NERM isn’t even in the HCM space (e.g. here…there are non-employee specific solutions in that space), how did any of your clients end up selecting NERM? Any particular strength / selling point other than it’s from SailPoint with an OOTB connector?
Traditional HCM systems are typically only focused on your traditional workforce employee. Positions are created in those HCM systems, applicants are interviewed, and someone eventually fills that position and has specific attributes like a department, cost center, position number, etc.
When it comes to dealing with non-employees (staff augmentation, professional services, agency temp workers, etc.), they typically do not fit the normal HCM use case described above when hiring a workforce employee. HR teams typically do not want non-employees in their system for this and other reasons, hence why NERM is sometimes desirable for these non-employee management use cases. It also enables sponsors at an organization to start the onboarding for non-employees they need for their projects, etc. rather than going through the traditional HR route. You can even enable the external portal to allow the non-employee themselves to provide critical information needed for their onboarding rather than putting that process entirely on the sponsor of the non-employee(s).
There are a lot of HCM systems out there per your list. The only one I’ve worked with recently that handles non-employees well is Workday’s Contingent Worker Management module (and maybe Beeline). Hopefully others continue to pick up in this space. NERM is okay and flexible for process customization, but it has it quarks for sure.
Some user cases I have seen utilized with NERM:
Some organizations need a pre-hire account generated while their paperwork goes through, often times several days after the start date. In this case NERM can act as the initial authoritative system until the HR system is ready to be the authoritative for the person.
I have also seen customers where they prefer to use different forms due to customer familiarity and will call the NERM API to initiate the workflows for the provisioning.
Other customers have a large contractor base where they need other organizations to onboard them and will use the portal to allow full administration for a set class of persons.
So while the product is titled Non-Employee, it doesn’t adequately describe the use cases it provides.
Yeah, that I understand / knew. I’m more interested in the non-employee capable HCM solutions out there. How does NERM stack up in that space? Like clients would have an RFP for acquiring such solution as it’s not strictly an IGA solution. i.e. NERM and ISC are in difference technology disciplines.
Gemini gave a few solutions in that space:
I understand the use cases…my question really is more about how did NERM ‘win’ over other solutions in that space. Like, step away from IGA / SailPoint for a moment. I need a book of record for my non-employee population. Somehow it’s kicked out from HR / HRIS…or contract management team’s ownership…and landed in the room with IGA… (how did that happen is organization specific).
Naturally, wouldn’t I go with mature solutions in that space that are easy to manage, easy to hire people into, relatively cost effective…etc. Where does NERM stand out?
Another conversation lost to AI 
. Jk. It’s nice to see the shift in products based on Gemini’s hallucinations.
In addition to the use cases @ts_fpatterson has mentioned, I’ve also seen it used at health organizations where they need to bulk onboard a bunch of agency nurses during a strike, or university students need an affiliation with the health organization of a teaching hospital are a couple of examples I’ve seen particularly in health care.
LoL…can’t trust AI…
It’s a good point. From what I’ve seen the IAM team ends up being responsible for helping onboard these people and the HR team says they don’t fit into traditional HCM platforms, so IAM decides to own it and bring on a platform like NERM to help manage those identities instead of doing it directly in something like AD. Simple as that.
Ends up with IAM team because of poor ownership alignment. I would argue that non-employee lifecycle in the book of record system (prior to landing into IdM) has their own industry specific lifecycles that’s more business oriented than logical access oriented. As such, it ends up with IAM team picking up the debt.
e.g. Relationships between organizations have to be entered / maintained (e.g. partner organization termination), relationships of non-employee hierarchy, delegated administration of these relationships…etc.