Will Salesforce.com Become a Force in HR?

5 comments

Salesforce Salesforce.com announced on Tuesday a "virtual software bazaar" of on-demand software applications, introducing newly created HR capabilities.  Delivered from Salesforce and a handful of partners via their AppExchange service, current HR functionality includes:

  • Employee Services (incl. Performance Management)
  • Expense Tracking
  • Payroll
  • Policy Management
  • Recruiting
  • Surveys

Before HR vendors throw up their white flag, it should be noted that this new service is a very simplified solution offering with scaled-down functionality and an introductory level pricing model (Salesforce.com is giving some functionality away for free) and targeted primarily at SMB customers.  Nonetheless, it is a great attempt to expand existing Salesforce customers while leveraging partners to attract a new client base.  One of those partners, SuccessFactors, announced their service participation earlier this week (not surprising as they are mutual customers and located only a few miles away from each other), and are pricing their AppExchange Edition at $95/employee/year. 

In a sidenote, this week’s feature article is eWeek discusses Salesforce.com recent challenges in uptime and performance.  AppExchange and their supporting partners are dependent on Salesforce.com’s hosting infrastructure and any continuing performance degradation will have severe impacts on the AppExchange service, their partner support, and customers who are now demanding penalty-based SLAs with on-demand vendors.

  • http://systematicHR.com Doubledubs

    Jason – I must admit I know nothing about AppExchange or SF.com’s participation. This is an interesting idea, but I could not find any mention of how the whole package is tied together if you purchase more than one component.

    For now, it looks to me like there is little to no integration, possibly a web services architecture on the AppExchange side to give an integrated look and feel, and some pretty low level applications. As the AppExchange idea grows, if SF.com can include more robust applications around the core of HR proctices, they might be able to have some impact on the industry. Right now, the idea is where SF.com was 5 years ago, in the low to mid market. Can they execute this in the same way they did for CRM?

  • http://www.talentism.com Jeff Hunter

    Electronic Arts is starting a pilot program to use Salesforce.com as a sourcing / pre-ATS module. The integration metephor is top notch Dubs. I just met with an ATS vendor and told them that their major competition is Salesforce.com and Microsoft (MS CRM 3.0). More to come.

  • http://www.hr-xml.org/blog/ Chuck Allen

    The geek in me wants to believe… However, I think Jason is correct that enterprise HR solution providers shouldn’t worry about finding a white flag. I think SF.com might be able to sell some fairly standalone solutions for SMB. I’m also intrigued (again the geek in me) by the possibilities of registries of integratable components. Network endpoints, supported operations, and policy would be exposed to allow for opportunistic trial and adoption of these components (see strikeiron.com for a geekly vision of the “e-bay of applications” idea). However, the realist in me just isn’t convinced that either type of registry or application exchange very directly impacts the type of enterprise HR solutions often discussed in this blog. Some of them will likely put up their own smorgasbords of components and have a bit more architecture around them.

  • Phil Fersht

    Have to say this is a significant potential move in the HR apps space. When you look at the massive popularity and installed base of the SFC customer management solution, the ease in which they can start deploying simple – but highly effective – HR and accounting apps for small business is potentially a big play. Let’s not beat around the bush here – small companies want solutions that integrate easily, can be deployed with zero fuss, and are hosted on a per-month-per-seat basis. It’s high time someone took this market by the scruff of the neck – maybe SFC is the company to do that. They know the SMB space, have the resources, channel and marketing savvy.

  • http://www.hr-xml.org/blog/ Chuck Allen

    Phil Fersht wrote:
    > companies want solutions that integrate easily

    As I mention, the geek in me finds the easy integration possibilities intriguing, but are SMBs going to find integrated solutions through SFC? I don’t think this is very clear. I mentioned Strikeiron in my comment above. I’ve since learned Strikeiron is making its web services components available through SFC. But are SMBs really customers for these types of components? I’d think that their solution providers, acting in ‘general contractor’ mode, might be more likely buyers of those components than SMBs themselves.

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