A WEB-BASED MANAGEMENT INFORMATION SYSTEM FOR HUMAN RESOURCES IN SELECTED UNIVERSITIES OF DUHOK PROVINCE
ABSTRACT
Today, all managers use the information system to manage their organization efficiently and effectively. Moreover, a management information system (MIS) is a type of computerized information systems. Hence, human resource management information system (HRMIS) has a fast processing to produce accurate information within the organization environment. Therefore, many researchers proposed numerous HRMISs for university campuses. However, some universities, including Kurdistan Region universities are still relying paper-based system in managing their human resources. Based on that, this study aims to identify and analyze current systems which are used for managing and accessing human resource information in the university campus. Further, the study tries to design a web-based HRMIS based on the requirements achieved from aforementioned aim. The data collection of this study has been carried out at three universities, as a case study, in Duhok province. A mixed method of data collection was done. Then, the qualitative method of data collection conducted using interviews and observation instruments. Also, the quantitative method conducted using system usability scale (SUS) to evaluate the designed web-based HRMIS. Further, the analysis of collected data was based on the strategic planning technique using SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats) to identify strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats points. Then, the requirements of designing a proposed web-based HRMIS were achieved. After implementing of the proposed system, the evaluation results of SUS were conducted to be acceptable (i.e. total score is 72.03%) based on the end-user viewpoints. Further, the reliability of the proposed HRMIS will be conducted at the University by using reliability measurement tools after implementing such system for a period of time. KEYWORDS: Human Resource Management Information System, SWOT, System Usability Scale, Duhok.
1.INTRODUCTION
Information system is an academic study which contains of hardware and software, database, human resources and procedures, that people and organizations use to collect, process, create, generate and also distribute data (Hasan, Alina, & Nor, 2014). Today's, all managers use the information system that incorporates a series of information technologies to manage their organization efficiently and effectively (Rafael & Carlos, 2012).
Moreover, Management Information System (MIS) is a type of computerized information systems that help managers to take the decision-making, and also monitors the current state of the organization. In addition, such systems can gather and process information from various sources of organization to support decision-makers in the level of management (Ankrah & Sokro, 2012; Hasan et al., 2014). Hence, Human Resource Management Information System (HRMIS) is became a key management tool, which collects, maintains, analyses and reports information on people and jobs (Shaikh, 2012). This system has a fast processing to produce accurate information and enhanced employee communications within the organization environment (Kashive, 2011). Further, the HRMISs are process of producing, organizing and storing the information to help the organization managers at different levels. Nowadays, most successful organizations are using HRMISs to facilitate the daily operations of Human Resources (HRs) in their management process (Hasan et al., 2014).
In order to establish effective MISs, the design process of such systems needs a well strategic planning (Fergerson, 2012). Also, the design of any information system needs a strategic planning technique as a base, which is the key factor of progress of any organization (Sarhan, Atroshi, & Ahmed, 2016).In addition to that, Basahel and Irani (2009) said that “Strategic Information Systems Planning (SISP) techniques can be vital contributors in the IS strategy (ISS) designing process.”. The aforementioned researchers have been classified these techniques regarding to the strategic analysis, competitiveness, and alignment. Based on their classification, SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats) has been considered as an analysis technique, which is the bedrock of data collection and analysis of this study.
Furthermore, universities are one of the main sources for developing environment in many countries especially in our country. For that reason, many researchers have proposed different HRMISs for universities to facilitate the work of administrative staff and decision-makers (Fergerson, 2012). However, most of these universities in some countries including Iraq (especially Kurdistan Region of Iraq) are still using manual system to manage their human resources (Ismaeel & Mikhail, 2014). This leads that the work of administration units within the university campus are still separated from each other. Therefore, Disintegrated administration units and manual systems hinder information sharing and cooperation among administrative staff, thus impeding optimal use of human resources and delaying applications of new updating of information because large amounts of data are difficult to manage and control in a system that uses paper. The aforementioned problem is the extraction of message of the Minister of Higher Education and Scientific Research in Kurdistan Region Government (KRG), as he said on the 3rd, May, 2016, “The project of electronization our universities and ministry is one of the significant projects of our ministry and has started some steps onward (Goran, 2016).
The University of Zakho, as one of Kurdistan universities, is still using manual system to manage their human resources system. Therefore, the management of university’s staff information within the campus has become one of the chief problems. To overcome such a problem, the university needs to have an electronic HRMIS instead of traditional manual system. Such electronic system also needs a strategic planning analysis technique, which is SWOT, for designing a good management information system in this study. The significance of developing HRMIS is to facilitating the management work, sharing the up-to-date of staff information among administrative staff and providing information in a timely mariner with lowest efforts and costs.
2.RELATED WORKS
The review of related works helped the researcher to determine the extent of research conducted with regard to the topic. In addition, the review exercise helped the researcher to understand the importance of HRMIS in organizations and identify the problems facing employees during the information management staff in any organization, such as time consuming, cost effective and loss of information. For example, Navaz, Fiaz, Prabhadevi, Sangeetha, and Gopalakrishnan (2013) proposed a design of Human Resource Management System for company. The main objective of such system is to reduce the effort of administrator to keep the daily events, such as attendance, projects, works, and appointments. For that reason, many researchers proposed different electronic systems for managing human resources to solve the aforementioned problems, especially in the universities campuses.
According to Abadiano (2012), a Human Resources Information System (HRIS) has proposed for the University of Cebu. The aim of his proposed system is to provide solutions to the difficulty of the manual human resources system recently used by the University of Cebu, which is characterized by being very slow in processing the request and inquiries. Further, such a system will enable faculty and staff to transact queries faster in the database server and automatically they will be able to obtain information that they need, and make necessary update. The aforementioned study has some objectives such as: To analyse, design and develop a prototype of a Human Resource Information System (HRIS-UC) for the University of Cebu, Cebu City, to describe features of a good human resource information system may be included in the university’s HRIS and to design a Human Resource Information System. However, the aforementioned researcher just focused only on the dilemma of the manual human resources system recently used by the University of Cebu which is very slow in processing the request and inquiries.
