The Regional Municipality of Peel is enhancing its communication strategy with its employee service centre, says Deborah Arsenault, the regional government’s chief human resources officer.
The platform, which launched at the end of August, is hosted on Peel Region’s employee intranet and provides workers with information on their benefits plan, payroll and workplace policies. According to Arsenault, the program was developed to meet the needs of a hybrid workforce with diverse roles.
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“We have traditional office workers as well as employees who are involved in 24-hour operations. . . . They can get the information on a personal device, so they don’t have to be in an office to access it. We needed a human resources program to service those needs [while being] very careful with taxpayer dollars by focusing on efficiencies and effectiveness.”
The service centre also allows employees to request employment information and monitor the status of these requests. “For example, if they need an employment letter, it all comes through [the service centre]. Employees now see exactly where their request is [with the HR team] and they can actually track it all the way through.”
Employee input was instrumental in developing the service centre, says Arsenault, noting Peel Region used employee surveys as well as a third-party consultant that conducted a “listening tour” to gather feedback from workers across all layers of the organization. Following the launch of the platform, employee feedback has been largely positive.
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“People are like, ‘That was so easy to use’ and ‘Oh my goodness, I actually got a response.’ This is our first step into this platform and I really see us maturing and moving forward at a much bigger scope.”
For employers who are considering implementing a similar program, it’s important to have a strong change management plan in place to explain the new platform to both employees and the HR team, she says, noting the platform has already helped streamline several administrative tasks.
“You need to be very visible during the change, taking every opportunity you can to be in front of your employees, while in the back of the house, you have to prepare them to now become more customer focused.”
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