This article found on the Harvard Business School website speaks to the failure of web services and the trouble of integration.
These days, rather than doing large integration projects, we’re using portals to bring single views to users, but avoiding having a huge integrated database with 100% of the data in one spot. For reporting, we dump everything into a data warehouse or other analytics tool and crank out information that way. In many cases, this type of reporting requires a highly specialized position.
How does this apply to our current strategy of scaled down HRMS combined with point solutions? We really just have some base “census” type data going to the point solutions from the HRMS to the point solution, and summary data going the other way. Gone are the days of full integration, at least for the time being. It is true that integration is getting easier. But with the incredible specialization of HR functions and HR software, the need for generalists to know about every little detail is disappearing.
