Author: Dwane Lay

VP of Customer Experience

About: Dwane is responsible for analyzing, defining, documenting and communicating HR processes and best practices to Dovetail’s HR product development team and the HR community, as well as working with prospects and customers to analyze their current environment and improve it with technology and process implementation. Prior to joining Dovetail, Dwane was the Director of HR for Missouri Baptist Medical Center, St. Louis MO. He is the author of LeanHRBlog.com and is a well-known presence on the HR social media landscape. Dwane holds an MBA from Lindenwood University in St. Louis, MO, is a certified Senior Professional of Human Resources with HCRI, and has earned a Six Sigma Black Belt. Expertise hr process design, hr technology, technology adoption and implementation

Posts by Dwane Lay:

The Gift of Independence for Your Employees

July 3, 2018 Do you ever read HR blogs? Most of HR blogs will tell you that HR doesn’t really know what they are doing, and are, generally, untrusted by employees and leaders everywhere. Do you ever read message boards or groups that ask employment questions? Most of them will also tell you that HR doesn’t really know what they are doing, and are generally untrusted by employees and leaders everywhere. Do you ever read about companies that don’t have HR? Didn’t think so. So how do we bridge this divide? How do we service employees' needs, give them the answers they are looking for, but not expose them to the HR team they are trying to avoid? How do we make them feel that they are not only valued, but are being considered as we develop our company infrastructure? The answer,…

Configuration vs. Customization

June 22, 2017 Discussion and Confusion about the Difference There is a healthy amount of discussion (and an unhealthy amount of confusion) over the difference between configuration and customization where software is concerned. If you are one of our clients (and if you aren't, there's way to fix that), you probably know this already, but we think it is a big enough deal that we thought we'd talk about it more. And we've done a quick 30-min presentation on this same topic. If you've had more than two conversations with me, you'll know that I love analogies. In fact, my love for analogies is like a simile. I'm not always great with either of them. But to explain the difference between customization and configuration, I have just the analogy for the job. We will use the wardrobes of two famous billionaires. First up,…

The Community Garden of SaaS

July 14, 2016 The Perfect Analogy From time to time, we come up with analogies on the fly that make so much sense, we have to share them. This is a great example. Not long ago, I was trying to explain how SaaS works in relation to developing software and product management. While we've talked about our process in the past, it has been on the "how," not the "why." To explain that part, we found a perfect analogy in the Community Garden. The Plot Let's start with the land. To get our garden going, we need a place to put it. So we imagine a city block that has been razed and plowed. This is our garden, and we have opened up access to our clients, who wish to grow their own beets. We let the spinach people in too, of course.…

The Carnival of HR Returns!

June 15, 2016 It's Back! Carnival of HR: I feel like we just finished sweeping up the popcorn and peanut shells from last time, and yet here we are! I'm always excited to get to host the carnival. It's a great chance for us to stay connected to the HR community that means so much to us, and to share our platform with great authors in our space. Thanks to all of you for visiting and reading. Please take a few minutes to check out the links. Theme: Conferences Our theme, loosely applied as always, is around conferences. We do a lot of them, and we were very much looking forward to SHRM16 this month. We've realized, though, that the show starts on Father's Day this year. That's happened in the past, and it usually kills off any chance of attending for me. …

Dovetail Software – Some Assembly Required

June 1, 2016 Some Assembly Required When you swing by Target to pick up a Lego Millennium Falcon, you probably don’t expect to open that box at home and find a fully-built Falcon waiting for you. Instead, you expect to see organized bags of pieces and instructions on putting your new space ride together. Frankly, if you did get one already put together, you’d probably want to take it apart and start over. And maybe you want your Falcon to be a little different. Maybe you want the new square radar dish instead of the classic round version. Maybe you want to add more thrusters, or more guns, or finally get the hyperdrive upgraded in your version. That’s the best thing about Lego. You can do whatever you want. And you can always take it apart and do something different later. A good…

Planning for Long-Term HR System Success

May 16, 2016 Be Prepared Before Change Happens As a partner for some of the best companies in the world, we get a unique view of talent movement in the business world. Sometimes, that means seeing system administrators move on to bigger roles, either with their current company or a new one. While we are always happy to see our friends being successful, it does lead to some difficulties if the proper preparation hasn't been taken. If you are a system owner, champion, administrator, or power user, there are a few important things to keep in mind as you go through your daily life. Ownership Matters One of the earliest signs of system atrophy is seeing a system owner or champion change roles. When a system is put in place, no matter the size, it is because someone cared enough to make it…

Why HR Needs Lean, and Lean Needs HR

April 19, 2016 Lean HR In case you didn't already know, I kinda like Lean. I've dabbled a little in the idea of tying Lean and HR together, and at times, have been known to talk about it out loud. But sometimes, I think it makes sense to go back to the beginning and talk about how these two topics work together, and why you need them both. Simplicity Lean is, at its heart, all about reducing waste. That's as simple as it gets. Find where you are losing time, money, or other materials, and then stop doing that. It could be as simple as finding out the report you work on for two hours each week is no longer read by anyone. It might be as complex as a complete warehouse redesign. But every step is with the specific goal of spending…

We Take Your Ideas Seriously at Dovetail

March 23, 2016 Product Enhancement Requests When Building a Software-as-a-Service Application Part of building a SaaS application is the need to balance the needs of the many with the needs of the few. Or the one. (Yes, that’s a Star Trek reference. Well spotted.) We get some great ideas from our customers, who find new and amazing ways to use our software every day. Because of that, though, we have to be mindful of how we handle those requests. Some of them will make the system more useful for everyone, while some are very specific to that one client’s needs. With that in mind, we thought it might be helpful to understand our process and how we handle these requests. Idea Generation Ideas come to us through several channels. We often hear of ideas during implementation, but they also flow in from active…

The Power of Useful Knowledge – Knowledge Base Management

January 28, 2016 Knowledge Management I wrote a piece on Getting Started with Knowledge Management that has been used by several of our clients at the beginning of their process. If you're still trying to figure out what you should be doing to move off of the starting line, it could be very helpful. And if you are serious about using an HR Case Management platform, then you should be very interested in the topic. Otherwise, you are missing out on what might be the most powerful part of the system. If you've done the foundation work, though, you might be looking around for the next step. So let's talk about that, because the care and feeding of your knowledge base is a critical element of long term success. Unlike most software companies, we use our own product every day. When one of…

HR Tech and Advisory Boards

December 21, 2015 The Tradition of Advisory Boards There's a long standing tradition of HR tech companies creating advisory boards to help them guide their company. This has been especially visible over the last few months, and I've had several clients and contacts asking about our board, how we use them, and what value they add. The answer is really simple. We don't have one. It's not that we haven't thought about it or discussed it. We did. We had long discussions over it, and as a team made the decision that there wasn't value to us adding a board. There are good reasons to have an advisory board, I think. Here are a few of them, and our perspective. Product Direction The obvious (or at least the most often mentioned) benefit of an advisory board is, well, advice. Getting input from thought…