Checklist to Create HR SOP

1. Recruitment & Onboarding

When creating recruitment and onboarding SOPs, you must take into account that there are different processes under this procedure which include:

• Application screening and interview process
• Offer letter creation
• Background checks
• Onboarding procedure

To ensure that HRs follow through each stage of the recruitment and onboarding process, here’s a checklist to help you create the SOP efficiently.

• Onboard the right HR tool to help you screen hundreds of candidate applications
• Shortlist resumes that match the existing job opening requirements
• Share the profiles with the team managers to see if the shortlisted resumes are a good fit
• Set up an introduction call
• Send out tests
• Discuss the results with the candidate at the end of the interview process via email or call
• Connect with the selected candidate to discuss the next steps
• Understand the candidate’s compensation expectations and negotiate as per the existing hiring budget
• Update the offer letter as per the discussed salary expectations and send it to the candidate
• Check out referrals provided by candidates to conduct background checks
• Create a customized onboarding process for each job role

2. Training & Development

When creating an SOP for employee training and development, we must consider the various methods to impart knowledge, ways to collect training materials, performance management and appraisal procedures, and improvement plans. To ensure all these elements are added to your SOP, follow the following checklist.

• Identify the problem areas that hamper employee productivity
• Discuss with managers to create a training module for employees
• Use the right LMS solution to execute the training program for the team
• Schedule workshops that upgrade employee skills
• Identify what skill sets are not included in the training module
• Connect with team members to identify improvements in the existing modules
• Get the suggestions approved by the necessary managers involved
• Update the changes to the learning management system
• Scheduling feedback sessions for employees with their managers
• Create goals and objectives for employees to assess their performance
• Identify areas where negotiation can take place with the employees
• Identify the right metrics that help you measure employee performance
• Capture constructive feedback and share it with employees
• Identifying the best ways to enhance internal communication within teams and across teams
• Finding the best methods to boost team building for better output
• Inculcating leadership skills among employees through regular workshops

3. Compensation & Employee Relations

In this type of SOP, you must include payroll processing procedures, performance-based compensation plans, disciplinary procedures, grievance procedures, absence management, and conflict resolution. There is a good chance that you may end up missing out on either of these processes, given the number of topics it entails. However, the checklist below will help you avoid missing any of them during creation.

• Decide on a date every month when you will start assessing leaves and salary estimates
• Update the right employee information in the system for timely disbursement
• Choose a payroll software that sends out payslips to employees once the salaries get disbursed
• Record payroll updates for future reference
• Set up goals and objectives based on their job role
• Measure their performance based on the outcomes
• Set up compensation plans based on the results they achieved in percentage
• Evaluate the market to understand the current trends for employee compensation before sending increment letters
• Conduct disciplinary hearings in case there are allegations against the managers about misbehavior during office hours
• Offer formal grievance options to employees if they are not satisfied with the results or decisions made by the management
• Give the option to employees to choose someone from the team who can accompany them during the hearing
• Maintain records for all the disciplinary actions to ensure the same situations don’t happen in the future
• Create a leave policy summary that explains to employees the various leave application processes
• Share links for leave application forms that they must fill out before their leaves
• Ask employees to give advance notice to avoid work delays
• Create a summary that informs employees about their duties on the day they take a leave
• Perform active listening and remain calm while both parties express their complains
• Offers solutions to both the parties involved that work in their favor
• Find ways to arrive at a compromise and ensure they agree to work in harmony going forward
• Encourage both parties to apologize for their behavior to avoid future conflicts

4. Recordkeeping & Security:

Recordkeeping and data security are other important topics on which your company should create an SOP for HR team members. That’s because it will help them:

• Understand how to manage employee data as per security protocols
• Identify the regulations their team must follow during the employee life cycle
• List out reporting procedures for both managers and employees

To ensure you capture all the elements of this SOP, here’s a checklist to get you through the creation process:

• Schedule email awareness training
• Add firewalls so that no malware attacks employee systems
• Recommend employees change their passwords every quarter
• Encourage them to use communication platforms that encrypt the data
• Implement access control to avoid losing essential data accidentally
• Collecting employee records from start to finish
• Capture all the recruitment and hiring process data in one place
• List training resources that employees can refer to at any time
• List data privacy and security procedures
• Identify and list management training programs
• List possible situations where employee termination and separation can take place
• Identifying the right POC who needs to be involved in the process
• Understanding the type of report you’d like to create on an annual basis
• Keeping employees looped in during the reporting process
• Choosing the right software that allows recording all the reports from both manager’s and employee’s perspective

How Does Document360 Help You Create HR SOPs?

