Transcript for "Mastering ASO: Stay Compliant & Learn Best Practices":
Welcome, everyone. We're so excited to have you join us today for this webinar on mastering ASO, staying compliant and learning best practices. Our Our administrative services offering or ASO for short has a plethora of benefits and offerings that we want to ensure you're using fully. We can't wait to take the time to show you around the ASO and provide you with some automation tips to to maximize all of our offerings. So whether you're tuning in from the office or from home, we're really excited to have you here today. First things first, we'd like to take a few minutes to introduce ourselves. My name is Theresa Morton. I am a technical account consultant, and I'm currently living in Boise, Idaho with my husband and three dogs. I've been working at Rippling for over three years and specializing in all things finance. And throughout my time here, I've had the pleasure of working closely with many clients and businesses across the world. I'll be hopping in periodically throughout this presentation to provide you with automation tips and best practices to make sure you're taking advantage of everything the ASO has to offer. I'll go ahead and pass this over to Steven and allow him to introduce himself. Great. Thanks, Theresa. Hey, everyone. Today, I'll be your guide through all things ASO. I'm based out of Los Angeles, and I've been at Ripping for three years too. I am a senior technical account manager, and I work with our largest ASO customers. I hope that some of my clients are in attendance today. I'd love to know your thoughts in our next sync. In the past year, I've partnered with hundreds of admins to break down the services within the ASO and show them how to take full advantage of their Ripline subscription. By the end of this presentation, you should be able to explain to your boss what the ASO is and how it'll help save you countless hours that would have been spent otherwise on administrative tasks. Some quick announcements before we dive in. As I'm talking through these housekeeping items, I suggest logging into your Ripley account as we will be building out workflows together today. Stay on your home page for a moment as we will be taking a look at a few tasks on your dashboard before hopping into workflow automator. I'm getting ahead of myself as Theresa is our automation expert on the call today. But as soon as you are logged in, feel free to say so in our chat. Some other housekeeping notes. We love questions. Please make sure that as questions come up, you're posting those in the q and a section of our webinar. We have some moderators and a special guest joining us to help answer our question as they come in. If any questions come up after today's session, please keep in mind that your account manager, HR advisers, and Ripon support are fantastic resources available to you. Last but not least, this slide deck and a copy of our recording today will be shared out to you after this session. We have included some helpful links throughout this slide deck, so we'd highly suggest saving this as a resource. Our main goals today are that you feel comfortable with the ASO offerings and also have a designated space to implement some of the automation tips that we're suggesting. Now that we've set the stage, let's dive right in. Many of you are at companies that are expanding quickly and growing your businesses across The United States. What you don't want to deal with or, in reality, don't really have the time to deal with is all of the administrative and compliance related tasks that come with the life cycle of an employee. To mention a few tasks, every time you hire an employee in a new state, you're required to set up different state and local tax accounts to ensure that you're remitting taxes appropriately. If you have employees across the entire country, imagine trying to do this every single time for each state. You would also need to make sure that the labor laws for each state are displayed in your offices and the employees are taking the required sexual harassment prevention trainings. What about if you're planning on terminating an employee? Do you feel confident in the laws surrounding termination in that particular state? Luckily, most, if not all of you, are already on the ASO. And on the next slide, we have a timeline that talks to all the offerings that ASO has throughout the life cycle of an employee. This slide provides a comprehensive timeline on the different offerings throughout the employee life cycle and the benefits to being on the ASO. I know we're sending out the recording of our session after our time today, but I suggest taking a screenshot of this page so that you have all of these resources listed in the same place. Remind yourself to take advantage of them. We have this life cycle broken down into three segments, when the employee is hired, resources for existing employees, and then in an unfortunate circumstance that you are terminating someone, we have the end of employment phase. Anything that is notated with a lightning bolt will have an additional automation tip provided in this webinar today. I won't be reading through everything on this slide today, but as you can see, there are lots of key areas that you can maximize