Posts
Tech & Innovation Blog
Grace Hopper Celebration – Opportunities for Women in Tech to Connect #vGHC21
Women in STEM, Grace Hopper, Voice of Our People
We met up with four ADP women in tech attending this year’s Celebration. They shared their inspiration and what it means to be a part of this incredible community.
Grace Hopper Celebration – Opportunities for Women in Tech to Connect — #vGHC21
ADP is proud to sponsor our 12th consecutive year of AnitaB.org’s Grace Hopper Celebration (GHC) held this year, September 27 – October 1. This year’s virtual Celebration theme is “Dare to Transform” and provides attendees with over 240+ sessions, Sponsor Hall, and 1:1 Meetings. All attendees will have great opportunities to network, inspire, and create long-lasting relationships with professionals. If you are attending, stop by our booth and say Hello!
We are even prouder to announce that AnitaB.org, host of GHC, named ADP 2021 Top Companies for Women Technologists Winner in the Large Technical Workforce category. The assessment considered key factors including representation by diversity, trends in hiring, advancement, and leadership. While facing a global pandemic, we continue to take multiple steps in supporting the technical talent pool. Read the full press release here.
The annual Grace Hopper Celebration – now in its 28th year – has been designed to connect women in technology to discuss career and research interests. We met up with four ADP women in tech who will be attending this year’s Celebration. They shared with us the inspiration and what it means to be a part of the incredible community.
Sree B.
Isabel E., Vice Present in Product Development, believes Grace Hopper is a beacon of hope for change. ”Being a woman in tech who usually is one of few women in the room, it gives me goosebumps to see the sea of women and diversity at Grace Hopper,” Isabel said. “It makes me feel optimistic for the future.”
Sree B., Senior Director in Application Development, tells us the Celebration is a wonderful opportunity to learn the journey of the highly talented and courageous women in technology, all dedicated to making a difference. “Hearing their stories; of success, failures, hopes, and achievements is truly inspiring and empowering,” Sree said.
“It offers a unique chance to
celebrate us – the women in tech.”
Tanuja G., Director in Application Development, attended the conference in person a few years ago and remembered the energizing experience. “Grace Hopper is a celebration of all things in tech! It’s a fabulous time and place to reflect on and celebrate everything women have achieved in the world of technology with the support of their allies in tech,” Tanuja looks forward to attending the virtual conference this year.
Tiffany D., Lead Data Scientist, shares with us Grace Hopper to her represents a chance to collaborate and learn from other females in technology. “I am very grateful for this amazing opportunity,” Tiffany said.
We also spoke to these women about their experiences as technologists here at ADP.
Isabel E.
Isabel describes ADP as a nurturing environment where Associates are treated with dignity, respect, and supported professionally and personally. “I have had the opportunity to grow as a person and a professional with support from my leaders and my peers,” Isabel said. “I feel like I belong because I share a common empathy for clients and Associates with my peers.”
“People matter first
and matter most.”
Sree sees ADP as one big family as she reflects on what Carlos, CEO of ADP, often says. She resonates with ADP’s core values, with a philosophy to care for its people and values. “I’m so glad to be part of ADP’s DataCloud team. I lead a cutting-edge technology team, where we focus on data monetization and provide solutions to our clients to bridge the pay equity gap, whether it’s gender-based or ethnicity-based,” Sree says, taking pride in working for ADP.
Tanuja G.
When it comes to mentorship, Tiffany and Tanuja share similar experiences. Tiffany values the support she has received from her management, organization, and fellow Associates; they make her feel like she belongs at ADP.
“My managers, mentors, and team members all made me feel like I was already a part of the family,” Tanuja said.
“Over the years, and moving across different product teams, that feeling has followed me, and I have been lucky to impart that same sense of belonging to other team members whom I’ve had the pleasure to welcome into the fold.”
This year’s Celebration will be Sree’s third year attending GHC, and she feels rewarded as a nominated attendee. “I’m often the only female in most of the technical meetings, and I’m glad that GHC provides an avenue to hire more female techies and strengthen our presence around the room.” Sree looks forward to working with more female technologists.
In addition, Sree said, “ADP strongly encourages inclusive culture among the Associates. With GPT sponsored mentorship programs, women are strongly encouraged to focus on their career growth and aim for leadership roles. I’m well respected across the teams I work with, not just because of the knowledge and skills I possess, but because of ADP’s culture to remove gender parity and provide an equal opportunity for everyone.” Sree also believes that ADP continues to support their Associates in learning and future development.
Tiffany D.
When it comes to training and resources, Tiffany shares her career journey, “ADP empowered me to make a career transition from Finance to Technology.”
“ADP provided me with the tools to learn
and grow in this industry.”
“ADP has supported me throughout the stages of my career through mentorship, conferences, technical and leadership training, speaking opportunities, and support to pursue an advanced degree,” Isabel said.
“I am encouraged to use the knowledge I’ve gained and receive a chance to work on new and challenging projects, using cutting edge technology,” Tanuja said, and feels grateful to be attending the GHC for the second time.
In the future, ADP will continue providing opportunities and an environment for technologists to ask questions and learn from industry leaders. We encourage all women in tech to challenge, inspire, and celebrate what’s to come.
#WomenInTech #ADPLife
Interested in a tech career at ADP?
Click here to search for your next move and visit Who We Hire.
Tech & Innovation Blog
Designing For All People: Inclusive UX at ADP
UX Design, Inclusive Design, Voice of Our People
Amber Abreu, Senior Manager of User Experience (UX) research at ADP, speaks with us about the essentials of inclusive design, educating with empathy, and the future of UX innovation at ADP.
Designing For All People: Inclusive UX at ADP
Amber Abreu, Senior Manager of User Experience (UX) research at ADP, has devoted her career to working in the field of inclusive and accessible UX design. She speaks with us about the essentials of inclusive design, educating with empathy, and the future of UX innovation at ADP.
What are you working on these days?
