Cathy Martin

Success Stories and Predictive Analytics

By Cathy Martin | January 24, 2011

Thanks to Andy Spence (@andyspence) for asking me the question, “Do you know any success stories from predictive analytics in HR?

I do know some success stories and I hear and read more and more everyday. But before I discuss the successes, I would like to define what “predicative analytics” mean. As defined by wikipedia:

Predictive analytics encompasses a variety of techniques from statistics, data mining and game theory that analyze current and historical facts to make predictions about future events.

In business, predictive models exploit patterns found in historical and transactional data to identify risks and opportunities. Models capture relationships among many factors to allow assessment of risk or potential associated with a particular set of conditions, guiding decision making for candidate transactions.

Predictive analytics is being used more and more in companies to make predictions about behavior, investments, and performance as it relates to a firm’s human capital.

Here are a few examples from my experience:

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HR Measures, Metrics and Analytics Summit-Recap

By Cathy Martin | January 20, 2011

The American Strategic Management Institute hosted the HR Measures, Metrics and Analytics Summit this week in Arlington, VA. This conference is my third HR metrics in the last six months. I ALWAYS learn something new. Below is a list of just a few observations from this week:

HR must take the lead on metrics, before someone else does.
It’s not good enough anymore for HR to align with organizational strategy, HR needs to actually BUILD organizational strategy. (Jeremy Shapiro, Stanley Morgan)
Metrics and Analytics will be used, paid attention to, and acted upon if you can relate them to organizational outcomes.
Many organizations are at the infancy stage of HR metrics, just starting to track HR effectiveness and efficiency but….
Organizational leadership is more demanding for evidenced based decision-making
The future of HR Metrics is predictive analytics….the future is now! (Darren Shearer, SuccessFactors)
Insight from data can’t happen until you begin to integrate your HR data with other functional data
HR tracking metrics like those found on scorecards are important, but analytics will prove impact and show insight enabling HR to show how people really make the difference in the organization.

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How Clean is Your Human Capital Data?

By Cathy Martin | January 17, 2011

Over the last few weeks, we have discussed the importance of HR Analytics. We discussed last week about looking at linkage to business strategy in order to start the process. Another important issue to look at, at the beginning of the project is the data itself. The one common theme/issue I have heard from conferences, clients and colleagues is the issue of data hygiene.

I believe that data cleanliness has to be a priority in HR as analysis of Human Capital data is more and more common every day. The one “stopping block” in the analysis process is the state of the data. By having strong data entry rules on the front end will save a lot of heart ache on the analysis end.

Here are some data pitfalls we have experienced:

1) Data is not entered into HRIS in a uniform manner thus creating issues when trying to perform data analysis

2) Data is not entered in a manner that allows for comparison across data sets. In other words, in the HRIS you enter data at the divisional level and in the CRM system you enter data at a location level.

3) Data is not normalized across data sets. Different scales, statistics and types of data are used within and across functions.

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Where to Start the HR Metrics Journey?

By Cathy Martin | January 11, 2011

Many times I have been asked by students, attendees and colleagues, “Where do I start with HR Metrics?”

I have answered that question in the past by saying, “Start with low hanging fruit, maybe with efficiency measures in recruiting like tome to fill or cost measures in training like training cost per employee.”

I still believe those are important EFFICIENCY TRACKING metrics, but I believe we are so past metrics like those. We need to be focused on those metrics that give us some INSIGHT into a decision, an issue, or strategic outcomes.

So my answer today, is slightly different. I believe you start your metrics journey with your business strategy. It has to begin there. Leaders are looking for metrics that let them know how they are doing against their strategic objectives, what investments make the most sense (ROI) and what are areas that need improvement.

So, HR is key in this role, since approximately 60-80% of organizational budgets are tied to people related investments and/or costs.

Let’s look at an example. Say your company has a strategic outcome to grow market share by 10% in the next 2 years. After cross functional team meetings the leadership team creates the following list of action items to accomplish the growth goal:

1) Reduce call center turnover in order to get new and retain current customers

2) Provide training to call center employees to increase product knowledge in order to increase sales

3) Increase employee engagement by 5% which leads to an increase of customer satisfaction leading to repeat business.

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HR Analytics: Learning the Language of the Business

By Cathy Martin | January 3, 2011

We have been discussing HR Analytics over the last few weeks with such topics as “The 3 Most Important HR Measures” and “How to Introduce Analytics into the Organization.”

I have been thinking about how to make sure HR Analytics are not only apart of the overall HR Strategy but that they produce information and insights that are actually USED.

So, like with any information that we have in our organizations, adoption really depends on a few things:

1) Ease of use

2) Access to the information

3) Understanding of the information

4) WIIFM-why should the end user care?