the usage of the ASO to help you stay compliant across all 50 states. Some key areas that I want to highlight and I've seen my admins get the most benefit from are the ASO with the automatic state tax registrations, especially if they were transitioning from a PEO or planning on hiring employees in lots of new states. They have also loved working with HR advisors often because they are a one person HR team trying to manage everything, so it can be helpful to talk through nuanced situations with a specialist. In a world where terminated employees are quick to post on TikTok after a termination, it also doesn't hurt to speak with an HR adviser to make sure you're staying compliant and protecting yourself. Speaking of HR advisors, we actually do have a special guest, Dave Murphy, helping to moderate this session today, and we'll be speaking about his team later in this presentation. As you can see, there are so many benefits and offerings for our ASO. During this session, we're going to be diving deeper into state and local tax administration, right way, LMS, and our HR advisor team, so hang on tight as we continue on with our presentation. The first area that I'm looking forward to covering with you all is state and local tax administration and how the ripping ASL can help. In the past few years, some of you may have increased your remote workforce or even gone fully remote to source the best talent. Were you aware that the ASO can help with all of this? We can register on your behalf. We can make sure your state unemployment rates have been updated, and we can even help with streamlining unemployment claims that previous employees have submitted. With the rippling ASL, we can help you maintain your state taxes for any state that you have hired employees in. Gone are the days that you're trying to navigate a clunky state registration page or calling local agencies to register your account. You can rely on the ASO to ensure that these are registered for you. Each of these benefits will cut down on the countless hours that you might have spent on the administrative work to manage hiring employees in different states. You may be wondering how we will do this for you. The answer is simple. Complete your tax tasks. It's a total tongue twister, but it is vital in Rippling being able to register for the applicable state and local agencies on your behalf. I'll say that again. Make sure you're completing these tasks on your dashboard so that we can register for you. We won't be able to complete the required tasks on our end without these tasks first being completed. All of you should be in Rippling already and looking at the dashboard now that you're logged in. If you're brave enough, go ahead and post if you have any tasks that you'll need to work through as soon as our session is over today. If you aren't logged in, take the time to do so now as we have some automation tips coming up. I know what you're all thinking. Ugh. More HR tasks for us to complete? Don't worry, though. These tasks are quick and easy to work through, but you'll want to make sure that you're staying on top of them so that Ripland can create these accounts for you and in turn file for you on time. Please take the time to complete these tasks as soon as you can. If you run into any questions while working through these tasks, our support team is only a quick chat away and is happy to help you with any questions you may have. We are going to be looking at a great workflow to make sure you're staying on top of employees being hired in new states as it will be an indicator of potential path paths on your end. Passing this over now to Theresa to get us started in the workflow studio. Great. Today, I'm gonna be your workflow guide. And after this session, you're gonna be a pro on all things automation as it relates to the ASO. We all may be coming from different packages, but when it comes to workflow availability, please keep in mind that anything that we work on today can be left in draft status. So you can enable these when you're ready or even try out multiple options depending on your workflow availability. If you run out of advanced workflows, this would be a great reason to reach out to your account manager. Before we get into creating, I just wanted to talk through some workflow bases basics. We've moved into a new era of workflow. So if you're familiar familiar with our legacy workflows, we retained a lot of the same functionality, but there are some key differences to be aware of. Some of the key updates include using branch logic to have multiple triggers in a workflow, setting up workflows to release at a specific date and time, and even triggering workflows manually. There's so many new features, so I would highly recommend checking it out. I'm gonna go ahead and pull up my demo account. So if you still haven't logged in to Rippling, now would be a perfect time to do so. Okay. Now that I'm in Rippling, you'll wanna go ahead and start by navigating to the left hand side and click on workflow studio, or you can just click on the app on your home page. For those still learning more about workflows, I like to think of them as a way to automate and customize anything you may be doing manually through through utilizing an if then statement. If x y z happens, then