Human Capital Analytics

Preface xi

Acknowledgments xiii

Introduction Realizing the Dream: From Nuisance to Necessity 1

Chapter 1 Human Capital Analytics 13

Human Capital Analytics Continuum 16

Summary 28

Notes 28

Chapter 2 Alignment 31

The Stakeholder Workshop: Creating the Right Climate for Alignment 33

Aligning Stakeholders 33

Who Are Your Stakeholders? 35

What Should You Accomplish in a Stakeholder Meeting? 37

Deciding What to Measure with Your Stakeholders 41

Leading Indicators 42

Business Impact 44

Assigning Financial Values to "Intangibles" 44

Defining Your Participants 45

Summary 59

Notes 60

Chapter 3 The Measurement Plan 61

Defining the Intervention(s) 62

Measurement Map 63

Hypotheses or Business Questions 66

Defining the Metrics 67

Demographics 68

Data Sources and Requirements 70

Summary 77

Note 77

Chapter 4 It's All about the Data 79

Types of Data 80

Tying Your Data Sets Together 86

Difficulties in Obtaining Data 89

Ethics of Measurement and Evaluation 90

Telling the Truth 92

Summary 97

Notes 98

Chapter 5 What Dashboards Are Telling You: Descriptive Statistics and Correlations 101

Descriptive Statistics 102

Going Graphic with the Data 103

Data over Time 104

Descriptive Statistics on Steroids 106

Correlation Does Not Imply Causation 108

Summary 115

Notes 116

Chapter 6 Causation: What Really Drives Performance 117

Can You Create Separate Test and Control Groups? 120

Are There Observable Differences? 121

Did You Consider Prior Performance? 121

Did You Consider Time-Related Changes? 122

Did You Look at the Descriptive Statistics? 123

Have You Considered the Relationship between the Metrics? 123

A Gentle Introduction to Statistics 123

Basic Ideas behind Regression 125

Model Fit and Statistical Significance 126

Summary 130

Notes 131

Chapter 7 Beyond ROI to Optimization 133

Optimization 134

Summary 143

Notes 144

Chapter 8 Share the Story 145

Presenting the Financials 147

Telling the Story and Adding Up the Numbers 148

Preparing for the Meetings 152

Summary 152

Notes 153

Chapter 9 Conclusion 155

Human Capital Analytics 156

Alignment 156

The Measurement Plan 157

It's All about the Data 159

What Dashboards Are Telling You: Descriptive Statistics and Correlations 159

Causation: What Really Drives Performance 161

Beyond ROI to Optimization 162

The Ultimate Goal 164

What Others Think about the Future of Analytics 164

Final Thoughts 169

Notes 169

Appendix A: Different Levels to Describe Measurement 171

Appendix B: Getting Your Feet Wet in Data: Preparing and Cleaning the Data Set 181

Appendix C: Details of Basic Descriptive Statistics 193

Appendix D: Regression Modeling 199

Appendix E: Generating Soft Data from Employees 205

Glossary 209

About the Authors 225

Index 227