The City of Hasselt’s HR hustle

Promoting your employees’ professional development is a hot topic today. If you give employees the opportunity to continue learning, they will work more efficiently and perform better. It is clear that these positive effects contribute to the growth of the entire organisation and, as a manager, you can no longer ignore this. But how do you develop a customised training program for each individual employee?

Sign of the times

Staying up to date on professional development is extremely important today, which is why Groep Hasselt has chosen a Performance & Learning Management System. They want to digitise and optimise their current HR processes. “Creating a culture of feedback and mutual appreciation is a crucial first step in focusing on the professional development of employees,” says Veerle. “Technology can certainly help shape this culture.”

“Our current tool no longer meets the requirements to allow our employees to develop,” suggests Miet. “The tool is too rigid and not easy to use. Over the years, it has become more of a registration tool.

Furthermore, dissatisfaction with the tool was used as an excuse not to introduce feedback conversations. At Groep Hasselt we strongly believe that feedback is inseparably linked to the success of a professional HR policy.”

Enter the dragon

To counter these problems, Groep Hasselt chose to purchase two modules from Cegid Talentsoft: Performance Management and Learning. The first module focuses on feedback and evaluation, the second on training.

Veerle: “In a non-profit organisation, you have a challenging landscape with extremely diverse functions. Groep Hasselt has about 1,700 employees with diverse profiles, from workers to project employees and directors. Implementing software that updates the skills of all these employees is not an easy task. By rolling out Cegid Talentsoft, we can provide a customised offering for each target group.”

Peter Heeringa, Professional Services Director Benelux at Cegid, adds, “We offer one system that everyone can work with, no matter what profile they have. The tool gives them access to their personal functionalities. Training is offered in a customised manner in order to obtain the correct and required certificates.

In terms of data, the tool offers a range of possibilities. Every organisation that uses our system can use standard reports, but also real-time dashboards. This way, everything can be monitored accurately.”

A tough nut to crack

“Once the choice of Cegid Talentsoft was made, we started customising the software systematically with the support of a project manager,” explains Veerle. “During workshops provided by Cegid, the tool was fully tailored to our organisation. Specific templates were implemented and organisation-specific names and processes were carefully added.

Then, we started a pilot project where only two departments worked with limited functionalities of Cegid Talentsoft. This way, extensive testing was possible, and feedback could be provided. The lessons learned will be taken into account in the rollout of the performance module for the rest of the organisation.

The next step is to customise the learning module for our organisation, again through a number of workshops.” “For example, we want our internal training to continue to be offered in a classroom setting, but also to be available in the form of e-learning,” continues Miet.

“It is currently in a testing phase, which will be followed by a go-live phase, and then two to three weeks of follow-up. After that, the handover with CSM support and Customer Care follows, and it is up to the organisation itself to embrace and further develop this technology with gratitude,” concludes Peter with a smile.