I just started a new role as Senior Manager of UX Research for the Growth team. ADP’s Global Product & Technology organization has three UX teams working under an “OneUX” umbrella: Our Generative team focuses on foundational understanding of our customers and internal associates, the Emerge team handles next-generation products, and the Growth team, my team, does boots-on-the-ground, day-to-day research for various product teams. OneUX is a huge effort with a focus on inclusive and accessible design. It’s a new initiative, and we’re all sort of holding hands as we move through this process together.
As a team leader, I’m excited to support people who are making a positive impact. The work we do on this team really does help people in their lives. I like having a sense of purpose that gets me out of bed every morning, and I want to share that feeling with the rest of my team.
You’ve had quite a career journey and came back to ADP. What brought you back? 
Someone I used to work with at ADP remembered me, told me they had an opening and asked if I was interested. I liked the people and thought it was a good fit. It was that simple. But I also saw it as a place where I could make a difference. In the 15 years since I’d previously worked at ADP, I’d worked on UX teams at companies like Delta and AT&T, where I’d been able to educate so many people about accessible design.
I think lots of organizations don’t fully understand what inclusive design actually means, even if they think they do. They might have UX teams, but sometimes they’re just checking a box—though I see this less and less as more people become aware of what smart user experience design can achieve. I was happy to come back to ADP because their commitment to inclusive UX matches my own.
Your passion for inclusive design is evident. How did you follow that career path?
In art school, we had only one semester on inclusive design, touching only a small facet in the much larger field of research and design. Inclusive UX is very technical, but the way you implement and deliver technical requirements can be so innovative. I’ve always been drawn to the intersection between problem-solving and really technical aspects of design. Think of some of the technologies we take for granted, like Alexa or Siri. Those ideas came out of inclusive UX design trying to help people with different capabilities and needs. Now everybody uses them, not just people with disabilities. Also, consider people who, for whatever reason, can’t use a mouse. What’s their user experience going to be?
My personal story is one of the reasons I’m passionate about inclusive design. I was paralyzed due to one of my pregnancies and lost the use of one side of my face. I couldn’t drink from a cup anymore. I couldn’t close my eye. I had to relearn how to do all sorts of things. My experience isn’t the same as someone who is permanently disabled or missing a limb or blind, but I think going through that and being willing to share the experience helps us talk about how UX can affect people and how it can help.
Probably the most significant technological innovation in modern history has been computerized technology and the internet. Technology was supposed to make our lives easier—but an entire segment of the population wasn’t considered and was left behind, which is antithetical to the whole purpose. If anything, computerized technology should create more equity instead of causing a great divide. I’ve been working my entire career to close the gap.
What’s your approach to inclusive design?
I try to educate and create empathy. At previous companies I’ve worked for, I’ve tried to bring people from the community to help inform designers of their particular experiences. I’ve also taken designers to an exhibition called Dialogue in the Dark that simulates total blindness. When you go in, you’re in utter darkness. You can’t see the hand in front of your face, and you confront the challenges blind people face every day. People who aren’t blind know it must be challenging, but being exposed to their daily experience helps us understand what that means.
It’s important to ask a lot of questions, seek knowledge, and share that knowledge. I tell this to people all the time: You’re not the first person to have this problem; someone has solved it. We just need to talk to each other.
How do you see your work shaping the future of ADP?
We’re still in the early days of evolving our UX teams. One area we are focusing on is the employee experience—if you’re an employee and you have to go out and check your payroll statement or your W-2, you’ll see changes there. We’re also updating our all-in-one platform for payroll and HR software targeted at mid-market clients. We’re working to make all of our visual design and interactive components accessible from a shared library. Once we get further, those changes will be visible across other products in our portfolio.
In the next six months to a year, I would like to put in place a solid foundation for an inclusive research program. It would include recruiting partnerships to bring people into research who have different disabilities and language capabilities and people from communities outside of ADP offices. Long term, I’d like to stand up a dedicated research program focused on informing future-thinking designs so we can operate on an international scale in countries with stricter accessibility requirements like Australia, UK, and Canada.
What excites you about what’s next?
There’s this misconception that the accessibility guidelines are only for people with disabilities, which is not true. They are for people whose first language is not in the system language. They’re for people who are older or less educated. There are different tiers of accessibility. And the core fundamental principles are that this work should lift up everyone.
There’s a lot here to be excited about, and because we’re all working together, we’re going to be stronger in the long run. Our team is growing, and we want people who care, who are willing to say, “I don’t know, but I’m willing to learn.” Every person who works on the project will say that they directly impacted someone with a disability in a positive way.
Interested in a career as a UX Designer or Researcher?
Click here to search for your next move and make sure to subscribe to our blog!
ADP Wins Prestigious Ventana Research Digital Innovation Award for Next Gen HCM Platform
ROSELAND, N.J., July 30, 2020 /PRNewswire/ — Identified for having the most striking impact in the human capital management (HCM) market, ADP was recognized as a winner in Ventana Research’s 13th Annual Digital Innovation Awards for its Next Gen HCM platform. Named as winner for the HCM category, ADP was selected based on the award program’s stringent criteria, earning acclaim for Next Gen HCM’s advanced technology and ability to drive change and increase value for organizations worldwide.
Learn more about ADP’s Next Gen HCM technology
Ventana analysts examined vendor submissions for their innovative technology approach; how it applies to people, processes, information and technology; the best practices it supports; the degree of team involvement; and the technology’s business impact and value.
“The range of ADP’s Next Gen HCM innovation that merited the award includes dynamic teams and matrix organizational structures, AI-driven insights, and global compliance,” said Steve Goldberg, VP & research director of HCM at Ventana Research.
Differentiating ADP’s Next Gen HCM is the platform’s design for team-based, agile ways of working as a complement to traditional hierarchical structures, as well as its ability to adapt and scale. The customizable solution enables organizations’ flows of work while driving team performance and the ability to rapidly adapt to changing needs. Built cloud-native from the ground up, the global platform supports a personalized experience that cultivates fluid, dynamic work to unlock greater value for the organization.
