HR operations where every new hire starts with a laptop, access and payroll ready — because each step has an owner

Mi Retail is an operations center that manages the human work around your HR systems. The HR information system keeps employee records, org structure and payroll inputs; Mi Retail handles what happens when a person event needs other people to act — an onboarding that needs IT, payroll and a manager, an offboarding that must remove every access, a certificate an employee asked for or a schedule change a manager must approve. Each of those becomes an Operational Work Item with an owner, a state, a due date and evidence, and it moves between departments until it is resolved. HR sees what is missing without chasing anyone.

No. Your HR information system stays the system of record for employees, contracts, compensation, time off and org structure, and your payroll system keeps calculating and paying. Mi Retail never holds a second copy of the employee file. What it adds is the coordination those systems were not built for: the IT account that must exist by Monday, the bank form payroll is still waiting for, the laptop that has to come back when someone leaves. The HR system knows a person was hired; Mi Retail knows who still has to act, on what, by when, and with which evidence each piece closed. Keep your HR system; Mi Retail takes over where the work leaves it.

When an offer is accepted, people operations opens one onboarding work item for the new hire, with the role, the team and the start date. From it, child work items go to each area that has a part: IT prepares the equipment and the system access, payroll sets up pay and benefits, and the hiring manager prepares the first-day plan and a buddy. Each child has its own owner, due date and evidence, and HR follows all of them from the parent instead of asking around. On the first day the manager confirms it went as planned, and the onboarding closes only when every child is complete.

The child work item that cannot move is marked blocked with its reason — for example, payroll waiting for the new hire’s bank details and tax form. That reason is visible on the parent onboarding, so people operations knows exactly what is missing and who has to provide it, days before the start date instead of on the first payday. HR can send a request to the new hire or to the manager from the same case, and when the document arrives the blocked item returns to progress. Team Operations shows every onboarding with a blocked piece, so coordinators can act on risks before they become a bad first day.

Offboarding works like onboarding in reverse. When a departure is confirmed in the HR system, people operations opens an offboarding work item and fans it out: IT removes every account and collects the equipment, payroll prepares the final pay, the manager plans the knowledge handover and facilities recovers badges or keys. Each child closes with its evidence, such as the list of accounts disabled or the equipment return record. The offboarding cannot close while any piece is still open, so the organization can show, for each former employee, when every access was removed and by whom, instead of trusting that an email chain was completed.

Yes. An employment certificate, a correction to a payslip, a schedule change or a question about benefits becomes a request that lands in the right HR queue with an owner and a due date. The employee follows it in My Requests: who is handling it, what state it is in and whether something is needed from them, without writing to ask. Requests that need a manager’s decision, such as a leave approval, reach that manager’s My Work with the context attached. HR stops answering the same status questions by email and can see which kinds of requests take the longest and why.

Each person sees only the work that involves them. IT sees the equipment and access work items it must complete, not the salary or the contract. Payroll sees what it needs to set up pay. Managers see onboarding, leave and requests for their own team. Employees see their own requests. Work items can be marked restricted, so sensitive cases such as a disciplinary process or a medical leave are visible only to the people involved. Personal data stays in the HR system of record; Mi Retail carries the work, the owners, the states and the evidence each step needs, and nothing more.

Yes, when they have their own organization on Mi Retail. A request to an outsourced payroll provider — set up a new hire, process a final settlement, correct a deduction — can be sent as a derived work item that lands in the provider’s own intake queue. The same applies to a recruiting agency, a background-check provider or a benefits broker. Each side keeps its privacy: you follow the state, the due date and the result, and they see only what you sent them, not your internal HR work. When the provider closes its work item, your onboarding or offboarding can continue, and the exchange stops living in email.

Every work item keeps who acted, when, what they decided and which documents supported it. For an onboarding that means the signed offer, the approved access profile, the equipment handover record, the signed policies and the manager’s confirmation of the first day. For an offboarding it means the accounts disabled, the equipment returned and the final pay processed, each with a date and an owner. Control & Assurance lets internal auditors or an HR compliance lead review those trails, record findings and request corrections without asking the team for screenshots. The evidence is captured while the work happens, not rebuilt afterwards.

Yes. In a small company the founder or an office manager often handles hiring, equipment, accounts and payroll alone, and Mi Retail adapts to that: the experience collapses to one Today view with what must be ready before someone starts, without approval chains or departments that do not exist. The value is the same — every step of an onboarding or a departure is a work item with a date instead of something to remember. As the company grows and IT, payroll and managers become separate roles, the same work items start moving between those people, and nothing has to be redesigned.

The People suite of StoneOS brings apps for the domain work of HR — People Records, Recruiting, Onboarding, Offboarding, Time & Attendance, Shifts, Leave, Payroll, Benefits and Performance — on top of the Business Core apps every team uses, such as People, Docs, Drive, Calendar, Chat and To-do. Those apps keep the depth of each HR domain. Mi Retail is where the work they generate meets the people who must act on it: an onboarding that needs IT, a leave request that needs a manager or a shift gap that needs cover lands as a work item in the right person’s queue. If you keep your current HR system, it stays the record.

Start with onboarding, because it touches the most departments and a bad first day is visible to everyone. Create an onboarding workspace, invite IT, payroll and the managers who are hiring, and open the next new hire as one work item with its child work items instead of a round of emails. After a few hires you will know which pieces arrive late and why. Then add offboarding, so every departure closes with its access removal confirmed, and open employee requests through My Requests. Connect the HR system you already use and add the People suite apps when they fit. Mi Retail is free to start.