Where are the good examples?
A week ago we visited the Nordic People Analytics summit, which is the first people analytics conference in Stockholm. We are happy to see that all 150 spots were sold out – the people analytics community in the Nordics is growing!
As so often at HR conferences, the day started with a consultant telling “poor HR” that we need to start talk money, otherwise, the CFO never respects us or gives us a budget. We’re really curious why it has to start this way. Is there never an end to the belief that HR isn’t a qualified function? We do not agree and we think it’s time to start focusing on all the good examples from brilliant teams, inspiring each other and for once stop talking about what HR is not capable of doing.
So, what did we learn? On stage was a mix of vendors, consultants and representatives from people analytics teams. As heterogeneous as the speaker list, was also the presentations and conclusions. We got to hear about everything from basic reporting to interesting ML solutions. Some meant that dashboards were a hoax, others that they were key. There was a lot of talk about the importance of predictive analytics, but very little information on cases or how someone actually has done it from start to end. Another theme was to push out people analytics to the business.
Three cases that we find worth highlighting are the following:
- Mark Hayton and Phil Mercy from Nokia did an informative talk on how to cross-analyze employee and customer views. At Nokia they went beyond employee engagement surveys and also asked their employees about how they perceived the customer experience. Through a gap-analysis, they showed how they are able to identify areas of improvement before the customers noticed them. They also got clear feedback on areas where they internally were satisfied, but the customers saw a need for improvement. They showcased a very professional scientific approach to validating data sources and results. Really inspiring!
- Marcus Mossberger at Infor talked about the importance of making each employee reach their full potential and how data can be used for doing so. This was made possible through careful assessments and a deep understanding of behavioural science. In a time where we want to use predictive analytics, he made a point of the importance of not getting stuck in past behaviours in talent management processes. Marcus presented examples of how diversity can be significantly improved by making the talent identification process more objective.
- Manjuri Sinha delivered an inspiring talk on how Zalando despite their size implemented talent analytics in their hiring process. Through insights, they managed to improve multiple parameters in their hiring process such as quality of hire and time spent on administration. This is similar to what we have seen in our past careers, where there are significant improvements to be made using more digital processes and careful analysis.
There were some really great speakers, but we also noted that a majority of all speakers represented consultancies or product vendors. As visitors, we appreciate when sponsoring vendors that are selling products are separated from the main agenda. We’ve for instance seen great examples of pitching stages at other conferences.
Although the vendors can present an interesting perspective, we personally would have liked to see more great examples from more in-house analytics teams. All of you out there doing cool people analytics stuff in the Nordics, it would be great to hear from you!
And, do you want to learn more about analytics? Check out our trainings!
/Henrik & Sara
