[29]APRIL 2016 | www.hrotoday.com

Talent Management

Meaningful HR analytics speed the data-to-action cycle, reducing the traditional time lag to realize business benefi ts by helping companies “Identify, Intervene, and Intercept” – let’s call this I3. However, according to SAS, a pioneer in statistical analysis systems, “Predictive analytics is the use of data, statistical algorithms and machine-learning techniques to identify the likelihood of future outcomes based on historical data.”

If this sounds confusing, you are not alone! Predictive analytics has become a catch-all for vendors and HR buyers alike, given its meteoric rise in its prominence. However, in reality, predictive analytics goes beyond descriptive statistics and reporting by helping companies make evidence-based recruiting and talent-related decisions. Here is a handful of practical examples of implementing predictive analytics and the business benefi ts.

Effectiveness of Talent Attraction Channels

Most companies have multi-pronged strategies for addressing their recruitment advertising and talent attraction channels, but not all channels are equally effective. Implementing predictive analytics to identify the most effective channels can help a company save money, which appeals to the company’s CFO. Even more importantly, this will help attract more relevant candidates and reduce time to fi ll open vacancies, which is a multiplier in terms of positive real-world business impact.

Success of New Hires

An IT analyst supporting HR at a top Wall Street fi rm recently shared one of their attempts at integrating

predictive analytics into the recruitment process. This fi rm has defi ned a reference profi le of a successful internal employee for every job description, and each new applicant is automatically benchmarked against the reference profi le when they apply for the same job.

This predictive model scores the likelihood of the new applicant being a top performer in the new role based on the historical performance of the benchmark profi le in the same role. Based on this score, the applicant is prioritized into the recruitment funnel. The net business benefi t is that recruiters are talking fi rst to the candidates recommended by the predictive model, and, so far, the results have been encouraging.

Employee Engagement

The reality is that most employee surveys are on the verge of becoming obsolete. Just how reliable is a self-reported survey anyway? Ask employees how they feel about their company or their boss a week before performance bonuses are to be paid, and you will get a fl uorescent green scorecard. Ask the same question a month later and you will get a very different answer.

While self-reported surveys might produce really nice graphs and charts, or infographics, what actionable business value do they really create, and most importantly what do you do next? Measuring the intensity of employees’ job-seeking activities outside of your company is probably the single biggest proxy for engagement. If employees are looking for work outside of your company, clearly they are not engaged.

Forecasting The Future

By Michael Beygelman

Using predictive analytics instead of past statistics for HR decisions creates business benefi ts.

[30] HRO TODAY MAGAZINE | APRIL 2016

Talent Management

Absenteeism or Workplace Accident Likelihood

Historical data about absenteeism and workplaces accidents is readily available in most modern HRIS systems, so predicting absenteeism or the likelihood of accidents is almost the lowest hanging fruit, in terms of ease of implementing predictive analytics in the workplace. The benefits are dramatic cost savings, improved employee morale and productivity, and a safer working environment.

Contingent Workforce Utilization

Utilization of contingent workers has become a necessary business practice for most organizations, yet nearly all companies struggle with knowing the ideal timing or scenarios in which to deploy contingent labor or the right balance of their workforce blend. This is a business function that has mountains of data sitting in VMS and HRIS systems,

which could be mined to train predictive models and provide procurement and operations leaders with actionable insights.

It’s important for organizations to differentiate between predictive analytics and the descriptive statistics and reporting on what happened in the past. Both offer their respective business benefits, but implementing predictive analytics provides organizations with a unique assessment on what might happen in the future. While the benefits of business reporting and descriptive statistics edify and educate organizational leaders on past successes and failures, the end result of predictive analytics is to streamline future decision making and produce new insights that lead to better actions.

Michael Beygelman is CEO of Joberate®, an HR analytics platform that helps companies make evidence-based recruiting and talent-related decisions. He can be reached at michael@joberate.com.

Case Study: The Power of Predictive AnalyticsA Q&A with Lori Hock, CEO Americas for Hudson and Rebecca Valladares, senior vice president of relationship management for Hudson

Why do you leverage predictive analytics?

We use predictive analytics to get ahead of the game. In the past you may have been able to get access to certain analytics, but it would have been much more manual and inefficient. Now we have access to analytics in real time, which allows for better decision-making and greater efficiencies.

Things move so fast, making real-time data a game changer. Predictive analytics in the past was highly subjective, based largely on interpretation and emotion. Tools, like Joberate, offer us the opportunity to move past subjective opinion to the use of quantifiable data, making the prediction more relevant.

From a CEO’s perspective, predictive analytics can feed both the micro and macro components of business strategy, such as identifying areas for improvement, pinpointing training and coaching needs, or analyzing the candidate market for a potential facility move. It’s extremely valuable when used right.

From a recruitment perspective, if we are tracking a pool of 1,000 top candidates, 800 of them will be satisfied in their current roles. The rest may be considering a move, but 50 will be actively searching for a new role. If we can begin by prospecting those 50 candidates first, it makes us that much more efficient and effective. Joberate analytics are like a modern, automated hot list.

How do you execute on the information you receive?

Every CEO and business unit owner appreciates the value

of attracting and retaining the very best talent. Staying abreast of market changes, understanding compensation plans, determining pay rates, identifying management issues, endorsing learning and development opportunities all require the ability to understand the job-seeking behaviors of the workforce, internal and external. Predictive analytics help leaders understand the issues and prioritize what problem they need to solve. Leaders have more information to consider: What are the issues that need to be addresses? How do we want to engage the workforce? What value do we expect to gain?

From a recruitment perspective, Joberate analytics can prompt us when a candidate has begun a new job search and is potentially considering a move. It gives us a jump on when best to reach out to that candidate.

What can be achieved through predictive analytics?

Predictive analytics overall leads to better efficiencies, and any improvement in efficiency improves KPIs for the talent acquisition team. Our digital footprint is broad sweeping. Our job-seeking behavior also leaves a digital footprint in terms of our interest in exploring roles at other companies, sectors, markets and the frequency in which we do that. While some may be uncomfortable with the access to these analytics, when used properly and productively we can make a positive impact on our business and the workforce. It allows business leaders to make better decisions, manage risk, better seek and engage talent and solve challenging workforce issues.