What is human resources document management?

9 of April, 2025

One of many tasks a company’s human resources team must face is HR document management. This department handles a large amount of information related to workers, and if not managed properly, it will encounter problems.

Therefore, human resources document management consists of the efficient use of all information related to the company’s staff. This information is key and at times can be confidential:

• Worker contracts.
• Employee’s personal documents (ID or foreigner identification number, social security affiliation number)
• Payrolls.
• Medical leaves.

These are documents the human resources team must process, file, and retrieve as efficiently as possible. Poor HR document management will greatly slow down the company’s processes, even complicating the compliance with legal requirements related to data protection.

For this reason, many human resource teams have a strategic document management plan that helps them overcome challenges related to HR document management. Choosing the right document management software based on the type of company must be a part of this plan.

Challenges of HR document management

Undoubtedly, the handling of documents is the main challenge human resources face in relation to document management. On one side, there’s the slowness in searching for information related to a worker. Time is lost searching for information, partly due to an uncontrolled storage of documents, regardless of whether they are necessary or valid. Outdated information is often stored which slows down these processes.

One of the consequences of this excess of stored information is an abundant use of paper with the economic and environmental cost that it entails. In some cases, the company itself may face lawsuits or penalties for not providing the requested information on time to the worker or even authorities such as the Labor Inspection. On the other hand, there are reprocesses, a further waste of time.

Benefits of good HR document management

If the HR team is able to develop an adequate HR document management, it can perform its job much more efficiently as manual tasks will be reduced. For this, it is essential to have a project manager like Sesame to help them keep all documents under control. The searches will be much faster and simpler so that anyone interested in consulting a document can quickly access it.

Good human resources document management also serves to strengthen the security of documents, especially those that include sensitive or confidential information. Not only will they be safe from possible losses, but a complete record will be kept, and unauthorized data modifications will be avoided. A history with the users who have accessed the document, changes made, and the date of the change is key to tracking this type of documentation.

One should not lose sight that document updating is reinforced. It will be done quickly and immediately, which can be very advantageous for companies with a very high employee turnover rate.

Finally, from the environmental point of view, it is important to highlight that document digitization reduces the use of paper. In addition, by storing them in the cloud, space is saved in the company by not having physical files.

Document manager for Human Resources

One of the keys in the changes experienced in HR document management in recent times has been the digitization of processes. The possibility of having a document manager that stores all the information in the cloud has relieved the human resources department of work.

Now, this team spends less effort on administrative tasks with the classification of documents and can focus on issues such as training the staff or searching for new improvements for the company.

In the case of Sesame’s functions as HR software and document manager, it is worth noting the help it provides in the hiring and onboarding processes. When selecting workers, it allows channeling candidacies through a single tool to which all members of the HR team will have access.

A candidate database can also be created. Once selected, the onboarding checklists allow the HR team to ensure they have all the necessary documentation related to the new worker.

In conclusion, efficient HR document management will mean a workload reduction for the human resources team, which can focus its efforts on other more helpful aspects for the organization.

Having a good project manager is essential when dealing with, storing, and accessing documentation related to the workforce. The more employees the company has on payroll, the more important it is to optimize document management to avoid future problems.

Iris Serrador

People Partner | LinkedIn | | Web | +post

Customer-oriented, both internally and externally, specializing in the definition and implementation of HR policies, as well as talent management, recruitment, and retention. Strong leadership, communication, negotiation, organization, and team coordination skills. Over 12 years of experience in Human Resources.

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