Eating the HR analytics elephant in five chunks (Or, How to handle your post-training-stress)

You have all that data, you have taken the training, and you are deadly inspired. It’s time to get started, do all the cool stuff, and increase the value added from HR to the business! But you have no idea where to start with your people analytics journey? No worries, it happens to everyone from time to time. Here are some efficient tricks on how to easily get started.

1. Start with your strategy. What’s the one question that is top of mind for your CHRO or CEO at the moment? What is crucial that you succeed with concerning people the next year? Pick that one. Write it down. Define what you mean by it. And try to map out what processes it covers. That’s where to start!
   
   
2. Google is your friend. Search for “the 100 best metrics to track attrition” (or whatever is relevant in your case), pick one that suits you. Choose something where you have the data, or easily can get started with collecting it. And of course, choose something that can answer your most important question.
   
   
3. Make it sliceable! Map out who might want to have an answer to the question. The country manager? The business unit lead? In that case, make sure that you can extract the data in those dimensions. Is there a specific segment of people that this question concerns? Make sure that you can carve them out from the data as well!
   
   
4. Dig into the data. Pull data for the last two years, try to visualize the trend. Slice it down on your segments. Write down how you did it, specify each step (you will most likely need to do it again…). How did you extract the data, what parameters did it involve? In what steps did you break it down? Decide on how often it makes sense to update the analysis. In some cases, it might be on a monthly basis, in some cases yearly.
   
   
5. Tell the story! Report your findings and save the money for the business. Take that last crispy chunk of the elephant’s ear and enjoy your fifteen minutes of analytics fame! You did it!
   

Wow! Is it really that simple? To get started, yes. To succeed over time, maybe not. You will probably discover that your definitions might work for one process, but not for another. Or that you cannot pull all data in your preferred format when you want to slice it in a certain way. There are hundreds of more “or….”, but don’t care about them now. The important thing is that you got started.

Taking the first step, is the only way to start the process. What better way is it to do that, than through supporting the leaders regarding the company’s most important people-issue? Now you’re ready to take the next step and tying it together to the business’ second most important question. It’s only 99 % left of the elephant to eat.