During a presentation about industry collaboration on the HR-XML standard at the recent Linuxworld conference in Sydney, OpenSkills chairman Bruce Badger said HR-XML is an XML protocol that describes how to exchange data about HR matters, like competencies, and review information.

"This is something that cuts across all industries [and] was created because of need," Badger said. "People have to capture resume information and [vendors] are selling not insubstantial systems to support HR information, but there is no established way to do it."

Badger said complaints like "every time I add a new HR service provider, I have to learn another set of conventions for communications," are common among HR software users.

Information like recruiting, assessments, performance management, services procurement, and temporary staffing all touch on HR information. The HR-XML Consortium, which has more than 90 HR vendor member, including big names like Microsoft Corp., Oracle Corp. and SAP AG, was formed to "spare employers and vendors the risk and expense of having to negotiate and agree upon data interchange mechanisms on an ad hoc basis".

By developing and publishing open data exchange standards based on XML, the consortium provides a means for inter-company transactions without the need for "many separate interchange mechanisms".