Once you learn the benefits of HR SOPs, you can hardly resist the idea of creating yours immediately. But we recommend you choose SOP software that enables you to create them swiftly.

If you’ve been searching for HR SOP software but haven’t arrived at many solutions, we suggest you explore Document360.

Schedule a demo with one of our experts to take a deeper dive into Document360

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This SOP software will allow you to:

1. Provide a central hub for knowledge sharing

If you plan to create HR SOPs that the HR team and employees can access, you must create an internal knowledge hub. Now that is something Document360 specializes in. It can help you create internal knowledge repositories and take them live on the intranet.

Employees and HRs can use the SSO feature to open and access the HR SOP repository. This allows you to centralize all the required information and create a trustworthy internal source of information for all.

2. Structured Documentation

Most SOPs are a heavy read for HRs and employees as they seem content-heavy and contain all the information in one place. However, Document360 allows you to create structured documentation articles that encourage readers never to get bored with company policies.

Here’s how you can structure documentation content with Document360.

• Where possible, you can add images or training videos. These will help you visually represent the context of the SOP content.
• Rather than adding every aspect of the hiring process in one article, Document360 allows you to create categories and sub-categories in the sidebar navigation. This way, each article doesn’t look content-heavy, and you can offer the necessary information regarding one standard procedure at a time.

3. AI features to ease content creation

Document360 also offers an AI writer feature, which is supposed to aid the companies’ writing process. This AI writer feature allows its users to:

• Create outlines
• Create shorter or longer summaries of the existing articles
• Get article recommendations based on search history

Read More: How AI Writer Works

4. Easy navigation and customization options

Like customers, employees also wish to find answers to their urgent questions faster. You can help your HR team members avoid reaching out to the management if they have minor questions about various processes by making it easier for them to find all the answers via easy navigation in their SOP documentation.

Document360 offers three easy navigation options to their users, which include:

• Ask Eddy feature summarizes the article information for faster resolution
• Detailed sidebar navigation to help HR team members find their answers from the right article
• And, let’s not forget the simple search bar option

They make navigation easier. But that’s not all.

You even get customization options that help you create a unified module for HRs and help them find all the relevant information hassle-free. To help them get updated information, you can block access and direct them to more suitable articles per their search.

5. Granular access control

Create team accounts to control documentation access. This is especially true for HR SOPs. You will make this live on the intranet, but that doesn’t mean that all employees must have access to it. Only administration and HR team members must have access to it.

In that case, create log in credentials for those accessing the SOP documentation to manage content access.

Check out: How to Share Content Access

6. Utmost Data Security & Compliance

Finally, Document360 is also known for its data security and compliance features. As a GDPR-compliant solution, this SOP software allows you to secure all the data via features like:

• Backup functionality
• Private documentation
• User access only
• SOC2 and SOC3 compliant
• IP restrictions

These aren’t just basic features but a necessity you must seek in any SOP software before onboarding it. However, Document360 offers these and many more, which you can explore during our free demo or signup process.

What do our Customer’s say?

Document360 has helped us achieve much operational efficiency simply because people know where to find specific information or document,

– Vijayakumar J, Manager of Product Management, Sophi, a Mather Economics Company

Read the full story here.

HR SOPs Template Example

We have probably covered all the HR SOP items, but let’s explore one example that allows you to create your own from scratch.

Here’s what your HR SOP template must contain:

Name: (Give a name to the HR SOP like Performance Appraisal or Compensation)

Purpose: (Explain the purpose of the SOP and how it aids the HR team members in the specific HR process)

Applies When: (Explain the various situations when the steps under this SOP will apply to employees)

Step-by-Step Procedure: (Explain each step or stage of this process using relevant content, images, and videos to avoid confusion later)

Frequently Asked Questions: (Identify and add possible questions related to a process to reduce the possibilities of HR members reaching out to admin every time they have doubts)

Links to Relevant Articles:

Feedback: (Check if the article helped them resolve that particular situation in the office)

With this simple and easy-to-follow template, you can create HR SOPs faster.

Conclusion

Training HRs and resolving their questions about the multiple processes they must manage can be hectic. That is why it is crucial to create HR SOPs that help them learn what roles and responsibilities they must undertake in different situations to avoid errors and remain compliant with labor laws.

And while you create one, make sure to onboard the best SOP software for your business. We hope our guide helps you create yours easily.