IBM Teams with Lawson for HR Management

February 10, 2009 Alex Woodie

IBM and Lawson Software extended their partnership last week with the introduction of a new batch of software and services targeting the human resources departments of small and mid size companies (SMBs).

As part of the deal, IBM will market and sell components of Lawson’s Strategic Human Capital Management suite along with consulting from IBM Global Services. The software will target several HR processes, including payroll, benefits, recruiting, talent management, employee self-service, and succession planning, and it can be deployed in-house or hosted remotely.

The Strategic Human Capital Management is a relatively new offering from Lawson, and comprises the third major product suite from the company (the others being the S3 and M3 ERP product lines). Lawson borrowed some HR components from its S3 line in forming the SHCM suite, and built or acquired the talent and workforce management components. The company started selling access to the suite two years ago as part of its IBM partnership.

IBM has plenty of expertise building human resources capabilities for some of the world’s largest organizations, and now it’s trying to apply that know-how to the mid market, which it defines as organizations with fewer than 1,000 employees. The new software and services offerings is dubbed Mid-Market Workforce Effectiveness.

Tim Ringo, IBM’s global vice president of human capital management, says: “The combination of Lawson’s core technology and IBM’s mid-market service delivery model will allow our clients to deliver HR services to their employees much more effectively and efficiently than ever before.”