Data Integration Supports Evidence-based HR
In our current economic moment, talent is paramount. Your ability to maximize the performance of your people determines your ability to deliver on business strategy. When your people are firing on all cylinders, you can feel it. Your organization just works better. People are happier, customers keep coming back for more, and the money keeps flowing.
In hopes of optimizing their people strategies in this way, more and more organizations are leveraging HR data to enhance their ability to predict future talent needs and make better decisions about their people. But when your analysis is based solely on available HR and recruiting data, you can only perceive a partial picture of your organization. Smart organizations are working to integrate disparate sources of information with their human capital data to measure, predict and understand their people on a whole other level. But where to start?
Finance and HR: A Natural Partnership
As keeper of the purse strings, finance is one of the most respected (if sometimes resented) functions in your organization. They also have a natural facility with numbers and data – something for which HR is not historically known.
Begin your journey by learning the language and data infrastructure of your counterparts in finance. Find out how they organize data in their systems. How do they measure a year in their systems? Fiscal? Calendar? Is that different from how you do things in HR? These questions are basic but foundational to any effort at data integration.
As your work in this area progresses, you will be able to combine data sets and start identifying potential cause and effect between talent issues and fiscal impact. Quantifying the cost of a chronically understaffed location can give you the burning platform you need to invest in a more proactive talent acquisition strategy. Similarly, better integration with the finance team can help you assess how your new manager training program is impacting sales.
Don’t Stop There!
While the finance department might be the first stop on your journey to analytical enlightenment, it should by no means be your last. Better integration between HR and business data has the potential to transform talent management at your organization. Work with business leaders to understand how your talent acquisition strategy is impacting customer satisfaction scores. Use operational data to predict future talent needs with pinpoint accuracy.
A more integrated, evidence-based approach to talent is within you grasp. Don’t wait to begin your journey.
For more on this topic, click here to access an on-demand recording of this HCI Webcast presented by Chirag Padalia, Director of Workforce Strategy & Analytics at Aurora Health Care.