“We’re incredibly honored that Ventana Research has recognized the impact our Next Gen HCM platform can have on businesses,” said Don Weinstein, corporate vice president of global product and technology at ADP. “Change is only accelerating in today’s business landscape, as we navigate a world that’s becoming increasingly uncertain. With our vast experience in supporting clients, ADP has studied what makes a business successful, and what can stand in its way. We’ve used this knowledge to deliver a flexible and adaptable solution that can support our clients as they evolve amid dynamic conditions and grow with their businesses as fast as needed.”
To help businesses thrive in a new world of work, ADP’s Next Gen HCM provides data-driven insights into how people work best; access to an ecosystem of mini-apps to personalize the workforce experience; benchmarking capabilities from aggregated and anonymized ADP client data spanning 810K+ companies and 30M+ employees; and the ability to react quickly to changing global compliance requirements.
For more information on the Ventana Research Digital Innovation Awards, visit https://www.ventanaresearch.com/resources/awards/innovation. To learn more about ADP’s Next Gen HCM platform, visit https://flowofwork.adp.com/.
About Ventana Research
Ventana Research is the most authoritative and respected benchmark business technology research and advisory services firm. We provide insight and expert guidance on mainstream and disruptive technologies through a unique set of research-based offerings including benchmark research and technology evaluation assessments, education workshops and our research and advisory services, Ventana On-Demand. Our unparalleled understanding of the role of technology in optimizing business processes and performance and our best practices guidance are rooted in our rigorous research-based benchmarking of people, processes, information and technology across business and IT functions in every industry. This benchmark research plus our market coverage and in-depth knowledge of hundreds of technology providers means we can deliver education and expertise to our clients to increase the value they derive from technology investments while reducing time, cost and risk.
Ventana Research provides the most comprehensive analyst and research coverage in the industry; business and IT professionals worldwide are members of our community and benefit from Ventana Research’s insights, as do highly regarded media and association partners around the globe. Our views and analyses are distributed daily through blogs and social media channels including Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn. To learn how Ventana Research advances the maturity of organizations’ use of information and technology through benchmark research, education and advisory services, visit www.ventanaresearch.com.
About ADP (NASDAQ: ADP)
Designing better ways to work through cutting-edge products, premium services and exceptional experiences that enable people to reach their full potential. HR, Talent, Time Management, Benefits and Payroll. Informed by data and designed for people. Learn more at ADP.com
ADP, the ADP logo, and Always Designing for People, are trademarks of ADP, Inc. All other marks are the property of their respective owners.
Copyright © 2020 ADP, Inc. All rights reserved.
ADP-Media
SOURCE ADP, Inc.
For further information: Leann McDonough, ADP, Inc., (973) 974-6861, Leann.McDonough@adp.com
Podcast: ADP’s John Marcantonio on Low-Code Development and HR
Mark Feffer: Welcome to PeopleTech, the podcast of the HCM Technology Report. I’m Mark Feffer.
Mark Feffer: This edition of PeopleTech is brought to you by ADP. Its Next Gen HCM is designed for how teams work, and helps you break down silos, improve engagement and performance, and create a culture of connectivity. Learn more at flowofwork.ADP.com.
Mark Feffer: Today, I’m speaking with John Marcantonio, head of platform evangelism and federated development at ADP Next Gen. We’re going to talk about low-code development, where it’s at, and what it could mean for HR and HR technology.
Mark Feffer: John, thanks for visiting.
Why is it that you, and someone in your position, would care about low-code development?
John Marcantonio: It’s a great question. I really view low code as the next frontier of software development. Actually, earlier in my career and my education, I was a computer scientist and definitely thrust into more traditional software development. Low code is a way to really not only increase efficiency of development, but broaden who can participate in that process and how great new ideas can get more rapidly developed and brought to market.
Podcast: @ADP Next Gen’s Head of Platform Evangelism John Marcantonio on low-code development, where it’s at, and what it could mean for #HR and HR technology. #HRTechCLICK TO TWEET
Mark Feffer: How do you define low-code development? What is it?
John Marcantonio: It’s a development methodology, where instead of, again, typing out code line by line, it’s more of a visual representation of the software development process. Instead of text, it’s visual blocks that represent app logic or data elements, things of that nature, where users can string together and create applications for either mobile, web, whatever the target is, within that type of drag-and-drop paradigm.
Mark Feffer: I’ve seen material that talks about it being applied in a lot of places around the organization. But how, in particular, do you think it can be used by HR?
John Marcantonio: I think HR [is in] actually, a rather unique position, as far as low-code development. I think of HR in the environment, just taking a step back, they’re oftentimes viewed as a cost center, obviously critical to the organization as far as managing people and talent. But compared to, let’s say, product development or sales and marketing, which are more revenue-driven, I think that oftentimes HR can sometimes struggle to really take ideas or initiatives they want to take as far as building new applications or integrating with systems or delivering new ways of engaging with the user base, because they’re fighting it out with the rest of the organization for resources or dollars or whatever it is.
John Marcantonio: Looking at low code, I think if we can broaden the base of who can modify or build applications, either as part of an organization or even HR themselves, I think it gives them a lot more control to not only consider these new ways of pushing forward people, operations and the HR function, but putting that control in their hands, really letting them go to town and potentially build up the skills and capabilities to make those ideas realities and continue to iterate without a lot of the overhead that exists in many other functions today.
Mark Feffer: When you think about HR practitioners, these are the people who still often rely on spreadsheets to do things. Do you think that HR practitioners are going to embrace this kind of thing or are companies going to have to nudge them along to adopt it?
John Marcantonio: I think there’s going to be a little bit of both. I think there’s certainly going to be a spectrum of individuals. Let’s say you’re right. Let’s say individuals more comfortable with the spreadsheet and more traditional models may have a little more of a leap, or may not be as comfortable with jumping into this type of technology or tool set. But I think there’s a lot of room, particularly for those up and coming, or maybe individuals more of like a business analyst or a broader background that are coming to HR organizations to embrace this type of flexibility, the ability to create applications or modify those things that can bring value to the organization.