this should result in x y z thing. On this dashboard, you can see a list of all my active workflows. We have two different types of workflows categorized as basic and advanced. You'll have a set amount of advanced workflows based on your Rippling subscription, but everyone can create an unlimited amount of basic workflows. The determining factor in whether a workflow is basic or advanced is through the triggers that we use. So big basic workflows trigger based on days before, on, or after the start date. Advanced workflows will trigger on anything else that you will see listed here. So you can see basic here. These are the other triggers. The actions for basic workflows are limited, to just assigning a task or sending an email. Advanced workflows can trigger on anything else that you see listed here, but the actions for basic workflows are limited. I'm sure everybody's itching to get started, so let's go ahead and hop into our first workflow. Okay. Now it's automation time. Together, we're gonna create a workflow that notifies you when an employee has changed their home address. This is gonna be an advanced workflow. So if you're at your limit for advanced workflows, you can inactivate any of your other advanced workflows or just make sure you're saving this in draft status. Please also keep in mind that this recording will be shared with you. So if you'd like to go back and watch, you have that option as well. Okay. Back in my demo account, I'm still in the workflow studio. So I'm gonna go ahead and click create workflow. As I mentioned, this is gonna be an advanced workflow. So the trigger that we're going to use is when a profile change is effective. Click select. We're gonna go ahead and add filters to narrow because we're going to add the condition for when the employee state changes. So I'll go ahead and search state up here at the right hand box and then find the one that says employee home address and select changes. Click add condition to narrow the trigger. Then I'm gonna go ahead and assign a task to send to anyone that you would like to make sure they're aware of the status update. That could be the manager themselves or a super admin, anyone in HR, maybe a payroll admin. You can even add yourself here as a recipient if you'd like. And then this this is completely up to you, very customizable. You can even set up different emails to go to different parties, if there are different tasks they need to be aware of. So for this one, I am going to select no due date. And for the subject, I'm going to put confirm your employee moved states. Now I already know what I wanna say here. I want to make sure I'm letting my manager know which employee is moving state. So I'm just going to search for the employee's name. Beagle full name as a variable has indicated that they have moved states. And then since a change in states could affect how taxes are reported for your company, you'll want to please confirm that the employee's updated address is correct. Alright. To make sure that we're good on time, I'm gonna go ahead and save this on in draft status. And to do that, you'll come up here and select save and publish. Let's continue to talk about another key offering available to anyone in the ASO, Rightway. Roodling ASO is partnered with Rightway to provide employees with support through benefit navigation and health advocacy services for anyone currently enrolled in health plans. This often results in better health outcomes and lower out of pocket costs for your employees. Who wouldn't want that? While you're on the ASO, your employees and their dependents will have access to Rightway, so make sure to encourage them to take advantage of this during open enrollment, qualifying life events, and new hire events. Employees will be able to partner with Rightway to make their the most of their benefit utilization, including benefit coverage, education, provider search and selection, pharmacy guidance, bill claims, and advocacy. They'll have this access before, during, and after they see a doctor, visit a pharmacy, file a claim, or pay a bill. To access Rightway employees, simply just need to navigate to their Ripping account and click in their benefits app. App. And then on the overview page, they will have a contact a Rightway health guide, and they'll wanna chat that. A fun tip for you all is to include a reminder to use Rightway in an upcoming company, All Hands, and definitely talk to it the next time you're going through open enrollment. We hope you all take some time to explore the benefits of Rightway today as this isn't just a great resource for your employees, but it can be a great resource for you as well. Okay. So back again with some automation time, we're gonna create a basic workflow that notifies an employee of their access to right way on their start date, but feel free to make this workflow that triggers before off or after the start date too. With our recent update to workflows, you'll have access to basic workflows that can trigger before, on, or after the start date to automate as many emails or tasks that you're manually managing right now. Additionally, you can also send up follow-up tasks to the manager a few days later to have them check-in with the employee and make sure that they've used the tool. It would be a