” Working data driven: start with yourself, HR! “

This article was originally published on CHRO.

CHROs who want to start working in a data-driven way often wonder which route to take. My advice? Start with HR itself!

Many CHROs have already reached the point that they want to start or have recently started working in a data-driven manner. I often hear them talk about the importance of fact-based decisions and insights. They want to start by asking strategic questions, such as ‘How many employees and which competencies will we need in three years?’ or ‘Can we use data to find out what buttons to push in order to reduce absenteeism or outflow?’, with the aim of making their People strategy more data-driven. But it may take some time before such strategic decisions actually lead to change.

Process improvement

Instead of having HR focus on policies and interventions, it may be just as interesting and rewarding to have them concentrate on their own department first. In recent years, HR has invested a lot of time in digitisation, and a lot of data has been generated. This data can help HR to further optimise its own processes, in order to relieve internal staff workload, but also to improve the quality of output and service.

To improve processes, you can first use process mining to analyse them. This involves comparing the process steps as conceived on paper with the actual steps taken. The latter information is extracted from the system. By making such comparisons, you may find that, in practice, some processes proceed very differently from how they were conceived.

It is also interesting to compare different groups, in order to find out whether some employees have gone through different steps – or a different sequence of steps – than others. This allows you to find out which matters influence the process. It also helps you to determine how to shorten the lead times or improve the quality by adjusting certain steps.

Employee journey

Collecting ‘technical data’ is one thing. It is, of course, also important to investigate the satisfaction with the process in question. To gather such insights, it is vital to map the employee journey(s) and their most important internal touchpoints, i.e. those moments of interaction between an employee and the HR organisation that can be decisive for the entire experience.

To really take things a step further, you can use data to automate processes. This involves using real-time data in systems, not only to improve operational decisions, but perhaps even to initiate actions automatically.

Trust the data

A recruiter can test multiple vacancy texts online, see in real time which text works best and use that as the final text. A continuously self-learning chatbot can be deployed on the ‘working at’ web page to optimise conversations with applicants. Case managers can automatically receive a message when someone calls in sick with a high risk of long-term absence, so that they can focus their scarce time on the high-risk cases. And so on.

Digitisation and the inclusion of artificial intelligence in processes are changing the work of HR staff,  making it important that HR staff dare to rely more on data and can interpret it correctly. After all, data provides them with more information and may thus help them to achieve a higher quality of work.