How future-fit organisations secure the best talents – Business Daily
A lot has been said about the workplace of the future. With businesses accelerating digitisation and the adoption of related technologies, Human Resource (HR) functions are on overdrive, empowering the current workforce with matching skills to realise the business impact, while aligning to an industry race to build fit talent.
Today, almost all spheres of our lives have been influenced by the unprecedented evolution in technology, impacting how we communicate, and transact, and the state of our health and well-being.
The adoption of technology into more personal spaces means that we now have more insights into individuals than we did previously, collecting relevant data, and analysing related information for business impact.
The concept of HR analytics is gaining pace in the boardroom; appreciating the place of insights in strategic decision-making, underscoring that people are the capital resource of transformation.
In addition to investing in people, HR analytics also allows us to look at the structure and models in organisations – giving us a view of what is happening now, compared to past occurrences that may be inhibiting growth and progression.
With this shift, organisations are now constantly reviewing their business models, better guided on ways to motivate and engage with their employees, enabling the HR function to build a more informed work culture, aligned to the overall business.
The use of data in decision-making is now also pertinent in a post-pandemic environment, whether to assess the advantages of hybrid work or the efficiencies to be realised from the increased automation of systems and processes.
Arriving at data-inspired decisions for our organisations is however not a single-shot affair. It goes beyond synthesising data to make sense. It is the commitment to value data and utilise it to make decisions that positively impact our people, who are our greatest organisational asset.
The realisation is that data that once sat in cabinets and was dealt with manually, can now be moved to devices and accessed on defined networks, which has redefined long-term strategic HR planning.
The tight race to secure critical talent in the market for instance has seen human capital professionals make use of HR-related data analytics to arrive at the most competitive ways for sourcing, evaluating and selecting new hires.
A recent McKinsey report states that companies with an effective people analytics resource were able to realise an 80 percent increase in the efficiency of the recruiting process, a 25 percent rise in business productivity, and a 50 percent decrease in attrition rates.
One can now make use of applicant tracking data to better appreciate platforms that help in the identification of outstanding candidates, how long it takes to hire them, benchmarks on their remuneration, and eventual onboarding.
According to PwC’s HR Tech Survey 2022, HR tech is helping to create value for both HR and the business at large.
The survey cites areas where HR leaders could do better by encouraging technology adoption and getting leadership buy-in for a truly cutting-edge tech transformation, to ensure that technology serves the people as opposed to just fixing processes.
When aligned to the overall company strategy, HR data analytics could point to performance, help build on financial projections and hence profitability, cementing the fact that the people element is not just to keep running the cogs of any business, but to build insights that shape and determine the business’ future.