I believe when you embark on an analytics strategy you have to adapt the language of the business into your outputs. Reports, charts, graphs and studies need to address the following:

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10 HR Analytics Predictions for 2011

By Cathy Martin | December 27, 2010

Ok, it’s my LAST post of the year. It’s time for me to ponder and think about what all I have learned in 2010 and try to see what 2011 brings in the world of HR Analytics.

I was so fortunate to have been invited to speak and blog on the subject this past year. I learned a lot from speakers and attendees.

My partner and I are writing our first book on the subject of Human Capital Analytics which HR should be heavily involved in.

All these experiences haven given me a lot to think about analytics and ponder what’s next.

So here it goes….my list of 12 predictions for next year:

1) HR will continue to struggle to find their role in HR Analytics, it should be in the drivers seat

2) CEO’s will get MORE demanding in their need for fact based decision making

3) Data analysis tools are no longer just for statisticians. The tools are now available for end users right on their desktops. (Excel, SPSS, etc.)

4) HR Departments will hire data analysis talent to get the data that CEO’s need to work within HR.

5) Metrics are yesterday…..(tracking). Analytics are today and tomorrow (insight based decision making)

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5 Ways to Introduce HR Analytics in Your Organization

By Cathy Martin | December 20, 2010

When I ask my readers for questions they never let me down! This week I received a great question from across the pond from Ade Adetukasi (@adetukasi on Twitter). His question to me is below:

How do you introduce Analytics to an organisation where the leadership has a “personnel management” mindset of HR.

Well, that is a great question and one that I have been asked many times. I think it is definitely a hard sale but it is not impossible. Before I answer the question I want to clear up some terminology first. Metrics and Analytics are used interchangeably a lot. I happen to think there is a difference. Someone summed it up really well for me this year…..Metrics are like accounting and Analytics are like finance. To me metrics are those measures we track in HR that tells us how we are doing as far as efficiency and effectiveness. Hopefully they are closely linked to the strategy but in order to really PROVE impact on results, you must use analytics. In other words take all the data in the organization HR metrics, Customer metrics, financial metrics and use statistics to get to insight and impact.

So back to the question with your leader with his head stuck in the sand…..in this situation I believe you would start with metrics so that the leader can see what is possible. Starting with Analytics would probably be too much for the non-strategic leader.

Here are some ideas to help with that situation:

1) Find out what is important to the leader and see if you can’t help him solve a problem using data you already have. Maybe he wants to grow market share. Maybe you can talk about retention of your top sales people. Looking at sales data with turnover data would be a great place to start.

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The 3 MOST Important HR Metrics

By Cathy Martin | December 3, 2010

Sometimes you take a risk when you ask your audience for questions that will be answered on your blog. I have been asking my readers over the last few weeks to send me questions that they have about HR Metrics and Analytics.

Well Ben Eubanks, @beneubanks (on twitter) and who writes the UpstartHR blog sent me the question, “What are the 3 most important HR Metrics?’

Wow, thanks Ben for such an easy question…NOT!

First, I would say that the metrics that will make my top 3 list have to be those that demonstrate they measure impact and/or results for the organization. So, you won’t see metrics like these on my top 3 list:

1) time to fill

2) cost per hire

3) overall turnover (the more granular this number is the better, turnover by performance, by generation, by engagement level is a better measure)

4) Training investment/per employee

5) HR staff/headcount

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Can HR Learn Some Tricks From Marketing?

By Cathy Martin | November 22, 2010

Marketing uses metrics/analytics to measure/segment/target customers. Why is HR so reluctant to do similar w/ Employees?

What a fantastic question! And one that I would love to know the answer to. I can discuss what I think are the barriers to segmentation, and what I have seen in my experience. I hope that we get many comments on this topic so we can really discuss this. (hint: please comment)

Here are some reasons I have found why HR does not segment its employee base:

1) I believe there is that lingering concern about “we have to treat employees fairly.” And I agree wholeheartedly. But, with many deliverables that HR executes, a one size approach is not going to work. Case in point, rewards and recognition. What motivates me is not necessarily going to motivate my co-worker.

2) I believe that many HR professionals do not have that skill set and/or do not approach their employee base as a diverse group with varying and different needs in an employment experience.

3) I have seen larger organizations taking a “marketing” and “branding” approach to recruiting, targeting different types of recruits using different messages. Why would we not use this approach to our current employees targeting, let’s say, generations in the workplace and use different retention campaigns? (probably is related to number 1 above)

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Can “Strategic Thinking” Be Taught?