John Marcantonio: I also think, too, it gives some more options to not only the practitioners themselves, but the broader organization, to think about who they can bring on to help augment that type of development. It could be the team. It could be a different class of consultancy or development shops that may not have the same overhead or cost structure, [as those that are doing] more heavy lifting, let’s say CRM or big marketing or rather costly external contractors that have a lot of expertise and knowledge. In a potentially low-code environment, you could have a broader pool of individuals that may not have to be as deep or as technical to execute the same level of value within those systems. I think the options definitely grow.
John Marcantonio: The last point in regards to practitioners, I’d say: I’d like to see a shift, not only in what can be delivered, but I would hope also that it broadens the horizons of HR organizations to think not only in terms of just the regular people operations or HR functions, but if they had the option to extend applications or create applications that can augment or improve existing processes, that becomes more of their day-to-day thought process. If they can make it better, great, then let’s think of those ideas. Let’s curate those. Let’s test them. If they can do that quickly and somewhat easily, the ideas become a virtuous cycle, where it’s like agile development. Let’s put it out there, let’s test it, let’s see what our users say. Let’s improve it and hopefully continue that from there.
Mark Feffer: What do you think the state of play is today? Are HR departments that you know of actually starting to do this? Are they starting to bring some of their tool development in-house with this kind of platform?
John Marcantonio: I think they’re starting to. I think there’s certainly been a lot of interest in even our own Next Gen HCM platform, as far as the possibilities of being able to modify and bring this type of rapid development iteration to market. If you asked me that question six months ago, I’d have one answer. Given the state of the world over the past few quarters with COVID and the rapid changes in work-from-home and different employee policies that have come to light, I think a lot of organizations have realized that the ability to shift rapidly and to provide information that’s very relevant now and really reach out to their employee bases is an incredibly powerful thing.
John Marcantonio: If you look at more traditional development models, if one wanted to go off and build, let’s say, an employee outreach mobile app that talked about work from home and new policies and updates that are going on, I’m sure the dust will settle from COVID by the time the contracts could be wrapped up. If you gave organizations the power to move very quickly and, again, roll that out, make it tailored to them, I think that’s a very compelling opportunity to really move the needle for their organization, help them stay ahead of things. Again, I think that mindset or those questions are starting to pop up more and more. The past few months have really brought it to light in a way that I don’t think many organizations have seen in the past.
Mark Feffer: One of the things that strikes me is the role of the HR practitioner has really been changing the last several years. They’re having to work more with data. They’re having to work more with mobile technology. Actually, all kinds of technology has become integral to what HR does. How does this impact the overall role of HR, the HR practitioner? Is there a real redefinition of the role going on?
John Marcantonio: I think there is. I think looking at the skillsets and, you’re right, what HR practitioners, organizations need to understand or be in tune with is definitely broadening. I think data was the first big step. We’re looking at what’s available in the organization. How do they leverage it to understand their talent base and where they need improvements or how to foster top performers is certainly more data-driven now that it’s available and they can start to rationalize it.
John Marcantonio: But then you take it one step further beyond, let’s say, very traditional, basic HCM systems, there’s certainly a lot more that can be done, can be tailored to the organization and make those practitioners that are more in tune to what are those possibilities or how do you, like you said, leverage things like mobile technologies to really integrate to the workflow.
John Marcantonio: I think it begs of the HR community to really start asking or thinking about those questions a little more deeply and seeing where they can start to improve and differentiate even in their own organizations. Not only for efficiency, but for employee satisfaction, their efficacy, just how they can react and continue to evolve within an ever-changing and increasingly changing landscape.
Mark Feffer: One of the things that strikes me about HR is they’re very concerned about how they’re perceived by people outside of the HR function. If they begin to do more coding on top of understanding data more, do you think other parts of the organization will start to look on HR in a different way?
John Marcantonio: I think they will. I think also it’s a balance, like any other organization. I think, again, a lot of peer groups in most companies—not only HR, again, sales, marketing, other ops, functions—I think it’s a balance on what’s the core value-add versus, like you said, what’s development, for example.
John Marcantonio: Obviously I don’t think any org wants to over-index with an HR team that’s just building software all day, even if it’s done in a low-code environment. But, again, I think it gives them a little more insight and flexibility in how to operate. I think every organization will face this mix in the future of what do they tool up or do in-house, what capabilities or expertise do they want their organization to manage versus just making it easier to bring in resources to augment their staff or to even take on these projects on their own in a way that’s not, again, massive or a big budget lift or involve a lot of overhead that you see in other projects.
John Marcantonio: I think you’re right. That’s going to have a trickle-down effect. Then as practitioners in HR orgs get more savvy, not only in data, but in the underlying technology, what’s available, I think it puts them in a better position. You can understand how does the whole ecosystem come together, how do all the moving parts come together. As individuals are discussing, again, big projects or integrations or building out new initiatives, I think it gives them more, not only perspective, but I think also credibility.
Mark Feffer: It seems like over the last few years, HR has been working pretty hard to develop a good relationship with IT, especially as HR technology becomes more sophisticated and more grounded in the company. How will low-code development, do you think, impact the relationship between IT and HR?
John Marcantonio: I think it’s going to get deeper. I think there’s two sides of the story. On the one hand, I think there’ll be a continued partnership as far as just the nuts and bolts of what IT would need to do to support, let’s say, a low-code environment. There’s user management and security provisioning, and, just like any other system, to ensure that they get up and running and it’s maintained from a, let’s say, network infrastructure perspective. Things of that nature. I think that gives IT something else to get their skillset on, work with, gives HR a little more visibility to how they operate and what’s needed there.
John Marcantonio: The flip side I can see as well, and this is something that all orgs are, I think, going through as they evolve through this process, is the more control or flexibility you give to any team, let’s say HR in this case, in a low-code environment, [the more] they’re building or modifying applications, particularly ones that may integrate with other systems within the company. It begs the questions of where’s the checks and balances and how do we make sure that everything is at a proper quality level and that whatever is being rolled out works consistently? If something goes wrong, who’s the one on the other side of the phone to get that question?
