5 min read
A care group operating residential, supported living, and specialist care services with several hundred staff across multiple sites. The organisation had invested in BambooHR as its HR management platform, but after a poor initial setup the system had been largely abandoned. The HR team had reverted to spreadsheets and manual processes, and BambooHR had become an expensive, unused subscription.
Service: Tech Consulting Care sub-sector: Residential, supported living, specialist care
BambooHR had been purchased with good intentions but implemented without enough attention to how the HR team actually worked. The workflows that were configured during the initial setup didn't reflect the realities of care-sector HR: high staff turnover, DBS renewal tracking, mandatory training compliance, complex shift patterns, and the particular onboarding requirements of care workers who need to be cleared before they can work with vulnerable adults.
The result was predictable. The HR team found the system didn't fit their processes, so they stopped using it. New starters were being tracked on spreadsheets. DBS renewals were managed through calendar reminders and memory. Training compliance was monitored through a combination of email threads and paper records. The data that remained in BambooHR was incomplete, outdated, and unreliable.
The organisation was paying for a capable HR platform that nobody trusted. Meanwhile, the actual HR processes were fragmented across spreadsheets, shared drives, and individual knowledge. When an HR team member was absent, critical processes stalled because the information lived in their inbox or their personal filing system, not in a shared system.
For a care provider, HR isn't just administration. It directly affects whether care workers are safe to practice, whether mandatory training is current, and whether the organisation can demonstrate compliance to regulators. The gap between what the HR system should have been doing and what was actually happening represented a genuine compliance risk.
We started with a full audit of the BambooHR instance: what had been configured, what data existed, what was accurate, and what workflows had been set up. We then mapped this against the HR team's actual processes, identifying every gap between how the system was configured and how the team needed to work.
The workflows were rebuilt from the ground up. Onboarding workflows were reconfigured to reflect the care-sector hiring journey: conditional offer, DBS application, DBS clearance, references received, mandatory training booked, uniform issued, first shift confirmed. Each step was assigned to the appropriate person with clear deadlines and automated reminders. No new starter could fall through the gaps.
We configured custom fields and tracking for care-specific compliance requirements: DBS renewal dates, right-to-work document expiry, mandatory training certifications (moving and handling, medication administration, safeguarding), and supervision records. These were set up with automated alerts so that expiring documents trigger notifications well before the deadline, giving the HR team and care home managers time to act.
The existing data was cleaned methodically. We worked with the HR team to verify every active employee record, update missing information, archive leavers who were still showing as active, and correct data that had drifted since the system was last maintained. The goal was to reach a point where BambooHR could be trusted as the single source of truth.
We then delivered role-specific training. The HR administrators received detailed training on managing the full employee lifecycle within BambooHR. Care home managers received focused training on the self-service features they would use daily: approving time-off requests, viewing team compliance status, and accessing employee documents. The training was practical, based on their actual workflows, and supported with written guides they could refer back to.
BambooHR is now the single source of truth for all HR data across the care group. Every active employee has a complete, verified record. Onboarding workflows run automatically, guiding each new starter through the compliance checks required before they can begin working with vulnerable adults.
The spreadsheets that previously held critical HR data have been retired. DBS renewal tracking, training compliance, and right-to-work monitoring all run through BambooHR with automated alerts. The HR team no longer relies on memory or calendar reminders for compliance deadlines that carry regulatory consequences.
When an HR team member is absent, their colleagues can pick up any process because the information is in the system, not in someone's inbox. The organisation has moved from individual knowledge to institutional knowledge, which is essential for a care provider that can't afford gaps in compliance oversight.
The HR team's relationship with the platform has changed entirely. A system they had written off as unsuitable is now central to how they work. The difference wasn't the software. It was the implementation.
BambooHR restored as the single source of truth for HR data · Workflows reconfigured to match care-sector HR processes · Historical data cleaned and validated · HR team retrained with role-specific guidance · Manual spreadsheet processes retired
Related service: Tech Consulting
Every care worker's compliance status is visible, current, and tracked automatically. The organisation can demonstrate to regulators, to families, and to itself that every person delivering care has the right clearances, the right training, and the right documentation. That confidence starts with getting the HR system right.