Space to work for Workspace – thanks to an integrated HR & Payroll system

Workspace is London’s leading provider of flexible space for London’s brightest businesses. Workspace owns more than 5m sq. ft. of space across 77 properties in London and the South East, providing a home to over 4,000 of London’s brightest businesses. 

Time is one of those things money just cannot buy - but what you can do is make sure you’re using the time you do have, as effectively as possible.

For Workspace, using separate HR and payroll systems was not the best use of their time. In 2022, the business decided it was time to invest in technology to take on more administration, freeing up the time to work on higher-value projects.

What’s more, they knew they could obtain greater insight into their data with modern technology, so they hit the market looking for flexible and innovative software that was just like their business. When Ben Saunders, Head of People, joined Workspace in 2021, the team was smaller and the HR and payroll systems in place did an adequate job. But as the headcount increased post-lockdown, and he could see the team duplicating efforts across different systems, Ben knew it was time to find an integrated system with better tech.

“The tech we were using previously was built in the 90s and it was time for us to modernise. I’d heard of IRIS Cascade and evaluated it alongside several solutions. It seemed to be the product that did exactly what it said it would; it integrated the HR and Payroll system and allowed us great reporting with lots of flexibility to obtain additional information as and when it was required.

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We also wanted to put the control back into the hands of our employees, and the self-serve option within IRIS Cascade seemed to be user-friendly and intuitive.

When there are legal requirements like pension auto-enrolment, it’s great to know you’ve got the tech in place to help you get the data at a click of a button. IRIS Cascade makes that so much easier for us.”

The team uses IRIS Cascade to manage employee holidays, salary changes, overtime, bonuses, accessing pay slips, as well as managing the payroll.

Eileen McDonnell, Payroll Manager at Workspace, says, “Before IRIS Cascade, we operated a standalone payroll system to our HR system. While it processed payroll, we were limited in reporting functionality and I spent a significant amount of time each month (circa a week per month) entering data already in the HR system, resetting passwords, and adapting a limited suite of set reports to provide the required information. Since we moved to Cascade, I can reuse this time to focus on other projects as well as provide more sophisticated reporting to the business.

Ben tells us, “IRIS Cascade has helped lighten the heavy admin workload, saving us valuable time, particularly with our day-to-day responsibilities. Automating repetitive tasks ensures compliance and gives us the time to add value by generating greater insights into our team. As a growing business, using the right HR system has been vital to our success and we’re thrilled to be working with IRIS to make that happen. I would say IRIS Cascade is a fantastic product for any business that puts employees at the heart of everything they do.”