A business case for new HR technology starts with the work your organisation already does. For a UK organisation with a few hundred employees or more, that means showing where existing processes take up time, cause avoidable rework or make payroll harder to check.
The aim is a short decision paper covering what happens now, what needs to change, which costs need testing and what finance, payroll and IT still need to resolve. These six steps will help you build it from your own records and workflows.
1. Map the Current Workflow
Follow the changes that happen during each pay cycle. Someone joins or leaves, receives a salary change, updates their bank details, takes unpaid leave or moves role. Where does that information go?
For each change, record who enters it, where it is stored and who checks it before payroll runs. Note any duplicate entry, spreadsheet copies, emails between teams or manual checks. Pay particular attention to places where colleagues lose time reconciling conflicting records.
Ask colleagues in HR and payroll to walk you through recent cases. Following an actual employee change from start to finish can reveal manual handovers that a written process leaves out.
2. Turn the Problems Into Requirements
Each problem should lead to a clear requirement. Salary changes entered in two places might call for one controlled flow of approved pay data. Reports that take days to prepare because information sits in separate files might point to the need for one agreed employee record that both teams can use.
Then check whether the software you are considering can meet those requirements. CIPHR’s HR payroll software is one relevant reference point: it shows how employee and pay data can stay connected while payroll teams retain control over which changes move across and when.
Keep the requirements vendor-neutral. Describe the work your organisation needs to do before assessing how a particular supplier would support it.
3. Put Numbers Around the Current Work
Use your own records wherever possible to establish how much time the work takes. Count the hours spent re-entering data, checking mismatches, answering avoidable pay queries and preparing reports from several sources.
Only convert those hours into a cost where you can explain the calculation. Use actual salary costs or an agreed internal costing method, and clearly label estimates. If error rates have not been tracked, do not invent them.
This gives finance a baseline against which to assess a proposed integrated system. It also makes the assumptions visible: how much work could change, and how much would remain? Do not assume every minute of manual work will disappear after implementation.
4. Bring Finance, Payroll and IT In Early
Each team needs to examine a different part of the proposal. Finance needs the cost model and the assumptions behind any savings. Payroll needs to confirm how pay changes, approvals and checks would work. IT will review data flows, access controls, integrations, hosting and support.
Ask each team what evidence it needs to support a shortlist or budget request. Where an answer is missing, record the question.
Check which other systems the platform would need to exchange data with, too. Connections to finance, recruitment or benefits systems can affect the project’s scope, cost and timing.
5. Compare Costs on the Same Basis
Look beyond the software price. A like-for-like comparison needs to cover the whole-life cost, including software charges, setup, data migration, training, internal project time and any known integration work.
Separate confirmed costs from estimates. The integrated systems shortlisted by UK organisations can differ in scope and cost, so assess every option using the same cost headings, time period and assumptions.
If you include an estimated payback date, show how you calculated it. Make clear which parts depend on adoption, data quality or changes to internal working practices. The date should reflect those assumptions, not imply certainty.
6. Write the Decision Paper Around Evidence
Keep the paper short enough to use in a meeting. Start with the current problem, then set out the evidence, requirements, cost comparison and unanswered questions. Move supporting detail into an appendix.
The paper has done its job when senior leaders can understand what happens now, what would change, what it may cost and what still needs checking before a purchase decision. Approval is not guaranteed.
Before circulating it, ask someone outside HR to read it. If they struggle to follow the argument, revise it.
With the six steps complete, test the assumptions with finance, payroll and IT. Use the agreed requirements to compare suppliers on the same basis, keeping the decision tied to your organisation’s workflows and evidence.
