The Česká Spořitelna Foundation focuses on children and young people, in whom it sees the future prosperity of the entire country. By supporting education extensively, it develops their knowledge, skills and attitudes, which should contribute to their greater independence, self-sufficiency and financial health.
Among the biggest challenges that the foundation is currently dealing with in terms of personnel is the lack of suitable applicants. “Our requirements for the profile of candidates are specific, so we find it difficult to find applicants on the labor market who meet all our expectations, have the appropriate experience and at the same time are looking for new employment,” says Lucie Styblíková, HR manager of the Česká spořitelna Foundation.
“The lowest unemployment in the whole of Europe and the consequent lack of capable professionals on the labor market affects all sectors, from companies to state administration to non-governmental organizations and foundations. However, as I follow the activities of the Česká spořitelna Foundation, I think that in the end it always manages to get top professionals on board. However, it must be added that it certainly cannot be done by itself and requires an active, creative and well-thought-out hiring process.” – Milan Rataj, HR strategist and co-founder of the personnel system Sloneek.
Unique know-how and stepping into turquoise
According to Lucie Styblíková, a great advantage on the job market is that the České spořitelny Foundation is one of the largest philanthropic entities in the Czech Republic, which offers the unique know-how and background of the largest Czech bank. According to her, there are a minimum of comparable companies in the Czech Republic.
“Our entire organizational structure is very flat and relies on mutual internal cooperation. The governing body of our foundation is the board of directors, and no other organizational components have been set up. Each member of the team is thus fully responsible for their own agenda and cooperates with their colleagues on specific tasks and goals,” says HR manager Lucie Styblíková about the structure of functioning and the management of people. In many respects, according to her, their model could be compared to a turquoise-functioning organization.
Stacks of papers and endless Excel spreadsheets
A few years ago, the foundation was plagued by a time-consuming and complex HR agenda. The problems mainly related to paper records of attendance, entering and approving absences or paper holidays and related Excel tables. Furthermore, manual signing and approval of orders or briefings and access to guidelines or other important documents. “It was difficult to record, comply with the set limits of vacation, sick days, time off for volunteering and so on,” says Lucie Styblíková about the motivations for digitizing the personnel agenda.
“With a bit of exaggeration, we can say that the problems associated with HR are almost the same in all companies and organizations. Records of attendance, work, holidays, sick days, as well as challenges associated with managing people on a hybrid work model, as well as the familiar Mordor in the form of a huge number of Excel tables, documents, links and attachments. In order for any company to function flexibly and efficiently, it is necessary to put a stop to all this. Not only personnel and employees will feel the relief, but even the company’s budget.” – Milan Rataj, HR strategist and co-founder of the personnel system Sloneek.
“Before using Sloneek, we dealt with all documents related to the HR agenda and orders on paper, now we have everything clearly in electronic form and all employees can easily plan their work time off. From anywhere and even from a mobile phone,” praises the foundation’s HR manager.
They have been going to Sloneek for the sixth year
“At that time, our foundation was going through a transformation and we were looking for a suitable and convenient HR tool. It was most important for us to make the electronic system user-friendly. It was a company-wide vision, but thanks to an individual, Sloneek began to be fully utilized and over the years expanded to include other components that the system offers,” says Lucie Styblíková.
“I have to admit that it’s fascinating for me to watch when companies or organizations are progressive and manage to get ahead of the times. This is exactly the case with the Česká spořitelna Foundation. Digitized HR has been around for many years, while many Czech companies haven’t even started with it yet and are drowning in dusty files.” – Milan Rataj, HR strategist and co-founder of the personnel system Sloneek.
“Sloneek is easy to set up and implement. It was crucial for us to acquaint employees with its functionalities and thoroughly require its use in daily practice. Feedback from colleagues is positive, because the system is really user friendly. The team members are now more independent, at the same time they have a mutual overview of the absences, business trips or other work activities of their colleagues,” explains the HR manager, adding that she currently has sufficient and necessary information about all employees, their planned absences and the tools entrusted to them. There is also a clear system of access to all important documents and internal guidelines.
The implementation does not hurt and the system saves half the time
“During the implementation and sometimes even now, we use customer service. They were always willing to give us advice on solving a problem or setting up another component that we wanted to start using,” Styblíková describes.
“I would definitely recommend Sloneek to other organizations or companies. It is easy to use, clear, and for a company of our size, it fully meets the requirements for the HR agenda. When we calculated it, we came to the fact that using Sloneek saves us time every month, which is equivalent to about half a full-time job. And you can already tell,” emphasizes the HR manager.
“Finally, I would like to thank you for the opportunity to use Sloneek for free. We appreciate it very much,” she adds.
We thank our clients from the Česká spořitelna Foundation for their willingness and openness in sharing information that can be of benefit to other HR experts and companies.
