Allison King
VP, People Operations
Sound Physicians
Episode 389
Beyond Busywork: HR Automation Redefines Employee Experience and Strategy
Current chapter: Covering monthly expenses is the number one concern for employees in 2024
Built By PeopleNovember 12, 2024 · 17:08
Thesis
“By strategically embracing HR technology and automation, organizations can optimize processes, free up HR teams for more strategic, human-centric work, and ultimately enhance the employee experience from onboarding through the entire lifecycle.”
Show notes
No HR team is too small to automate. Allison King made her reputation figuring that out at a series of companies before landing at Sound Physicians as VP of People Operations—and her case is grounded in something specific: automation doesn't replace the human in HR, it gives HR back the time to actually be human.
King's path from applied mathematics to HR is unusual, and her frame on people operations reflects it. She defines the function as "the glue of all the different roles in HR"—the integrating layer that makes the machinery work. Her approach to implementing technology starts not with tools but with problem statements: What are we actually trying to solve? Who else is affected (payroll, IT, managers)? Are we trying to transform a full system or optimize one workflow? The organizations that buy HR tools without a clear problem statement end up with underutilized licenses and frustrated employees. The ones that start from the problem end up with adoption.
Her most instructive example is onboarding. By leveraging workflow automation across their HR system, IT, and identity management (Okta), Sound Physicians streamlined a process that was previously manual, fragmented, and globally inconsistent. The result wasn't just time savings—it was the cognitive and relational capacity to actually connect with new hires rather than processing paperwork at them. Her warning on change management is equally crisp: skip the buy-in steps, and whatever you're optimizing will get rejected regardless of how technically sound it is.
- No HR team is too small to automate: why early-stage process automation creates compounding returns as organizations scale
- Problem statement first: the evaluation framework that keeps HR from buying tools that never get adopted
- Automation as a human-touch enabler: how eliminating manual work frees HR to actually connect with people
- Global onboarding optimization: how workflow automation across HR systems, IT, and identity management transformed a fragmented process
- Change management is not optional: why skipping buy-in steps guarantees rejection, regardless of the quality of the solution
- Embrace AI and automation now—the professionals who optimize their outputs through technology will outpace those who don't
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What you'll take away
- 1Introduce technology and automation early in HR, even for small teams, to create time for more impactful strategic initiatives.
- 2Maximize the capabilities of existing HR systems and leverage current contracts for automation before investing in new platforms.
- 3Prioritize transparency and open communication in change management to secure buy-in from both executives and frontline employees.
- 4Utilize automation to handle manual, repetitive tasks, thereby enabling HR professionals to focus more on direct human interaction and connection.
- 5When evaluating new HR tools, begin with a clear problem statement and involve all key stakeholders (e.g., payroll, IT) to ensure comprehensive impact and prioritization.
What most organizations get wrong
- •I don't think that you are too small of a team in order to start implementing different technologies or different workflows that have automation behind them.
- •I do believe that some roles, yes, you could probably automate them out of the role, but I also think that that is something that not necessarily is going to happen, but you should kind of try to do to, to get those processes better so you can actually, as HR, connect with the people and, and go outside of the system.
In Allison's words
“operations was something that really wasn't, you know, a topic of conversation or considered a function, you know, 10 years ago. And so I really felt like I, I helped that company with understanding what people operations is, which is, you know, in my eyes, the glue of all of the different roles in HR.”
This highlights the evolving and crucial role of people operations as an integrating force within the broader HR function.
“I don't think that you are too small of a team in order to start implementing different technologies or different workflows that have automation behind them.”
This challenges the common misconception that only large organizations can benefit from HR automation.
“Systems and automation are great, but they don't provide that human touch that you still do need to have those conversations.”
This emphasizes the critical balance between technological efficiency and the irreplaceable value of human interaction in HR.
“Change management... if you start to skip or go too quickly through, you know, optimizing a process, you don't get that buy-in. You're going to get people who reject whatever, you know, process or project that is, and it's not going to be successful.”
This provides a crucial lesson on the necessity of empathy and thorough communication in successful change management initiatives.
“Don't be scared of it [AI and automation] and educate yourselves on it. I think that that's really going to get you further in your career because it's not going away, right?”
This offers forward-looking advice for HR professionals to embrace continuous learning and adaptation to new technologies.
The problems this episode addresses
- •HR teams waste significant time on manual data entry across multiple systems.
- •Outdated, non-technology based benefit enrollment processes create inefficiency and poor employee experience.
- •Lack of time for strategic HR initiatives due to overwhelming manual administrative tasks.
- •Stressful and inefficient onboarding processes that hinder rapid new hire productivity and engagement.
- •Complexity of managing global onboarding with diverse regulations, background checks, policies, and training requirements.
- •Resistance from employees and stakeholders to adopt new processes due to ingrained habits ('that's not how we've always done it').
- •Difficulty in evaluating and prioritizing HR technology, leading to suboptimal or unnecessary purchases.
- •Lack of cross-functional buy-in from departments like payroll and IT for HR system implementations.
In this episode
Covering monthly expenses is the number one concern for employees in 2024
Built by People
Allison King is VP of People Operations at Sound Physicians
Allison King on Built By People
You've gone from startup to much larger companies analyzing HR processes
Determining how to scale HR Processes
Change management involves getting buy-in from executives and frontline workers
How to Balance Technology and Human Touch in HR
How do you evaluate tools and platforms to implement? I'm curious
When to Choose the Right HR Technology?
Elsa, could you share an example of a specific HR process that you successfully optimized
Immigration & Onboarding Process Optimization
Alison says being transparent with colleagues before a project is important
In the End: Change Management
Topics covered
Organizations and entities mentioned
Full transcript
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