By Cathy Martin | November 8, 2010

I read a great blog post last week by the HR Bartender that has really made me think. That is what great blogs, do…make you think. Sharlyn Lauby discussed the fact that strategic thinking and creating a strategy are 2 different but interrelated competencies.

As a teacher/facilitator/participant in both of these subjects, I began to think, where do these skills sets come from?

Are you born strategic or can you learn to be strategic? (focusing on the HR profession)

Before I attempt to answer that question let’s think about the human brain for a moment. My business partner, Barbara Hughes is a licensed facilitator of the HBDI instrument which assesses our thinking styles or preferences. I will attempt to use some of the HBDI methodology to understand and answer the question above.

We all know the discussion around right brained people being the “creative” types and left brained people being the “number crunching” types.

The HBDI model divides the brain into 4 quadrants (see picture above) with the right side being your creative, people oriented side and the left being your planning, organizational analytical side.

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7 Ways to Tell if Your Metrics Matter

By Cathy Martin | November 1, 2010

Many times when we are working on metrics projects, we are asked the question, “Which metrics should we be focusing on?” In other words which metrics are the ones that are tightly linked to measuring the desired business results? It is a valid question, but a difficult one.

I have a passion around HR Metrics but this discussion can apply to any organizational metrics, as I have had conversations with marketing, operations and sales professionals that struggle with WHAT to measure.

Below is a list of questions we have asked in the quest for making metrics matter:

1) Did you start your metrics journey by mapping your organizational strategy?

2) Do you use value metrics that are tightly linked to profits, revenue, cost or budget?

3) Is it a metric that is near and dear to your CEO’s heart?

4) Does the metric stand the test of time? (it is used to gain valuable trending information)

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Taking HR Metrics to the Next Level

By Cathy Martin | October 11, 2010

I am preparing to go to New York City to attend The Conference Board’s Human Capital Metrics Conference. I was asked to come and blog about their conference. I am very excited about this, because metrics are near and dear to my heart, I love to blog and hey…it’s in New York City.

This is my second HR Metrics Conference in the last two months. I wrote about the first experience a few weeks ago. What has become crystal clear to me is that HR Metrics are at an interesting place. I see most HR professionals in one of the following situations:

1) Infancy phase of metrics-have just started measuring tracking metrics
2) Measuring for awhile-this group has been measuring HR effectiveness and efficiency for some time, but are not sure which metrics are important.
3) Predictive analytics-This group is making the leap from tracking and managing metrics to really proving impact by predicting HR and people related outcomes.

In my informal research and just plain gut feel, I think the percentages for the above is 45%, 45% 10%, respectively. So that begs the question, why so few HR professionals make the leap to Predictive Analytics?

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10 Reasons Why Accountability is so Hard?

By Cathy Martin | September 27, 2010

Over the last several years we have had the pleasure of working with awesome clients. As I think about common themes and challenges over the last year, accountability keeps coming to mind. Whether it is a matter of changing from a culture of entitlement to high performance or the task of setting goals so that everyone understands what is expected, accountability seems to be hard.

So, I ask myself, why is accountability so hard for managers and HR professionals? Here are some of my lessons and observations from the past several years: Read the rest of this entry »

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Measuring Impact: HR Shared Services

By Cathy Martin | September 20, 2010

As I think about the last few weeks I have had the pleasure of interacting with many HR professionals regarding HR Metrics. Last week, I discussed the Evolution of HR Metrics and this week I would like to chat about Shared Services and HR Metrics.

In my workshop at the HR Metrics Summit hosted by IQPC, I asked where people were in their HR journey and about 30% were in infancy or just starting, about 30% had metrics but weren’t sure if they were they right ones and about 30% were looking for metrics for a Shared Services model for HR. This made me stop and think.

For shared services to be effective, most people think about cost savings to operate HR, headcount reduction, and customer service effectiveness. So you may have metrics that look something like this:

1) HR cost per employee
2) HR staff/FTE ratios
3) Customer satisfaction scores
4) Problem resolution metrics

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Can You Measure Employee Attitude?

By Cathy Martin | September 7, 2010

A few weeks ago I co-presented a webinar for HR.com entitled, “Performance Appraisals Your Managers Will Love.” I made a statement that went something like this:

Remove the word ATTITUDE from your performance appraisal.

Well, I got a lot of feedback from those 8 words. Most of the feedback was around, “We need employees that have a good attitude towards their jobs and customers.” I don’t disagree. However, you have to define attitude so that everyone understands it. Also, it is a very subjective term, because what I think is a good attitude is totally different from what my co-workers define as a good attitude.

I googled attitude and I read many definitions, but here is a good representation of what I found:

Attitude: a complex mental state involving beliefs and feelings and values and dispositions to act in certain ways; “he had the attitude that work was fun”

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