John Marcantonio: I think as much as it’ll be excitement and another area of skillset and onboardings for IT to handle, I think there’s that flip side is just another area of management, if you will, that will need to get sorted out in a very different way. Because, again, a lot of this is not only the development process, but you think about all the operational components. How do these apps get tested? How do they get deployed? Where do they get deployed to? Are there different integration or policy considerations that go along with it? These are things that I think every company is starting to revisit and understand. Does that follow the current book? Is there new rules they have to adhere to? Then they’ll make that call from there. But overall I think there’ll be a tighter relationship as more of this comes in focus.
Mark Feffer: Do you think that HR is positioned to be a first mover with this within the organization? When data started to rise, I think a lot of HR departments found themselves unexpectedly being some of the first users of different types of analytics. I’m wondering if you think the same kind of thing might happen here or do you think they might follow?
John Marcantonio: I think it will depend on the organization, but I think in many cases they do have the opportunity to lead, mostly because many of the orgs in the company, again, for product development or the other operational groups, they have an established process. They have either internal resources they’re leveraging, they have contractor bases, they have a rhythm of what they’re building and maintaining. The machine is up and running, if you will.
John Marcantonio: In HR’s case they’re always, let’s say, potentially fighting for resources or it’s much more difficult to get projects staffed and built out. If this gives them an opportunity to do that, either with their resources or, again, a much more streamlined, external set of resources, again, they take a little more control for themselves. I think that control will start to lead to some experimentation. That experimentation will lead to results that can be evaluated and iterated on.
John Marcantonio: I don’t expect every org is just going to jump in with both feet and say, “Okay, every HR member is now a developer. Go modify everything under the sun.” But I think as these tools become available and the opportunity comes up, I think there’ll be room for experimentation and hopefully, too, I think, these teams will wade into the waters a little bit, saying, “Okay, what if we built this one little widget?”
John Marcantonio: The COVID scenario is a great example. It’s like, “What if we just built a little app that allowed us to talk about work from home policies and link out to what we need? Great. Build it. Push it out. See what happens.” It doesn’t have to be a monumental undertaking, but with relatively low cost and risk, really standalone, isolated applications could be built, give the team some experience and confidence and use that as an test for the next.
John Marcantonio: If we live up to the promise of low code, say citizen developer, relatively low barrier to entry in development, I think it gives the opportunity for those HR teams to jump in potentially ahead of the curve. If all goes well, I can very much see them being the beacon for other teams in the organization to see what was their experience and were they successful and is this something that they may want to pursue or start migrating from other, let’s say, development practices or systems that are established.
Mark Feffer: John, thanks very much.
Mark Feffer: That was John Marcantonio, head of platform evangelism and federated development at ADP Next Gen.
Mark Feffer: And this has been PeopleTech, from the HCM Technology Report. This edition was sponsored by ADP. Next Gen HCM, designed for how teams work. Learn more at flowofwork.ADP.com.
Mark Feffer: And to keep up with HR technology, visit the HCM Technology Report every day. We’re the most trusted source of news in the HR tech industry. Find us at www-dot-hcm-technology-report-dot-com. I’m Mark Feffer.
Tech & Innovation Blog
Innovating from Within: Leaders from ADP’s Studio 55 on Taking Chances and the Power of Shared Values
HR Technology, Innovation, Pasadena
Imagine transforming a decades-old services company into a technology company ready to serve 1 in 6 Americans. Chris Lavender, Senior Director of Application Development, and Mike Ruangutai, VP, Product Development, had a chance to do just that as part of ADP’s innovation center, Studio 55.
The small, dynamic team powers every part of ADP’s offerings—from payroll to compliance—and is ushering in a new technology platform to serve more than 800,000 ADP customers across the globe. The teammates discuss the impact of their work, their shared love of music, and how strong collaboration will power the future.
*****
When Chris Lavender first got a call about joining ADP, back in 2017, it didn’t seem like the obvious choice. After starting his career in music, he’d spent six years as a developer, engineering manager, and CTO at small and medium-sized startups—a far cry from a 70-year-old company with more than 59,000 employees.
“The stakes were really interesting to me,” he remembers. “I get excited about solving problems that have a massive impact. When you’re that big, though, transitioning from a service company to a technology company is like trying to turn a giant ship. You definitely can’t do it alone.”
Chris considered the opportunity at ADP because he already knew several people on the team—including Mike Ruangutai, who first reached out. The two had worked together several years prior, at a medical billing startup called Kareo, and had stayed in touch ever since. Now, Mike is VP of Product Development at ADP and one of several former Kareo employees working for Studio 55, ADP Pasadena’s in-house innovation incubator helping support the company’s transition to tech. Mike had joined the company a few months earlier, and, like Chris, he’d been well aware of both the challenges and the opportunities facing the team.
“From an engineering perspective, ADP is the perfect petri dish. We have enough resources to experiment with new technologies and build our ideal ecosystem without worrying that any decision we make could be a company-killer,” Mike explains. “And because it didn’t start as a tech company, there’s plenty of fertile ground. There are lots of decisions yet to be made.”
As for the challenges? “Inertia,” Mike says. “Everyone has agreed this is the right move, but that doesn’t make it easy.” When he and Chris started talking, some of the team’s technology was decades old, and many of its practices and processes were in dire need of updating. To make the transition, they needed more people like Chris. “Chris is a unicorn. He’s a great technologist, but also a great leader,” Mike says. “To build an exceptional technology company, that’s who you want on your team.”
Leap of faith
Months earlier, when Mike was deciding to join ADP, he’d asked former Kareo colleagues who’d already done so for their unvarnished view of the company. “I asked them, ‘What are you seeing?’ ‘What do you hope to achieve?’” Now, he set out to answer the same questions for Chris.
“Mike and I have always had a really open, frank relationship, so I knew I could trust him to give me the full picture,” Chris says. “There was no sugarcoating whatsoever.”
And the same was true when Chris met with Mike Plonski, ADP’s SVP of Product Development and the head of Studio 55. “We spent more than an hour together, and he was not messing around—it was almost like he was trying to convince me not to take the job,” Chris laughs. “He wanted to make sure I didn’t have some glossy view of things. That transparency was super attractive.”
