Acme Foundry, based in Coffeyville, Kansas, recently needed a new accounting and payroll platform to support their 350-person team. Their existing payroll system was manual, time-intensive and limiting in what it could accomplish. It also happened to be sunsetting, which provided the opportunity for a new HR solution that could accommodate their expanding workforce. With a long history and relationship with the foundry, Pinion advisors recognized Acme’s need to improve back-office performance and capabilities by upgrading to more sophisticated software.
They facilitated a smooth transition to TalentPro, Pinion’s payroll and time-keeping software. The cloud-based, fully integrated HR solution enabled the company to enhance and automate their overall payroll and HR processes. The new technology brought innovation and efficiency to the payroll team, saving hours of work each week, reducing overtime substantially and boosting employee fulfillment in a new way. As a family-owned and operated company, Acme Foundry saw it as a valuable opportunity to improve the day-to-day lives of their employees.
Challenges – Manual Technology Hinders True Value
What began in 1905 as a 40-person team with an 8,200 square foot workspace, grew to over 350 employees and a 300,000 square foot facility. Just as Acme’s footprint expanded, so did their internal operating needs. This meant that the legacy payroll platform they had used for years no longer supported the expanded company.
Specifically, the platform lacked the technology to integrate with their timekeeping software, requiring the accounting team of six to manually key data for weekly payroll, overtime, time-off requests and more – for hundreds of employees each week. Manual entry was time-consuming and required meticulous attention-to-detail and overcommunication to prevent duplication, inconsistencies, or other errors.
Beyond the time strain, the platform was also limiting and inflexible in every-day use; as an on-premises platform, it required employees to be on-site to operate. Employees lacked the flexibility to work remotely or to resolve problems from home if they came up outside of business hours.
“While the sunsetting payroll platform forced us to get serious about finding a new system, we knew we could depend on Pinion to facilitate the move. We ended up with a TalentPro solution that made us question why we didn’t invest in it sooner. The upgrade is already paying off for us,” says Acme Foundry CFO, Aaron Heckman.
Solutions – An Upgrade That Pays Back in Dividends
As Acme considered their options for replacing the legacy payroll platform, Pinion was a natural choice. Pinion advisors have served the Acme team with general accounting services since the early 1970’s and have walked with them through exponential growth and shifting needs over the past several decades. With a strong relationship and understanding of the company, moving to Pinion’s TalentPro HR solution was a simple transition. Pinion advisors provided personal training on the new software, ensured the tools and resources fit the team’s needs, and answered any questions that came up along the way.
Since TalentPro is an open Application Programming Interface (API) system and can integrate with other programs, Acme was able to connect numerous HR platforms that they had been using separately for years. In this way, the cloud-based platform served as one simple HR solution for timekeeping, payroll, onboarding, reporting and other processes – bringing many complex functions into one simple tool.
Results – Return on Investment
- Streamlined payroll and timekeeping processes. By integrating TalentPro with Acme’s numerous platforms, the team can access all HR functions in one place reducing duplicate data, errors, and time spent jumping between programs.
- Saved valuable time and resources. By using TalentPro software to automate tasks like time entry, data processing, over-time management and more, the payroll team is collectively saving 16 hours each week, or 400 hours a year. With this simple change, employees enjoy less overtime and more time for family and the things that matter most to them. Leanna Cook, Acme payroll specialist, shared how it has impacted her life:
“With the new flexibility, I was able to work from home for a week to babysit my granddaughter – something I would never have been able to do prior to TalentPro. The flexibility has given me time back with my family and a richer life outside of work.”
- Empowered employees with new reward program. With the automatic timekeeping and attendance system, Acme was able to implement a reward program for employees who show exceptional performance and attendance. Before the upgrade from manual to automatic – a reward system would have been too cumbersome without additional staff to support it.
- Replaced excel spreadsheets with one digital, cohesive system. TalentPro allowed the team of six to work on one system with one record, upgrading their reality from paper-covered desks to a digital platform, and from multiple Excel spreadsheet versions to one consistent record. The single-source tool removed unnecessary complication, ensured greater accuracy, and enabled better collaboration for the team.
Learn more about the cloud-based, fully integrated HR solution that enabled Acme Foundry to enhance and automate their payroll and HR processes.
