Human Resources Outsourcing Is Alive and Well at CIBC

EDS provides 37,000 CIBC employees with online, self-service HR.

Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce (C$273 billion in assets) and EDS have proven HR outsourcing works. Their collaboration has proven so successful that just two and a half years into the original seven-year, $156 million contract, Toronto-based CIBC has already extended it to 10 years, with an option to renew for an additional four years.

Since signing the contract in 2001, Plano, Texas-based EDS has completed an employee portal called MyHR@CIBC, an e-compensation system and Direct Access, an e-HR system powered by Pleasanton, Calif.-based PeopleSoft's PeopleSoft 8.3.

Farming Out To Save Money

Having an state-of-the-art HR system has cost the bank no more than it spent maintaining its old systems. "Essentially the deal is cost-neutral," says Hugh MacDonald, vice president, strategic alliance management, in CIBC's HR division. "We're paying to EDS what we would have spent to do the work in-house. But, we're getting systems we didn't have; we're getting productivity we couldn't achieve; and we're getting the risk mitigation that we otherwise would have to pay ourselves."

Today, EDS provides CIBC's 37,000 global employees and 9,000 retirees with 24/7 HR business process services including benefits, payroll, workforce administration and compensation management. According to MacDonald, the bank now has a much more standardized and integrated system. In the past, each line of business had its own processes and way of doing things. CIBC also had multiple, stand-alone HR systems. "Now, I can get a report that tells me everything about the entire firm," says MacDonald. Another difference is the level of self service. Now all employees can fulfill most of their HR needs, freeing up HR resources, says MacDonald. "The work is either being done by EDS or the managers and employees themselves."

For example, its e-compensation system allows almost 5,000 managers around the world to manage the annual performance and compensation processes on a self-service basis. "By using this application, they can do analysis and see results in real time," MacDonald says. "They can deal with multiple departments, approve salary recommendations made by managers reporting to them, and make their own recommendations to managers up the line from themselves."

Through HR@CIBC line employees can sign up for benefit programs, change their beneficiary and do annual or regular updates to benefits selections. They also can use a what-if analysis feature. "Employees can do them the way they want to in real time 24/7."

At the crux of it all is HR Direct Access, a portal for all of the HR applications and tools, including job posting, recruitment, benefits administration and payroll.