Abu Dhabi Customs gets mobile access, AI tools with Oracle Cloud

Every day the Abu Dhabi Customs organization faces a balancing act: Make trade as easy as possible and leave a positive first impression of the emirate, while always keeping tight control on security.

Striking that balance takes great people and people management—the latter held back by outdated, disconnected on-premises HR systems that required extensive manual processes for routine activities. The customs agency’s employees needed mobile access and self-service tools for HR tasks, and the leadership team wanted more advanced analytics.

Abu Dhabi Customs overall is pursuing a transformation to increase automation, embrace best operating practices, and invest more of its budget in innovation, and the HR team wanted a human capital management system that met those standards.

Abu Dhabi’s government has created a minister-level position to drive innovation using advanced technologies. In line with that mandate Abu Dhabi Customs chose Oracle Cloud HCM as its HR platform after comparing multiple vendors’ systems, determining that the Oracle platform’s data analytics capabilities, powered by machine learning and artificial intelligence, are unparalleled.

Abu Dhabi Customs estimates that its HR team has increased productivity about 15% since adopting Oracle Cloud HCM. It successfully consolidated and replaced 14 HR systems with the Oracle system.

Abu Dhabi Customs implemented Oracle Cloud HCM in about three months, and employees adopted it quickly—more than 1,100 employees were using it within two weeks of the launch.

Employees can now use self-service features to handle routine tasks, and they access their HR tools via mobile devices, which helps inspectors who spend most of their time in the field. The agency implemented Oracle Digital Assistant to give employees automated voice access to Oracle Cloud HCM functions.

Abu Dhabi Customs is creating a centralized help desk to answer employees’ questions, using the case management capability of Oracle HR Help Desk to route questions to the right person, for response within 48 hours. That will mean Abu Dhabi Customs needs fewer HR staffers at each remote location.

Also, the IT team no longer has to do an annual assessment of the HR system to consider which new features to add and whether to do a system upgrade. Instead, Oracle Cloud HCM automatically updates with new features every three months, staying aligned with best practices and emerging technology capabilities. As a result, the IT team can invest time previously spent on system evaluations on more strategic issues.