So with a clear view of the work he’d be doing—and the support he’d have in the process—Chris decided to accept the position.
“It was a leap of faith. I lived really far away at the time, so I had a serious commute at first,” he says. “But I knew Mike and I worked well together, the footprint was huge, and the problems were really interesting to me. From a technical perspective alone, government compliance is a famously tough nut to crack. On top of that, we needed to change the processes, the flows, the culture. We needed a complete mindset shift.”
Playing in tune
Nearly three years later, Mike says Chris has helped lead the Studio 55 team through just such a shift. “The energy is palpable. There’s a ton of collaboration,” he says. “Teams walk across the aisle to talk with one another; they have lunch together; they problem-solve together.”
One key component has been a shared set of values. “I’ll say it until the cows come home, but it’s really important to me: The team comes first,” Mike says. “We have to help each other be successful—and that includes leaders. It’s our job to set the context, support our team, and then get out of the way.”
For Chris and Mike, that leadership style is informed, in part, by another shared value: their love of making music. Mike studied studio jazz guitar in college; Chris holds a master’s degree in composition, improvisation, and technology, and he also spent a year performing with the Blue Man Group. “Composition and software engineering have so much in common,” Chris says. “You’re creating in the abstract and bringing that into the real world. It’s the same muscle.”
Mike, too, sees the parallels. “An engineering sprint or scrum is like the drumbeat, the tempo. Then everything else layers on top of that—our product ideas are the licks and motifs we experiment with; the technologies we use are the notes. And just like you need brass here and strings there, you need different groups of engineers. Watching a team come together on a project is like watching a group of musicians adapting, feeling the groove.”
They’ve found some other kindred spirits on the Studio 55 team, as well—enough to put together a weekly after-work jam session. “We’re super informal, no audition,” says Chris. “It’s just a good way to exercise our brains and use them in a different way.”
Moving the needle
That brainpower will no doubt come in handy over the months and years ahead, as Mike, Chris, and their colleagues continue to work through the challenges that face their team and the rest of ADP. “There’s still some work that needs to be done across the company—we watch carefully for any evidence of silos forming, for example, and strive to get ahead of that,” Mike says. “But Chris and the rest of the leadership team have really moved the needle. Now it’s about nurturing that headway and leveling it up even further.”
Chris agrees. “We’re still turning the ship, but it’s definitely happening. We’ve made insane progress in just a couple of years,” he says. “We have teams working cross-functionally, communicating, getting problems solved—and doing it efficiently, without staying up all night or working on weekends. It’s been really gratifying to see.”
Learn more about ADP’s Studio55 in Pasadena.
Tech & Innovation Blog
Our Next-Gen Platform
HR Technology, Innovation, Lifion Team
We’re building the next generation of ADP’s Human Capital Management software solutions.
It’s an ambitious goal, but we’re focused and committed. If we do it right, we’ll completely upend the HCM tech scene.
We want to enable companies of all types to unlock the full potential of their people and become wildly successful. To do that, we’re building a pretty amazing platform with killer apps — from payroll and benefits to performance management and career growth — that will work seamlessly with a company’s unique culture. Instead of HR getting in the way, it’s just the right amount of HR for each company.
The best part? The work we do here will impact millions of people globally.
Cool, right?
Accessible Video Controls
[avia_codeblock_placeholder uid="0"]
What is the Lifion platform?
Our platform allows developers to build business-facing applications without the overhead of using conventional development languages.
The design tools enabled by our platform allow for rapid application development, so developers can work quickly by leveraging drag-and-drop UIs to define data sources, data types, constraints, display rules, UI actions, and more. They can even deploy the application and define access and authorization permissions — all with a minimum amount of traditional ‘hand-coding’ techniques.
But how does this accelerate innovation?
Simple: businesses’ need for software is being outpaced by traditional developers’ ability to build it, and our developers can build applications in days, rather than weeks or months.
Not only that, but Lifion developers are also able to refine and continuously improve on applications — a major competitive advantage over organizations that are still using more conventional methods of development.
Visualizing application logic is simple with the Lifion platform.
How do we develop at Lifion?
We built the Lifion platform to allow our devs to generate ideas and execute on them immediately. Since the platform allows us to bypass some of the typical bottlenecks in the software development process, we can continuously iterate on and improve our applications — which means our clients get the latest and greatest from us.
These iterations and improvements are possible because our platform and its powerful design tools allow our developers to seamlessly bind together a lot of things, like:
- application logic
- user interfaces
- data models
- data security & authorization
- unit tests
- ETL processes
This results in complex, custom application suites — all developed at rapid speed.
Interest piqued?
Learn more about how you can help build the future of HCM software — read more about our careers.
The Technology Helping Companies Embrace The Future of Work
To embrace the future of work, companies need technology that mimics how their organizations are structured and how their workers relate to one another.
Today’s work relationships, for example, are complex and fluid. Using highly structured relational databases, which organize data hierarchically in rows and columns to represent these relationships, no longer makes sense.
Instead, we need adaptable technology that models data based on contextual relationships. Enter graph databases, a revolutionary technology that Gartner predicts will grow 100% per year over the next couple of years.
Early Applications Of Graph Databases
Graph databases may now be leveraged by giants like Google and Amazon, but they weren’t always popular. In fact, their popularity grew with the rise of social media.
Consider the complex relationships between people, places and things stored in social networks like Facebook or LinkedIn. Organizing these relationships based on hierarchies is problematic, as it doesn’t align with the world’s natural order. That not only leads to inaccurate data models, but also dramatically increases the amount of effort it takes for a program to locate any given object.
Let me explain: Say you’re searching a social network for the CEO of Company X. When a software program searching a graph database reaches Company X, it finds the CEO right away. After all, the CEO works at Company X — they are directly related.
Putting People First To Rebuild A Stronger Economy: A Conversation With Ochsner Health
When a software program searching a relational database reaches Company X, on the other hand, it finds a hierarchy of people, divided into teams, which it must scan to locate the CEO. Teams are further divided into types of teams. The CEO is located on the executive leadership team, which sits within the broader leadership team. It’s not until the program finally reaches Company X’s team of executives that it locates the CEO.
