Human Resources Functional Architectural Design

The development of Business solutions in the realm of People Practices requires a specific integrated framework to succeed and deliver strategic impact. We refer to this level of integration but somehow have not agreed to it.  This framework can be equated to the architectural plan for a building, or a house for that matter.  It is not about processes (how to) at this point, but more about understanding what you want, what the options are and how these choices impact what you get.   If the design is not integrated the outcome will not be either.  In designing such a framework, one should be mindful to design for the future, which might be very different from what you have currently.  After all, one cannot live in a beach hut and expect it to organically become a mansion. In the rest of the document this approach will be referred to as “Functional Architecture Design”.

The challenge in designing solutions of this nature is they should provide flexibility, be IT friendly, consider cost of operation, maximise return on investment and where you want to be in the future.

Functional Architecture is not the accountability of the IT specialist. Consider the world of finance. The integrated thinking in the finance world dictates the relationships between the general ledger, debits, credits, the control account, journals, cash flow statements, the income statement, asset register and balance sheet. There is actually an international standard that dictates this integration. What is unique by Organisation is the general ledger design.  The general ledger of account codes and their interrelationships are subjected to serious design effort and its results drive how the Organisation thinks about, reflects on, analyses, tracks and reports on costs, profits etc. Finance would simply not be able to do what they do if they left the above to the IT specialist to sort out.   This same level of integrated architectural design is required from People Solutions.

From the above context; QBIT has hopefully provided some logical reasons why the Functional Architecture Design in HC solutions requires design effort up front.  Technology can after all, not miraculously hold together silo based thinking in HC practice. We regard it as our professional duty as HC practitioners to take accountability for such design and even more so, drive for an international standard regarding this.