Hi everyone! I’ve been lurking and learning from you all for a while, and finally feel like I have something to contribute. 😊
Our company (about 150 people, fully remote across the US) made the big switch from Workday to ADP Workforce Now about six months ago. I was one of the project leads on our side, and let me tell you, it was a journey. I wanted to share our experience, especially for other smaller companies who might be considering a similar move.
We loved a lot about Workday’s depth and reporting, but honestly, it felt like we were using a rocket ship to go to the grocery store. The cost and complexity were just too much for our needs. We needed something more focused on core HR and payroll without so many modules we’d never use.
So, the migration itself… was intense. The ADP implementation team was very structured, which was good, but the data mapping from Workday’s format into ADP’s system took way longer than we anticipated. We had a few scary moments with legacy benefit deductions almost not making it over correctly. My biggest piece of advice is to build in *way* more buffer time for data cleansing than they initially suggest. We needed every bit of it.
Now that we’re live, the day-to-day is… simpler. Payroll runs are definitely more straightforward for our team, and the employee self-service for things like pay stubs and W-2s is much easier for everyone to navigate. The compliance updates and tax filing are handled seamlessly, which is a huge relief.
But (there’s always a but, right?), the reporting feels like a step backwards. Workday’s flexibility there was amazing. In ADP, we often feel like we’re trying to fit a square peg into a round hole when we need a specific report. And while support has been responsive on basic payroll issues, we’ve had a couple of tickets about odd glitches in the time-off accrual logic that took a few cycles to really get resolved.
Overall, I’d say it was the right move for us financially and for reducing admin complexity. But I do miss some of that deeper analytical power. For any teams looking at a similar path, I’d be happy to share more specifics about what we learned during the transition.
Thanks!