HR tech exists specifically so you don’t have to shoulder this burden yourself

When talking to potential customers, we hear a lot about all the “options” they are considering when showing interest in implementing a talent management solution. Truth be told, when they starting saying the words, “We’re thinking about building our own system,” we can’t help but ask ourselves why they would want to put themselves through the pain and suffering of such a gargantuan task when there’s so much amazing HR tech out there that already exists.

Not that I’m biased at all, but Cornerstone falls squarely in that “amazing” category. 

For the businesses that think becoming HR tech experts of their own is the right plan of attack, it’s usually because they seek some, dare I say, unnecessary level of personalization that they can’t seem to find in an existing talent management solution. Here’s the thing: for those few areas of personalization that sit atop this “wish list,” there’s a whole slew of table stakes features and functionalities that take just as much time to build. For a company that doesn’t live and breathe HR every day, overlooking the foundations, in a quest to build those shiny, new personalizations, simply isn’t worth it.  

To build it or not to build it

It’s time to set the record straight. Here are five reasons why you should really trust the experts when the time comes to upgrade your current talent management solution: 

1. It’s expensive

You may initially think that re-allocating internal resources to focus on an initiative like this will save costs, but think again. First, you’re already paying these people, so factor in their salaries. On top of that, you’ve now suddenly taken a big chunk of their attention away from their day-to-day work to focus on this, which means you’ve made these resources even more strapped than they may have been before. This may require you to hire more full-time staff, or even contractors, to keep the trains running. But that’s not the only expense to consider. 

Building any kind of tech solution is rarely—no, never—a one-and-done activity. Once you’ve gotten it out of beta, you’ll most definitely have bugs to squash, platforms to migrate, updates to make, and the list goes on. Not to mention, you’ll need to give it ongoing support to make sure it runs smoothly and also plays nicely with the latest and greatest tech advancements. 

All of these headaches—and a lot more—go out the window when you buy a solution from a SaaS provider that, you guessed it, does this kind of work as its bread and butter. Not only will this be less costly to you most certainly in the long-term, because these companies are able to spread their costs across customers, but it will eliminate the time, resource strain, and just general hassle of having to tackle this on your own. 

2. It requires a lot of maintenance 

As mentioned above, any system that you build will always require ongoing support and maintenance. If you purchase a solution from an expert third-party, like Cornerstone, they take care of all of this for you. After all, it’s their job to stay on top of this for their customers. Taking this on internally means allocating dedicated resources to this product forever—or until you finally decide to throw in the towel and purchase an expert solution (which then makes all of the time, effort, and budget you put into it in the first place all for nothing!). 

But this doesn’t mean just allocating resources from your product team to support it, you also need to get IT, engineering, customer support, and even HR involved. When push comes to shove, building your own product often ends up being a synonym for “adding more headcount.” And if your primary goal, from the very start, was to be cost-conscious, you’re probably noticing by now that putting all of this work on your plate is quickly starting to add up. 

3. It involves an exceptional level of expertise

Contrary to what we may see play out in the news today, industry experts are still important—if anything, more important now than ever before. The same can be said for the realm of HR. Talent management is not something that you just “do.” It’s something that businesses, like ours, have taken a lot of time to perfect. Quite frankly, this is why we believe that if HR is not the core of your business, you shouldn’t waste resources on building an HR tech solution. It doesn’t make sense. All of your attention should be laser-focused on whatever is going to grow your business and increase its presence in the market. Taking on a new hobby, much less one that not in your domain of expertise, is most likely not your top priority right now. Given all of the seismic shifts the world has experienced this year, there’s no better time than now to stay in your lane—and let the HR experts take care of your talent management solution for you. 

4. It takes time 

Building an end-to-end talent management solution is not something that gets done overnight. The planning phase alone could feasibly take months. The rest could easily take a couple of years to fully implement. That’s placing a pretty hefty bet on a long-game strategy. Not to mention, if HR isn’t your core expertise, by the time you actually launch your product, there could have very well been some pretty major advancements made in the field that you failed to take into account or that simply weren’t part of your product roadmap. When you purchase a solution, those long, arduous months of planning and developing go out the window; your only focus, therefore, becomes implementation, training, and user adoption. Don’t get us wrong, that last part can move quickly or take a little time, too, depending on how fast you’re able and willing to move, but at least you’re not building the ship as it’s moving.

5. It needs to scale 

Time is a funny thing. Should you decide to venture to develop a talent management solution on your own, you may only think about the here-and-now during the planning phase of your product development and not necessarily taking into consideration how your business will change and grow in the future. While you may succeed at building a solution that offers you all of the personalizations your heart desires, if it can’t scale (up and down) based on how your business evolves, then you’ll ultimately end up finding yourself responsible for maintaining a one-size-fits-all solution that will quickly become outdated and require replacement. When you purchase a cloud-based talent management solution, for example, it’s as easy as a flick of a switch to upgrade, downgrade, or customize your subscription plan. And once you do, it takes effect uniformly across all of your subscriptions in one fell swoop. 

Don’t go at it all alone

Now, if you’re able to overcome all of these obstacles above on your own, more power to you and to everyone else on your team. You would certainly be the exception to the rule. 

But again, if you know there are HR tech experts out there—and this is a pretty crowded space these days—that offer turn-key solutions that can transform your HR operations almost overnight, why put yourself through unnecessary pain and suffering? (Hint: You shouldn’t!) 

Companies like Cornerstone exist for one reason: to help businesses, like yours, to recruit, train, and manage their people so that everyone within an organization do their best work, even better. This is why it’s so important to trust the experts and rely on a talent management solution that can grow alongside your business. Anything short of that, including your own attempt at building a competitive product, should be left on the cutting room table. 

So if you’ve been wanting to give your talent management solutions a much-needed overhaul, the good news is you’ve got the entire team at Cornerstone ready to help. Schedule a demo today to learn about what Cornerstone’s full suite of HR solutions can do for your business.