More Data, Less Insight?

Next time you’re out to dinner at a restaurant, sneak a peek at your fellow diners.  Chances are, more than half will be staring at their smartphones (even those on dates!)  We live in an information-saturated world.  We crave the information.  We love it so much that we carry it in our pockets and pull it out to consume it at any opportunity.  This reality is even more salient at work, thanks to “Big Data.”

And none of us are immune.  Here’s McKinsey on the inevitability of data.

“Leaders in every sector will have to grapple the implications of big data, not just a few data-oriented managers.  The increasing volume of detail of information captured by enterprises, the rise of multimedia, social media, and the Internet of Things will fuel exponential growth in data for the foreseeable future.”

Their insight goes on to share how data can reduce operating margins, drive efficiency and quality, reduce fraud and boost revenue, and create large skills gaps.  

“There will be a shortage of talent necessary for organizations to take advantage of big data.  By 2018, the United States alone could face a shortage of 140,000 to 190,000 people with deep analytical skills as well as 1.5 million managers and analysts with the know-how to use the analysis of big data to make effective decisions.”

In Talent Management, the first, and most obvious, use of Big Data applies to workforce planning.  Firms that have struggled for years to even capture the right information now stare down the barrel of not having analysts who know how to use it.  This is real problem to address in workforce planning: how to link workforce data with business goals, educate managers, and adapt as the business changes.

Mick Collins, Principal Consultant of Workforce Planning and Analytics at SuccessFactors, will lead a panel discussion addressing how to use data to synchronize strategic, operation and human capital plans in a webcast on workforce planning in a talent drought.