This complicated structure — an information architecture with at least four levels (just within Company X) — slows a social network’s data retrieval, resulting in a less-than-effective user experience.
In response to this challenge, Facebook’s engineering team developed a proprietary database that they called The Associations and Objects (TAO). This innovative technology allowed them to model the multifaceted relationships between people, places and things based on context instead of hierarchies. In other words, they no longer had to follow long data chains to retrieve specific information, which significantly increased the speed at which content was presented to users.
Modeling Work Relationships: Challenge And Solution
Given the complexity of human relationships, graph databases are much better suited to modeling the way companies operate than their predecessors were. The thing is, work is now done in teams, not hierarchies. In fact, 64% of workers now belong to more than one team, according to our company’s 2019 Global Study of Engagement report. And while hierarchical teams continue to exist, cross-functional, dynamic teams focused on achieving specific goals are more prevalent than ever.
In addition, today’s workers often have multiple roles within an organization, and their relationships aren’t limited to those they have with their supervisor and/or direct reports. Companies thus need technology that models these structures and relationships, empowering them to embrace cutting-edge business models built for the future of work.
A graph database can help empower companies to leverage both traditional and alternative workers (i.e., full- and part-time employees, temporary contractors, gig workers, and freelancers) across multiple teams (both functional and cross-functional) within the organizational model that best suits them, including one based on hierarchies, teams or projects.
So when should organizations consider a graph database? In our experience, we have found graph databases to be very useful when the datasets are associative in nature, as they avoid the often-expensive join operations that a traditional relational database will have to undergo. This nondependency on join operations helps them scale better, especially when dealing with growing datasets with an evolving data schema. While there are multiple vendors out there in the market, our company uses AWS Neptune for our managed graph database needs to conform to our overarching approach of going cloud-native.
Embracing The Future of Work
Innovative leaders at companies across the globe are already reimagining work with an eye to the future. HR technology powered by graph databases can empower these organizations to achieve their visions, enhancing performance and productivity along the way.
Based on what we’ve seen so far, it pays off: Deloitte’s 2019 Human Capital Trends (page 54) report found that over half of surveyed companies that make the shift to a team-based organizational model see significant improvements in performance. Moreover, because technology that leverages graph databases to represent a company’s workforce is more aligned with reality, the insights derived provide more accurate and actionable learnings, which is equally important to succeeding in the future of work.
Why ADP’s Next-Gen HCM Is A Disruptive Force In HR Technology
A year ago I wrote a controversial article about ADP’s new core HCM system, code-named Lifion. Well here it is a year later, and it looks like ADP has done it. The company’s next-generation HCM and payroll system is now available, and could become one of the more disruptive systems on the market. While the system is still young, it sets a technical direction for Workday, SAP, Oracle, and others.
How The HR Software Market Has Changed
Let me briefly discuss how the HR software market has changed. Core Human Capital systems are a large, growing and important market. Once considered the “system of record” for employees, they are now used by every company as a way to keep track of people’s jobs and work, plan and facilitate careers, and make sure people are paid correctly.
Now, they are changing again.
Today’s HCM platforms are no longer just systems of record, they are systems to make employees’ work lives better. They have to support many organization models (hierarchy, teams, projects, contractors, gig workers); they have to address many forms of reward and pay (salary, hourly, by the project, by output); and they have to be open to many third-party applications.
Organizations now function as talent networks, not hierarchies. 34% of companies tell us they operate as a network (up from 6% in 2016), and more than 88% of companies tell me they want a better technology to manage gig and contract work. Zappos, Schneider Electric, Unilever and many others now manage themselves as “talent marketplaces,” encouraging people to play roles in multiple teams around the world.
And these new HCM platforms are not just “applications,” but rather micro-services platforms where applications run. Some of the most innovative apps in HR now come from third parties. HCM vendors simply cannot build everything themselves. I now think of core HCM as “application ecosystems,” more like the i-Phone than like Quickbooks.
Moreover, these systems have be designed around “experiences” not “processes.” The word Experience is now the biggest buzzword in HR, and it is profoundly changing the way software is developed. It’s no longer sufficient to build forms, tabs, and buttons for users: now we have to build systems that adapt to our needs, listen to our voice, change based on our data, and can be configured in many ways.
(Both SuccessFactors and Workday are just launching Experience Layers on top of their systems to address this.)
Finally, the HCM system of the future has to be an employee productivity tool, not jus an HR tool. It isn’t designed for HR anymore, it must be designed for employees and managers. The system should be useful, simple to use, and must interface with Microsoft Teams, Slack, WhatsApp, and all the other various collaboration tools we use at work.
In short, this is a whole new world – and it requires a new architecture, new user experience, and new technology stack.
ADP, An Unexpected Tech Leader
This industry is not for the faint of heart. Building an enterprise platform takes years, and once you start you’re stuck with the architecture you start with.
Workday’s architecture is fourteen years old and quite innovative, it feels proprietary. SuccessFactors is similar in age and is now being re-engineered around SAP Hana and a new Experience interface. Oracle recently re-engineered its HCM platform and it took almost five years. So when a company like ADP starts from scratch, it can upset the apple cart.
While many customers rushed to buy cloud-based HCM systems, their satisfaction has been mixed. The platforms are highly complex, they don’t accommodate new organization and performance models, and buyers want more innovation. HR departments want a stable, reliable HCM platform but they also want to be able to mix and match the best of breed on top.
Today, using what is called “cloud-native” systems, vendors can build modern applications faster than ever. And technologies like AI, cognitive interfaces, natural language processing, and graph database are readily available from Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud, or Microsoft.
Enter ADP.
ADP you say? Aren’t they a 70-year-old payroll company? What are they doing in the cloud architecture business?
Well yes, ADP does pay more than 40 million people in the US (one in six). But behind the scenes, the company is filled with technologists, and its new Lifion group has assembled some of the most senior tech architects in the world.