great time to also include any other tasks you'd like to assign to a manager as it relates to the new hire. The world is your oyster when it comes to automation options. So I wanna show you how to configure this workflow in workflow studio. Go ahead and click create workflow, and we're gonna first start by selecting the trigger we want. And for this, it's gonna be the employee start date. You can also designate the time that it should send. I'm just gonna keep mine at 11AM. And now I'm going to assign a task to the employee. With no due date, advocacy, benefits, support offered by Rightway. And then I actually already have the description I wanted to use. It's easy as one two three. And I'm going to number these. And so this is gonna go to the employee to let them know exactly how they can navigate to right way. And since I mentioned it, I'm also gonna add it here. I'm gonna assign a task to the employee's manager to remind them to follow-up. On the right way benefits without a due date. Awesome. And just like it did last time, I'm gonna go ahead and save this as draft so we can keep moving on. Alrighty. Thank you for everyone for following along with the first set of automation tips. I'll be back soon to provide some more. Thanks, Theresa. Alright, everyone. Hopping back in, I'm going to be covering our next topic on our compliance offerings. With our ASO, you have access to all these different resources, and we're highlighting them today, encourage you to make sure you're using every one of these. The Rippling ASO includes Rippling LMS, our learning management system. It allows you to manage required courses such as sexual harassment prevention training for both managers and non managers. You You also have access to additional courses, such as information security, which is a popular course for companies working towards SOC two compliance. Through the ASO, Rippling also sends out workplace posters that are state specific and available electronically for all employees. Lastly, we have proactive compliance tools such as Mineral Law Alerts that send updates whenever a state has a new requirement. You also have access to the compliance three sixty dashboard that will flag any violations for sick leave and minimum wage requirements. You can access the compliance three sixty app by navigating to your toolbar in rippling, HR management, client three sixty. In the next slide, we are passing it back to Theresa with more automation tips to maximize your usage of Rippling LMS. Thanks, Steven. In today's fast paced business environment, staying competitive requires cons consistent upscaling and efficient management of employee training. With automation, companies can set up courses and assign them to specific employees all without manual intervention. This streamlines the entire learning process, enabling organizations to provide timely and relevant training without the overhead of traditional methods. In addition to creating your own training, you can also choose from a catalog of available trainings too. Let me show you how quick it can can be to set up a new course for your workforce and track the progress of the employees as they complete the training. So I'm currently in Rippling LMS. I'm gonna go ahead and show you how to maximize the rules for this course just to make sure you're sending it to all the applicable employees for the state. Go ahead and click add a course. And for this ex example, I'm just gonna select a training from the Rippling catalog and click continue. So I want this to be for my California supervisors, and I want them to take the harassment course. So specific to supervisors. So I'm gonna go ahead and add to library and click continue. And then you can actually see here that Rippling uses, recommended enrollment rules. So if I go ahead and click view recommendations, the default rules will populate. So you can see here, I do want this training to go to my supervisors in California. So the smart rules included any employee who is a manager and lives in California and is not a contractor. New hires that that meet the conditions will be automatically ruled. Otherwise, you can go ahead and just select a date and a time that this should be pushed out. And then you also have the option to set this training as, annual if you want your employees to repeat the course. So I'm gonna say that every year, my supervisor should take this. Then you'll go ahead and finalize the flow here and activate it. And you can see on the dashboard now how many people who are enrolled in real time progress of their course progress. Tracking progress is another major advantage LMS provides real time insights into the employee's participation. So by automating by automating and tracking the training, LMS boosts productivity throughout ensuring your employees stay up to date with the required skills, and it ultimately contributes to more agile and knowledgeable workforce. Thank you all for following along. I hope that in your exploration of this tool, you find some great courses to help uplevel the skills of your workforce. Now I'll be passing this on to a special guest joining us from the HR adviser team. Dave, I'll let you take it away. Thank you so much, Teresa. My name is Dave Murphy, and I manage our team of US HR Advisors here at