Fiduciam is an institutional funding lender, providing Business Bridge Loans and other short term loans to entrepreneurs and SMEs in the United Kingdom and across various jurisdictions in Europe. Through their use of technology, they make secure lending much more flexible and efficient to a wide range of businesses.
For this interview, we talked to Antonio Martín Barceló, CFO & Head of HR at Fiduciam UK. His role in the company, head of HR and as an HR component, involves dealing with admin, regarding payroll, contracts, onboarding of new employees etc.
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Main Issues Before Factorial
Fiduciam had never used an HRIS system like Factorial before, everything was based on shared folders, emails and spreadsheets, and it was really difficult to manage everything. Also – as we are a rapidly growing company, we are recruiting a lot of young talent, and the first issue we had to deal with was the onboarding process.
During the onboarding process, we had to coordinate several departments, the engineering department, HR, Finance, Operations and IT. It was a massive amount of emails going back and forth, spreadsheets, documents, and signatures across many documents – and with Factorial that has improved massively.
Factorial HR vs. Other HR Software Solutions
We are a small company and we did not want to deal with huge HR systems or ERPs, we came across Factorial and we realised it had all the things we were looking for in one single solution. The onboarding and offboarding, document management, performance reviews, payroll – it had everything we were looking for. So we started talking with the Factorial team, who was super helpful during our onboarding, and we were very happy so we took the chance and we are very happy with our decision.
Amount of Time Saved
We asked Antonio if he has seen a big difference in the amount of time that they save. To which he responded: “Yes, absolutely – even the onboarding process took each individual several hours. Right now – everything is super efficient, people work independently, and they don’t have to wait on others to receive information from the new joiner, everything is on the platform. People, depending on their role, have access to different information and tasks. It’s completely different from what we had before and what we have now. “
Streamlined Performance Reviews
Conducting a performance review used to be a very time-consuming process, not only because of the time it took for the team to review the employee but also because of the time it took to gather the performance report with the relevant signatures etc. As all the fields we required for a performance review, it took a lot of time with back and forth emails and documents that were not signed.
Now that we have the tool everything is super smooth, people are doing the performance review within Factorial, so there’s no emailing back and forth. They can check where they are, and we make sure all of them are signed and approved and ready on time. Between the managers, we can make sure that we are on top of that, and not have to postpone anything.
Factorial’s Analytical Tools and Insightful Reports
We asked Antonio if he uses Factorial’s analytical tools and reports in his work to which he responded: “Yes, absolutely. We have much better insight. I like the reporting feature, from the most simple reports to the most complex ones. Not only do we have a better insight, but we can also streamline all the processes that we have – the payroll, the holidays, who been absent in what period and so on.”
Having Better Insights Into the Fiduciam’s Workforce
Antonio mentioned that although at Fiduciam they have yet to explore the reporting side of the performance review tool to its full potential, it has nevertheless, been super helpful. All employees have access to their performance reviews after they are done, anytime they need it. So they can check where they have failed or where they succeeded in the previous period. For everyone in the firm, it’s much easier to track.
Organisational Chart
During our conversation, Antonio highlighted how the organisational chart makes lives much easier for everyone on the team. As Fiduciam is relatively a young company, they tend to recruit a lot of young talent. So when newcomers join the company, it’s quite difficult to put faces and positions and figure out who reports to who. Factorial has helped everyone to understand much easier what they are required to do at first, who they are supposed to report to, and the general company structure.
Employee Engagement
Antonio also told Factorial that their company has seen better employee engagement since adopting Factorial. Previously the feedback was that the onboarding of employees was a little bit difficult especially with the pandemic when not everyone was working from the office. Onboarding remote employees used to be much more complicated. Now with Factorial, everyone is clear about what they have to do, and what are the tasks, and no one forgets about anything because it’s all inside the platform, all in one place. And people feel more secure and they are more conscious of what they need to do.
Biggest Problems That Fiduciam Solved with Factorial
Antonio told us that Factorial has solved many of their problems. Their entire team has seen that they have more free time, minimising the tasks that take a lot of time, from the onboarding and performance reviews to following up on documents that need to be signed and the payroll. This is super relevant as we are always working towards tight deadlines. It’s been incredible to see the amount of time that we have freed.
With the performance review process, Fiduciam managed to reduce the process from 5 weeks to 3 weeks. That’s the amount of time it takes for all of the managers to sit down with everyone and for them to agree to participate. The 2 weeks that we have saved are usually spent following up, gathering documents, signatures and more. Not having to constantly go back and forth has saved them a good amount of time.
Furthermore, the preparation of the payroll was a more manual process. Antonio said: “Before, there would always be a list of emails with the new joiners, another with people who have changed their bank account, and another one with the people that are leaving. Now it’s everything and everyone in one single report. Reduces the time from 2 or 3 days to just a few minutes. We now only need to print the report that Factorial has prepared for us.”
In Conclusion
To wrap up, Antonio wanted to let everyone know, that Fiduciam’s experience with Factorial has been fantastic. Not only because of the tool but also for the team at Factorial. They found the whole process to be super smooth. Apart from the time they saved, their employees are enjoying having all of their documents and information in one single place, knowing where they need to go for all of their human resources related stuff.
