Leading Research Firm Rates Upcoming Lawson Software Suite Highly in Strategic Human Capital Management Evaluation Report
Company’s compelling demonstration of “best-of-suite” capabilities at HR Tech Conference’s ‘HCM Battle’ highlights latest in HR technology offerings
ST. PAUL, Minn. (October 11, 2007) – Lawson Software (Nasdaq:LWSN) today announced that AMR Research, a leading industry analyst research firm, rated Lawson’s forthcoming Strategic Human Capital Management solution highly in a recent evaluation report ranking 28 HCM vendors and applications. The report evaluates vendor solutions on four core areas of strategic HCM: workforce acquisition, management, development, and assessment.
In the September 2007 report, “The Strategic HCM Suite Landscape: The Consolidation of Workforce Acquisition, Management, Development and Assessment,” Lawson Strategic Human Capital Management received the highest possible rating in three of the four core areas: workforce acquisition, including candidate sourcing, recruiting and on-boarding; workforce development, including learning management and career and succession planning; and workforce assessment, including employee reviews, goal setting and compensation.
Lawson also received the highest possible rating in functional areas including usability and potential, and the second highest possible rating in breadth of solution and delivery.
“Differentiators include a global approach, with its first beta customer based in France, and transition management, which is a core capability allowing organizations to configure and tailor their own business processes that may differ from country to country, or industry to industry, such as on-boarding, reviews, promotions, benefits enrollment, and career development. The inclusion of Lawson Business Intelligence as the analysis tool wrapping the application is also a strength, as it can track many metrics across the business for Lawson ERP customers as well,” said authors Christa Degnan Manning and Koppel Verma in the evaluation report.
Lawson provided the first public view of its new software suite today during the HR Technology Conference’s ‘HCM Battle,’ pitting Lawson, Workday and Oracle against one another to demonstrate their systems’ human capital management functionality. Lawson demonstrated its ‘best of suite’ approach to HCM software. This approach combines core HCM functionality – payroll, benefits management, employee self service and other core tools that organizations need to manage their global HR needs – with strategic HCM functionality, including talent management and other advanced capabilities.
“We have taken a very methodical approach in developing Lawson Strategic Human Capital Management,” said Larry Dunivan, vice president of Global Human Capital Management Products for Lawson. “We designed this suite around the real needs of our customers and we have relied on customer feedback on key features, including usability and functionality. Strategic Human Capital Management was built from the ground up with our customers and their employees in mind.”
Lawson also announced its first charter implementation customers for Lawson Strategic Human Capital Management, including Commerce Bank, a $48 billion regional financial services provider with 15,000 employees and more than 450 stores serving much of the East Coast; France-based Manitou, the world leader in the manufacturing and distribution of rough terrain forklift trucks; and Sitel, a global Business Process Outsourcing services provider with 67,000 employees located in 27 countries.
“We needed a solution that truly allows us to be more effective in recruiting and retaining top talent – but we also like to be strategic about how we identify and nurture top talent and future leaders,” said JoAnna Rubin-Berman, vice president, Human Resources, Commerce Bank. “Lawson Strategic Human Capital Management offers the kind of functionality and flexibility that we need, delivered in a model that works for our operations. Lawson listened to our needs and we feel this solution can deliver the long-term benefits that we need.”
Lawson’s new suite, to be delivered via a Software as a Service (SaaS) model, is being developed using the Lawson Landmark Application Designer, allowing Lawson to design it for service-oriented (SOA) IT environments. Using Landmark, Lawson simplifies applications by reducing the amount of code needed for development, which can significantly reduce the work needed for organizations to implement and use the applications. In addition, SOA increases flexibility by allowing maintenance and upgrades to be made when and where they are needed.
According to the AMR Research report, “(Lawson’s) SOA approach has enabled it to build out a new platform with reusable components, such as competency models, user-defined question sets, and organizational groupings. In this way, clients can expect easier configurations, maintenance and expansion of the HCM suite for better operational efficiency and functional delivery.”
Lawson Strategic Human Capital Management is designed to help organizations strategically manage, develop and retain employees and improve an organization’s ability to identify and develop top talent and emerging leaders. It also helps increase profitability by linking an organization’s people to its business strategy.
The AMR Research report is available for download online atwww.lawson.com/amrshcm.
More than 1,100 companies use Lawson Human Capital Management applications to manage talent, automate administrative HR processes and help HR staff focus on more strategic, value-added employee initiatives. Lawson Human Capital Management applications provide organizations with the information they need to maximize workforce potential, while helping HR leaders contribute to organizational excellence with applications that directly support business operations.
Source: Lawson
