Organised by the Symbiosis Institute of Operations Management and in association with IBM, the agenda for HR Summit 2014 revolved around employing analytics for human capital management. It is an annual affair, which boosts exposure and corporate relations for the institute. I was honored to be a part of the proceedings. With a realization that’s dawning up on us about the massive amounts of data being handled by companies everyday, it is only natural for us to use it well 🙂 Panelists consisted of eminent HR heads, all with valuable experience yet an open mind. It was refreshing to hear them speak and understand the simple points they made.- for they junked the jargon and highlighted the basics.
HR skills are people skills
Good human beings empathise, listen and solve problems. For a company, right from inception to massive growth, the key lies in keeping its flock together. The necessity of a good work culture and work relationships in an organisation lays the base for an HR department. If the employees are satisfied, their expectations are being set and met- you have set the tone for a healthy company. It all boils down to being polite to each other, having mutual respect and working towards a common goal.
Mad world, Dynamic world
Employees today seek an identity, a role to play in the bigger scheme of things. They express on social media channels, and that is an important of who they are. So the necessity of checking out FB, Twitter and LinkedIn profiles before hiring. World is way more transparent today, so information flows quickly. There is an opportunity to harvest data which drives employee decisions (marital status, personal background, demographics, work relationships, competencies, priorities, work profile, etc), this treasure can be analysed and used to boost revenue, employee retention and efficiency. With only 15% of graduates being employable, there is a lot of demand chasing limited supply. As the world opens up yet becomes a smaller place, decisions taken on intuition and relationships are not enough. There is a need to tap into patterns and predict behaviour.
Intuition + Data
An employee planning to quit will show certain changes in behaviour well in advance, which a competent HR manager is trained to notice. However, in this dynamic world, we need companies to function like well oiled machines irrespective of the individuals sitting at key spots. We can no more rely on personnel who know their jobs well, because no one is irreplaceable. While human intuition is hard to replace, analysing data can do half the work and lead to better results. This sharpens (in a nice way) the HR challenge, by promising a smarter workplace that keeps an eye on the entire employee cycle instead of only the key touch points.
Hurdles to introducing change
With lack of transparency, crop up the power centres which control the flow of information. With transparency, their control diminishes and it triggers a struggle for survival. I have witnessed this in my young company, the world witnessed it when Ratan Tata took charge (he faced silos) and drove his way to glory. Silos are information structures which do not interact with each other (though the departments are inter dependent), but function very well internally. The key drivers being lack of trust and loyalty to certain figures other than the company. These hurdles are dangerous and need to be dealt with. Experts recommend showing the skilful power centres a way out- by training and redeploying. Tighten their work flow, keep check points to ensure work happens in a certain pattern thus restricting their chances of not following it. Let them go if they don’t obey.
Communication & Trust
To put HR Analytics simply- it’s a way for the managers to listen to their employees and make the workplace better. Data Mining is nothing but questions asked to understand what’s going on in employee minds. If employees don’t trust the management, the answers will be misleading. So in the end, it all boils down to effective communication and trust within the company.
HR for Startups
The CEO is the HR head and all team members are HR managers, managing themselves and their colleagues. Till a company reaches 50 employees, it is a tribe, tied together with a common belief and fight for survival. A tribe is like a family, having each other’s back at all times. Trouble makers need to be weeded out as early as possible, and it is the team’s job to set foundations for the culture. HR simply requires us all to be good humans- trusting and helping each other through it all 🙂
******
Editor’s note: If any rodinhooder would like to cover an event in any city for trhs – pls get in touch with me at asha@rodinhood.com
********