The digitalisation of administration at the university has taken an important step forward: the first e-file has been launched with the personnel file. More files are to follow.
For decades, they were a fixture in the university's personnel department and payroll accounting: cardboard folders in different colours, thickly filled with documents. The personnel file, for example, collected all the documents that come together over the course of a working life at the university - from recruitment documents to sick notes, proposals for overtime, weekend work or part-time work, as well as maternity leave documents. "A typical personnel file quickly grows to three to four volumes, but in individual cases it can be significantly more," reports Dr Heike Tendler, head of the "Introduction of the digital personnel file" project and an employee in the Human Resources and Organisational Development department. 150 sheets fit into one folder, called a "volume" in the HR department. A lot of paper has accumulated over the decades: There are around 9,000 files in the fonds, containing a total of around 1.5 million documents, often consisting of several sheets.
But paper is now a thing of the past. "The electronic personnel file was launched on 15 January and the analogue files were closed," explains Jörg Sprenger, Deputy Head of Human Resources and the project's client. The employees of the HR department and payroll accounting now use an electronic document management system for their daily work. The existing files will be scanned by an external service provider by May and transferred to the new platform. The digital personnel file serves as a central archive for the same content that was previously stored in the paper file, and is now also used to document payroll accounting.
"With the introduction of the digital personnel file as the first complete e-file, the university has reached a decisive milestone in its digital transformation," explains Jörg Stahlmann, Vice President for Administration and Finance. The abolition of paper-based personnel files will modernise work processes in personnel administration and increase security, transparency and efficiency.
Data sovereignty lies with the university
Many things will be faster in future: Whereas employees previously had to painstakingly trawl through the extensive paper files when they needed a particular document, they can now find it in seconds using a full-text search. New documents can be moved directly from Outlook to the digital file using the mouse. Changes made in the SAP system are automatically adopted. In addition, the e-files can be edited from any location, including from the home office.
Data security is ensured, for example, by the fact that access to the personnel file is role-based and only possible with two-factor authentication. "Only the responsible administrators in the HR and payroll departments have access - and only to the data that is necessary for their tasks," emphasises Tendler. It will still not be possible to view one's own personnel file without further ado: "As before, access to files is only possible on site following a proposal - that is the legal requirement." Data processing is carried out in accordance with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). The system is also audit-proof - every change to the data can be traced - and data sovereignty lies with the university: the software is operated locally on the university's own IT infrastructure, reports Oliver Merhof, who is supporting the introduction of the electronic file from IT services.
With the document management system, the university is relying on software that is used by most universities in Lower Saxony. "The state's digitalisation campaign 'Hochschule.digital Niedersachsen' enables us to exchange ideas with other universities," says Tendler. However, there was no template that could have simply been adopted. For example, the team had to define the authorisation structure according to their own requirements and implement retention and deletion periods in a legally compliant manner.
"We not only rethought the technology, but also the processes
Dr Heike Tendler, Project Manager
The file structure was developed together with the departments involved and further improved with test teams. Tendler and Merhof's team attached great importance to eliminating superfluous steps in processes. The aim was also to make the software as user-friendly as possible. "We not only rethought the technology, but also the processes," emphasises the project manager. "This lays the foundation for future digital workflows." The case file was introduced quickly as planned in nine months.
The next steps are already underway. "The goal for 2026 is to automate further work processes. For example, we want to gradually eliminate the need for PDF files, which still have to be printed out to be signed," says Tendler. In the coming months, her team will complete the "digital personnel file" project, after which other files are to be converted to digital form, such as the student file and the third-party funding file. "We are currently developing a roadmap until the end of 2030 so that everyone involved knows when each project is due," emphasises Vice President Stahlmann. The aim is to enable many employees to use the document management system in the medium term.
