Central Group elevates employee experience with HR automation projects 

The company streamlined its processes with mobile-friendly solutions.

As a forward-looking company with a diverse portfolio, retail and service business organisation Central Group deems it important to make sure that employee experience is of the best value by leveraging easy-to-use solutions to establish a stronger connection with its large frontline workforce.

With how rapid the pace has become in the industries they are serving, the company also needed to streamline its processes by introducing alternative tools on top of existing technology and eliminating manual and repetitive work on the floor. Central Group had a solution to these issues: implementing HR automation projects through bots to resolve the company’s pain points. 

One of the main processes that they have to improve on is having a more efficient and integrated leave application and HR management approach for its employees. This led the company’s HR team to build a Leave Bot through Workato to allow employees to apply for time off, overtime requests & approval with just a few clicks via the Workplace chat across Central Group, Central Retail and Central Pattana

Once a request is submitted, Workato routes the request to the line manager via Workplace to ask for approval. This saved the workforce’s time to take action in seconds via Workplace chat whilst solving the issue on an existing interface that employees were already familiar with.

Meanwhile, Central Group and Central Pattana also built the Health Bot to monitor employee health status and COVID risk. Through this automation feature, employees can submit their health declaration forms in just a few clicks via the Workplace chat as well.

Workato then picks up the data on the back end, identifies any COVID risks or cases, and notifies the HR team and respective line managers via Workplace chat. The bot also sends out automated questionnaires to keep track of employees in quarantine, documents vaccination statuses and broadcasts news.

This feature ensures employees are taken care of and assisted, and that the business is running continuously.

Lastly, Central Pattana also rolled out the HR team’s employee appreciation solution Chom Bot. This tool streamlines the employee appreciation workflow and brings greater visibility to the employees at different levels.

All of these innovations are also mobile-friendly and employees can complete the transactions quickly. Central Group deems this convenience important as many of their employees are often on the retail floor and have no access to desktops. 

The company’s efforts to address the pain points that employees are currently experiencing through technological innovation have been honoured by the Asian Technology Excellence Awards as Central Group brings home the Automation - Retail category win. The prestigious awards programme recognises exceptional companies that have pioneered groundbreaking tech solutions and initiatives that made an impact on the region.

The Asian Technology Excellence Awards is presented by Asian Business Review. To view the full list of winners, click here. If you want to join the 2024 awards programme and be acclaimed for your company's outstanding retail initiatives, please contact Jane Patiag at [email protected].