Taking the leap to a faster and more efficient solution with Jade Star

After NZ Ski went live with Fusion5’s Jade Star payroll/HR software, we caught up with NZ Ski’s Finance Manager Jill Barr, before she hit the slopes herself!

Tell us about your role at NZ Ski

I’m very lucky!  It’s amazing to be able to use my skills as a Finance Manager in an industry that I am absolutely passionate about. The great thing about NZ Ski and this industry is that it attracts people who are positive, energetic and creative; it’s a truly exhilarating industry to be involved in on a day to day basis. Not only that I get to live in the beautiful Queenstown region which provides a real lifestyle connection, I look out the window at work on wintery snowy day and the mountains are beautiful.

What led NZ Ski to choose Jade Star software?

NZ Ski went to market after making the decision we had to replace MYOB. We were looking for a system that could functionally deliver all the things we needed. Our requirements included being able to deal with the volumes of employees we have adequately, and cater to the seasonal nature of our industry. It had to easily and efficiently sign up new employees then terminate at the end of the season without a long unnecessary process, and it needed to be within our budget. Jade Star met all those things and more.

Through our reference checking Jade Star was seen as meeting all requirements and was reliable. Above all the key thing was the flexibility offered. We could quickly see that we could customise Jade Star to suit our exact needs and to ‘bolt-on’ other systems to the Jade Star solution thereby providing an integrated HR approach to our business. We saw a huge opportunity to provide a true business management solution by using Jade Star.

Now that we are live with Jade Star Payroll, Self Service and Timesheets we are looking to what Stage Two will provide us with. The aim of Stage Two is about improvements to business operations with a key aspect being our revenue and labour reporting during the peak 19-week season. This initiative will tie in with the employees’ time on the hills, and we are even considering integrating with RFID to minimise the input through time sheeting and making it more efficient for our employees.

Why Fusion5?

By default Fusion5 became our implementation partners. The Jade Star solution was chosen during Fusion5’s acquisition phase of Jade Star. We love the Fusion5 structure and the personal service we have received. The project and account management methodology works for us. Having a one to one relationship between our subject matter expert Adrian and Fusion5’s Stan has been very successful. Then adding value to the implementation by having a dedicated project manager to handle the strategic communications, timelines and planning, and Account Management has meant that the communication process has been seamless and well-coordinated. Picking up the phone to discuss the project has been easy and the Fusion5 team is always contactable.

Tell us about the success/benefits of implementing Jade Star

The project had tight timelines and as we have just gone live it is too early to realise all the benefits we are seeking. However even at this early stage we now have a payroll/HR system that provides a much greater level of reporting; our operations team have noticed immediate results in this area. The entire payroll process is faster, flexible and more efficient. It is the little things that took so much time that are now a breeze and we see a huge difference in how the database structure works to our advantage. Previously there were many processes we were unable to do until a pay was open, which lead to a multitude of paper trails and stacks of notes to hurriedly input when the pay was ready to go. Now we do these things as we get them in, no more paper stacks!

As we understand and learn Jade Star more we know that this process will only become more efficient. 

We are now getting fantastic feedback from the team in the field who use Jade Star Self Service; the ease of use and the information our people have makes parts of their role much easier. We are now looking forward to the outcomes from Stage Two.