the application process, a Jira ticket can be transferred to a separate project for onboardings and, if necessary, the responsible employee can be changed automatically.
Since the Jira ticket is now in another project (onboarding), it or the new employee goes through further steps in the Human Resources process. Here, too, further automatisms can be configured in Jira to digitize certain process steps.
Further possible automation and digitalization of the HR process:
Approval processes: Identity Access Management (IAM)
Not every employee needs the same permissions and shares in your company. New employees probably need access to the most important communication tools like Slack, email or CRM systems like HubSpot. For employees from HR or Marketing, on the other hand, it usually doesn't make sense to have clearance for software development tools.
Or your company uses Jira for all projects and Confluence for documentation. Access restrictions can be added here as well.
With the concrete automations, every stakeholder always knows which employee needs which approvals without you having to write even one email yourself.
Want to learn more about Identity & Access Management? You can find out more about our IAM solution here. here.
Automatic time tracking with Jira and Tempo
Another essential tool in many companies is the recording of employees' working hours in order to draw conclusions about performance and identify potential for improvement. For this you can use the Jira plugin Tempo and establish an automated time tracking system in your company.
Further functions using the example of onboarding
As an HR Manager, you will of course have other tasks at the Onboarding to do. New employees often need a laptop and other equipment to work. That's why Jira Tickets can be customized to notify multiple departments when the status of the Jira Ticket changes.
In our example, a notification is sent to the IT department, which can then immediately start ordering the hardware and subsequently give their "OK" in the ticket and attach a proof of the hardware order.
A similar procedure is possible in this case for authorization management. With a status change of Jira tickets, all involved stakeholders are automatically informed. As you can see, the possibilities for digitizing your human resources process with Jira or Jira Service Management are almost limitless and can be tailored specifically to your requirements.
Map HR workflows in Jira
Of course, the above-mentioned procedures or processes do not just stand there in space, but are mapped in Jira (Service Management) as workflows, which can then be visualized in the form of a Kanban Board.
This way you can always keep track of all active tickets and make sure you don't miss any new applicants or forget important steps in the further onboarding process.
However, workflows in Jira offer even more advantages. For one, they can be configured in such a way that, for example, all necessary steps must always be processed before an applicant / employee moves on in the process. It would be conceivable, for example, that new employees may only receive their equipment after signing their contract, or that applicants should only be invited to an appointment in the office after a telephone screening.
In addition, it is possible that a ticket status can only be changed (e.g. onboarding completed) if all involved agents or departments have processed the ticket. Of course, such dependencies can be configured flexibly and adapted to existing company processes and workflows.
Data protection and security in the human resources process
Personal data and security of IT systems continue to be among the most important topics for many companies in 2021.
Personal and private data (address, date of birth, bank details, etc.) is handled on a daily basis, especially in the personnel sector. These require special protection, must not be leaked under any circumstances and must follow certain legal regulations.
With Jira (Service Management), for example, applicant data is automatically deleted within the legal obligation and are thus no longer visible to the company. However, Atlassian's software also offers important security precautions for the IT infrastructure for active employees.
Due to the fact that projects in Jira can only be authorized persons, sensitive data can be protected from uninvolved persons in the company.
DSGVO & GDPR compliance
Many companies receive applications directly through their own website and use Forms. With Jira, we use the so called "Jira" for this. issue collector to achieve the same result. The provided data are transmitted on the one hand via a provided SSL certificate On the other hand, the Jira Issue Collector is protected by an additional level (Encryption), which encrypts all sent emails. Furthermore, the Issue Collector no cookies or data collected for marketing purposes. This means that all collected data GDPR and GPDR in accordance with the data protection laws, stored and deleted.
To learn how to add the Jira Issue Collector to your website, check out our Guide.
Reporting & OKR
As an HR manager, you probably have to deal with reports and OKRs on a regular basis, present your results in regular meetings and conduct feedback sessions with employees. In any case, it's time-consuming and annoying to create manual reports. This is where the Tempo plugin comes in again. With it, you can automatically create performance reports at any time, e.g. to track which employee has worked on which tasks for how long.
With the integrated notification function within Jira, you as an HR manager can then directly create feedback meetings and exchange information with the individual employees and, if necessary, jointly design a more efficient distribution of tasks.
Integrations and plugins: Job Portals, Microsoft Teams, Slack, HubSpot and own website
To simplify communication between all the people involved, it is possible to add integrations or plugins to Jira (Service Management). This allows an interface to the most commonly used communication tools such as Slack, Microsoft Teams or your email service to be set up.
Plugins for external tools
Slack for Jira
With Slack for Jira, you'll be notified directly when a new application comes in, for example. With the plugin you can additionally:
- Send personalized notifications to you and your channels.
- If you've connected a project to a Slack channel, a Jira bot will automatically preview tickets in Slack that you've been mentioned in.
- / commands to manage and search Jira Issues in Slack.
Click here for the plugin:
- Jira Server: https://xalt-team.slack.com/apps/ADZHDM3L1-jira-server
- Jira Cloud: https://xalt-team.slack.com/apps/A2RPP3NFR-jira-cloud
Microsoft Teams for Jira
With the Microsoft Teams plugin, you can work on or manage your Jira tickets directly from the app, similar to the Slack integration:
- Search for a project you would like to work on
- Edit tickets directly in Slack
Click here for the plugin:
- Atlassian Marketplace: https://marketplace.atlassian.com/apps/1217836/microsoft-teams-for-jira?hosting=cloud&tab=overview
- Teams: https://appsource.microsoft.com/en-us/product/office/wa200002140?tab=overview
Website integration and email notification
Jira can be easily integrated into your website via the so-called Issue Collector as already discussed above. This adds all new applications directly to a project in Jira Service Management. This way you always have all applications directly in one place and can manage and automate your human resource process with the previously created workflows.
In addition, as explained above, an automatic notification will be sent to your email address for each application received.
Another advantage of applications with the Issue Collector is that no accounts need to be created by applicants and only a few form questions need to be answered. In addition, interested parties can attach their CV, certificates or other proof directly to the application and upload them with the Issue Collector.
Integration of job portals and job exchanges
At XALT, we use a direct but innovative integration of various job portals in Jira Service Management. Among other things, we use the Jira REST API and translate job applications directly into a Jira ticket.
With this, nothing stands in the way of posting jobs on the job platforms of your choice.
HubSpot and other email automation tools
The flexibility of Jira (Service Management) also allows you to integrate other tools like Hubspot directly into your workflows. For example, with a simple email automation in Hubspot, you can forward applications directly to Jira and continue with your HR processes as usual.
Summary
With Jira or Jira Service Management, you can easily digitize and automate your HR process without having to change systems. In addition, Jira offers a variety of integrations and plugins with which you can integrate your most frequently used communication tools.