As Carlos Rodriguez the CEO and Don Weinstein the head of Global Product and Technology put it, ADP used to be a “services company fueled by technology.” Now it is becoming “a technology company with great services.” In other words, the company has heavily invested in its platform.
The new platform, today called ADP Next Gen HCM (a real name will come), has the architecture other vendors only talk about, and as it picks up speed it could become a major disruptor in the market.
What Is ADP Next Gen HCM?
Let me explain what ADP has done.
Through a skunk-works development team in Chelsea, NY, the company has been rewriting its payroll engine and HCM platform for several years. The project, originally called Lifion, is a “cloud-native” platform which embraces the latest technology stack needed to scale for the future.
“Cloud-native” simply means it’s built on the newest, containerized services, leveraging the latest technology in the cloud. This means the system is made up of many micro-apps, it uses low-code development, it leverages graph and SQL databases, and it never goes down for maintenance.
Let me give you some specifics.
ADP’s new architecture is designed around teams, not hierarchies, so it has capabilities to manage the future of work. You can create teams of any type in the system, and then include any type of worker in a team (full time, part-time, contingent). Teams inherit the hierarchical attributes of people (ie. who they report to) but also attribute them to the team. (Imagine a project team working on a new product, a safety team, and even an employee resource group.)
Unlike other HCM systems, each Team is an entity in itself, with its own business rules, apps, and measurement systems. You could have one team that uses an OKR goal application, another that uses a different survey tool. Teams are essentially the “grain” of the architecture, not the hierarchy. This is only possible because the system uses a Graph Database. Graph database technology models data as relationships, not rows and columns. (It’s the tech under Facebook and Google.) It has immense potential in organizations today.
The system is designed for “micro-apps and micro-services.” This means ADP can quickly build new applications easily, plug third party applications into the system, and open up the system for users and consultants to build apps. Think of the ADP Platform as a giant i-Phone: you can plug in any app and inherit all the data and security you’ve already built. You can assign apps to teams, so some teams can use one type of goal setting, another can use other features, and so on.
The development environment is “low-code,” meaning you can build apps in a visual tool. This means ADP and partners can extend the system easily, creating a flexible non-proprietary model to grow and expand.
ADP’s system is mobile-first and visually simple. The system uses a consumer-like interface (similar to Google), and seems very easy to use. Workday, which originally built a very innovative user interface, is feeling its age, and plans a major upgrade this Fall. SuccessFactors new HXM interface (Human Experience Management) is also a major push in this direction.
ADP’s AI engine is useful out of the box. And that’s not just because it uses AI, it’s because ADP has so much data. ADP houses more data about workers and jobs than any other company in the world, so if you want to know if your people are underpaid or if your retention is out of line, ADP has benchmarks you can use. The AI-based intelligence application delivers suggestions and recommendations on hundreds of talent issues, all in a “narrative intelligence” interface.
Just to let you know how much data the company has, ADP has more than 800,000 customers and a skills-cloud with more than 30 million employees’ job descriptions embedded.
ADP’s talent applications are also coming along. Clients sometimes complain about various parts of ADP’s recruitment or learning software, but StandOut, ADP’s next-generation engagement, goal, performance management, and team coaching system is a very competitive product. It is integrated into Next Gen HCM so it can be deployed immediately to any or all teams. The product has been highly successful in ADP, driving a 6% improvement in engagement and a 12% increase in sales productivity. 97% of ADP associates have completed the StandOut assessment, an aspiration most companies would dream of. (Cisco is also a big fan.)
ADP’s Next Gen Payroll engine, coupled with the company’s acquisition of Celegro, uses a reusable rules engine to greatly reduce the complexity of payroll. Payroll is a complex business operation filled with lots of special rules. The Next Gen payroll system is designed to be “rules driven.” Microsoft uses ADP’s Global Payroll and has reduced the number of global payroll administrators from 400 to a handful of payroll SMEs across the globe.
ADP’s new payment system is redesigned for real-time pay (the payroll engine computes all gross-to-net and deductions in real-time). This lets companies pay employees and contractors more frequently.
ADP’s Wisely system, the company’s smart payment app, is gaining more than 250,000 new members per month, making it one of the fastest-growing payment systems in the market. (Wisely lets you allocate pay to different categories, automatically create various forms of savings accounts, and use credit/debit and other pay methods right from your payroll.)
Through ADP’s application marketplace, the company is now one of the leading “platform as a service” vendors in the market (SAP is #2). As I mentioned above, HR departments need an “ecosystem of HR apps.” The average HR organization now has 11 systems of record and most companies have more. ADP’s app marketplace has more than 400 apps and sees more than 780 million hits annually. So if you use ADP for HR, you’re likely to find almost any add-on app you need.
Finally, ADP’s mobile HR app is highly competitive ADP has more users on its mobile app than any other vendor, and it includes a configurable onboarding and process design tool, so you can use it as an employee experience platform too. (It is the fifth most highly rated app in the Apple App store with a 4.7 rating and millions of reviews).
Is All This Really Ready?
Years ago an IBM Fellow made a funny statement to me: new software platforms are like babies, they make a lot of noise and they don’t always do what you want them to do. But over time they grow up, and eventually, they become responsible adults.
ADP Next Gen HCM is a fast-growing pre-teen. Today more than 20 pilot customers are using the system, and it’s working well. (Gold’s Gym is a customer and successfully manages many locations, many types of workers, with many pay models). It’s not going into full production until 2020 or 2021, but momentum will grow.
In the US, more than 60% of large companies have moved to cloud-based HCM already, but that still leads a lot of market opportunity. And I know some early cloud buyers are becoming itchy, so they may want to switch.
Can ADP Pull This Off?
One more point: can and will ADP sell and market this well?
In every market I’ve studied the “best product” does not always win. It’s the combination of product, marketing, sales, and service that wins. This is ADP’s next challenge. Now that the company has an advanced new HCM platform to sell, will they market, sell, and evolve it effectively?
I’m not saying you should short Workday, Ultimate, or any of the other successful HCM systems in the market, but this new ADP platform will be a force to be reckoned with. Let’s watch it closely.
