Navy Pier Located in the heart of Chicago, Illinois, Navy Pier is one of the top destinations in the Midwestern United States, drawing nearly nine million visitors annually. Navy Pier, Inc. is a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit corporation established in 2011 to maintain Navy Pier and oversee the redevelopment of one of the most important civic landmarks in the United States and one of the most-visited leisure and cultural destinations. Navy Pier’s mission is to be a world-class public place that celebrates and showcases the vitality of Chicago and provides for the enjoyment of Chicago-area residents and guests year-round. This mission extends to their internal staff. Providing world-class service requires being an employer of choice. Navy Pier and Employco selected the UKG Ready platform in an effort to provide an efficient daily process to their employees and management - a cornerstone in their strategy to be a destination employer.
Employco Employco is a HR Outsourcing firm composed of HR, Insurance and Payroll professionals who provide the resources, services, and expertise that enable their clients to grow and prosper. Their approach provides powerful cost reduction alternatives that help decrease employee administration overhead, reduce insurance premiums, protect their clients by assisting with government compliance, and save valuable time by handling both routine and critical HR tasks. Employco delivers on all of these initiatives to free clients from the hassles that stand in the way of their company’s success.
After an extended closure due to COVID-19, Navy Pier was faced with the immense challenge of reopening the Pier in time for the 2021 season while simultaneously retooling their HR partners and systems and hiring hundreds of seasonal staff. Navy Pier chose Employco for their HR and Payroll needs leading up to their reopening. Employco needed to implement the UKG Ready Time and Labor Management and HR modules within 45 days to be in place prior to the reopening and high tourist season. This challenge was made even more daunting by the fact that Navy Pier has five different collective bargaining agreements in place and different time-off policies for seasonal versus regular staff.
Employco turned to IMVIZE for support implementing UKG Ready TLM and HR. Navy Pier was coming up on the busiest season of the year making it extremely important to have knowledgeable implementation partners to configure the solution for their staff.
With the help of IMVIZE, Navy Pier met their goal of having a new and improved system in place in time for the reopening and tourist season.
Navy Pier was provided with a tailored project plan and expectations that the IMVIZE, Navy Pier, and Employco teams were expected to meet. Throughout implementation, communication on the status of the project and outstanding items were communicated clearly and frequently due to the sensitive timeline of the project. IMVIZE guided Navy Pier through the process of implementation and training. The NavyPier team was very receptive to feedback and changes that occurred throughout the project. In addition, the project benefited from great collaboration with all project stakeholders allowing things to run smoothly even under accelerated timelines.
The strategic planning done by IMVIZE in conjunction with Employco to meet the immediate and longterm needs of Navy Pier made it possible to attain a complex implementation in a very condensed timeline. Navy Pier’s commitment and resolve to making their staff available to the implementation sessions also proved to be a vital contribution to the success of the effort.
Having the IMVIZE team work with Employco and Navy Pier allowed a successful implementation of the Onboarding and TLM modules.
Navy Pier was able to use UKG Ready for hiring in time for their busy season. IMVIZE worked with Navy Pier and Employco to have the Onboarding module live for over 100 seasonal hires on a 3 week lead-time, from the time of discovery to ‘go live’.
Collaboration across different departments and vendors was achieved to successfully implement the Time and Labor Management module in a 4 week lead-time. With the stress of the pandemic on supply chain and workforce, such a tight deadline was incredibly challenging. However, Employco worked diligently to find a vendor that could deliver and install 9 time clocks in a 2 week time frame. IMVIZE and Navy Pier worked to ensure the time-entry rules, paycalculations, and accruals setup was captured in UKG Ready correctly for all employee types including the 5 unions. All three parties collaborated on the testing of the configurations to ensure time was being captured and processed correctly. After the initial solution was launched, additional modules were later deployed such as the Benefits Administration module in time for the 2022 plan year open enrollment.
"There was clear communication with the client every step of the way. Everything went exactly as planned." – Heather Hudik, Client Services Specialist, Employco
“The IMVIZE team was able to grasp our business complexities with ease, took ownership of the project, and communicated effectively.” – Jeff Brown, Chief Financial Officer, Navy Pier