Rippling. And Theresa and I actually go way back. We were hired just about the same time at Rippling, and she has been one of my go tos for back end technical support. And my entire time here has been a lifesaver countless times and is a phenomenal resource on on all of this. Over the last four years, we've made leaps and bounds with our HR advising services. Our advisers bring a wealth of knowledge, over fifty years of combined experience, national HR certifications, advanced degrees, and prior roles at a wide variety of HR, and payroll providers. Our team really understands the realities of operating a small business, and we understand that there's no one size fits all solution for any of our clients. And we're really here to support you where you are. The HR advising team can help you, help and guide you through a variety of critical times in your employee life cycle. We can provide guidance on topics such as hiring, training, claims assistance, employee performance management, employee relations, termination risk avoidance, and much, much more. Sometimes you may just need a sounding board. Many times, with our clients and especially our ASO clients, you may be a HR team of one. You may be a finance professional who's who had HR thrown on your plate. So regardless of the situation you're in, your background in HR, your expertise in HR, you can always feel free to reach out to our team. Admins with full or super admin permissions have the ability to reach out directly to our HR advising team, and you are able to bypass support. So it comes directly to us, ensuring a a greater level of confidentiality for any sensitive scenarios you may be facing. You can reach us through the help center. So if you navigate to the help center, just on the top right, link on the right hand menu, you can find the contact HR advisor button. When that, inquiry form pops up, please just choose the most applicable case reason. If you don't see your specific reason listed, just just choose the most applicable or closest, and we're still happy happy to support and happy to assist. But if you are able to provide as much, context or additional information about the situation or inquiries you can, we would greatly appreciate it. It allows us to prepare, just a little more before following up with you and reaching back out, and and taking on your, inquiry, concern, situation, whatever it might be. I'll be passing this back to Theresa for the last, final workflow walk through today. Now that you know how to reach out to an HR adviser, let's set up a workflow to remind your team to reach out if an employee is about to go on long term leave. Feel free to also use a workflow like this if an employee has been involuntarily terminated. It can never hurt to touch base with the HR team as they're here to help. Alrighty. So going back to workflow studio, I'm gonna go ahead and create a new workflow. And the workflow trigger here is actually going to be based on the employee's time off. So when a leave request is submitted, let's select this. Now I wanna add filters because I don't want a notification every time somebody requests vacation, only long term leave. So the filter I'm gonna add here is specific to the leave policy. So if the leave policy equals long term leave, I want my workflow to trigger. Now I'm gonna go ahead and assign a task to either a full or super admin, letting them know to reach out to an HR adviser directly. I'm going to say new leave request has been submitted with two days after. And I have this already copy pasted, but I pulled this from our help center article that Dave referenced earlier. But this just describes the different offerings that the HR advisers can help with. So I'm gonna go ahead and save that. And last but not least, save it in draft, come back for it later. Alrighty. Thanks for everyone for following along through all our automation tips today. I'll go ahead and pass this back to Steven to wrap things up. Alright. Thank you everyone for following along throughout our review of ASL offerings. Before we hop off today, let's do a quick review of the benefits of the ASO through the employee life cycle. Here's that same slide highlighting all of the ASO benefits as they relate to an employee's life cycle within Rippling. If you didn't take a screenshot earlier, now would be the perfect time. At its core, the ASO provides HR and compliance services. To call out a few key benefits, we have state registration. Don't forget about the task tasks on your dashboard. We also have workplace labor law posters. Employees have access to right way, state specific LMS courses, and, of course, access to HR advisers through key events. We encourage everyone to look into all of these benefits to make sure you're fully maximizing your ASO offering. One more quick thing before we let you all go today. Theresa has kindly drafted an additional list of automation suggestions to help with efficiency and optimization of your Rippling ASO. Feel free to take a screenshot of this page too if you'd like to get started with implementing some of these before the recording and slide deck is sent out later. Alright, everyone. Thank you again for taking the time to review the ASO offering and tools to help you automate and optimize your processes. Have a great day.