Due to web-based applications considered as web sites with user interactivity, such applications become a key factor in designing HRMIS to provide multi-users access when they connect to the internet (Lingareddy, 2007). Therefore, Achola (2013) proposed a designed human resource management information system (DHRMIS) based on the web to facilitate the work of HR department regarding effectively managing human resource information and records. The above researcher used the quasi-experimental method to assess the existing human resource system in the Kampala International University with the new proposed system. The results found that the proposed system improved the work of HR department much better than the old system. However, the aforementioned study assessed pre-test design, as assessment of the existing human resource system, and post-test design, as after the implementation of the proposed DHRMIS system.
The growing demand and complexity of developing web services and based on the analysis of Human Resource Management and information system requirements for numerous enterprises, especially in higher education institutions, Chen and Ni (2013) proposed a cloud computing-based HRIMS (cHRIMS). Cloud computing technology can help enterprises save early stage work force and financial investment, which through internet can rent necessary software services from software service providers. The cHRIMS has its advantages such as user convenience, high security, high performance etc. The architecture of such system has 3 layers which are composed of 6 system components. The aforementioned study aims at reduce cost and increase HR performance efficiency. However, the developing of cHRIMS system platform is still in its early stages and has not been used at the university yet.
In addition, in most universities of Kurdistan Region, Iraq, information of human resources with regard to managing and sharing within the university is still using manual system (Goran, 2016). Such a system can lead to insufficient management and loss of information at university campuses with large amount of manual data, where lack of computer-based management system can lead to generate inaccurate information and spend more time and efforts (Abadiano, 2012). For the aforementioned problems, Ismaeel and Mikhail (2014) proposed Design of Locally e- Management System For Technical Education Foundation-Erbil called DLMS4TEF. The previous study deals mainly with a problem that there is no e-management and automation necessary for the operations’ procedures of the departments in the Technical Education foundation-Erbil. Thus, the aforementioned researchers aimed to design and implement a local website for an e-management to link between information and technology for foundation of technical education. This e-management system covered some management issues as monitoring system for the process of work. However, the problem of managing human resources information at the university is still available, which is based on paper.
The aim of earlier studies was enhancing the management of HR information within university campuses by proposing electronic MISs. However, most of them were using their universities as a case study and none of them used any strategic planning technique in developing MIS for HR in the university. While, selecting a right strategic planning in designing process of MIS can establish an effective system for management in any enterprise (Fergerson, 2012). Based on the literature, proposing and implementing of a system for managing human resources’ information within the university campus in Kurdistan Region, Iraq, is still in the early stages. Therefore, this study tries to design and implement HRMIS for some universities in Kurdistan region, as case studies, in order to overcome most of the problems mentioned previously in this section. In addition, this study intends to use SWOT analysis, as a strategic planning technique, in order to investigate the current system used in managing HR of the selected universities and find the requirements for designing a web-based HRMIS.
3.METHODOLOGY
A methodology is an examination of finding solutions to any problems (scientific and social problems) through objective and systematic analysis (Dey, 2005). The research process is used to collect information and data for the purpose of making business decisions. The methodology of researcher may include publication research, interviews, surveys, and other research techniques (Rajasekar, Philominathan, & Chinnathambi, 2006). In any study, researchers use different methods for collecting data which is based on the requirement and type of investigation. Therefore, research methods are divided into three types such as: quantitative, qualitative and mixed methods. The quantitative research is descriptive and experimental research, which uses hypotheses. In quantitative method, data can be collected as numbers (Dey, 2005). The qualitative research is the research that includes analyzing and interpreting texts and interviews to discover meaningful patterns describing a particular phenomenon. Where the questions are how and why, the use of qualitative methods is necessary (VanderStoep & Johnson, 2008). Also, the mixed methods is a procedure to mix quantitative and qualitative research. Based on that, the mixed methods can be used when one type of method (qualitative or quantitative) is   not   enough   to   address   the    research    problem   and to answer the research questions (Karikari, Boateng, & Ocansey, 2015).
In the current study the mixed methods were used .The study has been conducted in different universities as case study, especially in government universities. In this study, the qualitative research method was adopted interviews and observations instruments as data collection techniques. In this step of research method, a list of questions was designed for interviews, however after data collection the data will be analyzed by SWOT analysis technique to determine strength, weakness, opportunities, and threats for proposed and current systems used. Based on the participant’s requirements the system was designed by using a web-based application tools and after designing the system was tested in two universities and implemented at university of Zakho. In addition SUS technique, as quantitative research method, was used to evaluate the scalability and usability of the proposed system from. The SUS is a free, easy, and effective tool for assessing the usability of any system (Al-Khawlani, 2009). Further, Bangor and others said” The SUS is composed of ten statements, each having a five-point scale that ranges from Strongly Disagree to Strongly Agree”. It was developed by Brooke in 1996 to measure the effectiveness,  efficiency, and satisfaction of the system (Bangor, Kortum, & Miller, 2009).
Due to the data collection instruments conducted in the way of SWOT analysis as a strategic planning technique, the analysis steps of this technique were bedrock of this work. Further, agile system development life cycle (ASDLC) steps were used to develop the proposed system. ?ztürk (2013) said “Selection of appropriate Software Development Life Cycles can increase projects success”. For ethical issues, the data collection was conducted after getting the respective approvals from the management of the aforementioned universities for conducting the interviews and the observations.