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HR Technology Trends for 2014

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When so many thought leaders gather in one place, there is sure to be some highly insightful conversations and more importantly, some solid conclusions reached about the current climate of HR.  Industry experts recently gathered in Chicago for the SHRM Annual Conference to discuss HR technology trends, among other topics.  Their conclusions about the top 10 HR technology trends for 2014 give us a clear glimpse into what HR leaders are talking about and will continue to talk about during the coming year.

Here are a couple of those 10 top technology trends that we feel especially close to and why.

HR data is secure in the cloud. When done right, the cloud is just as secure as on-site, on premise software solutions.  Of course it is!  And we’ll even go further to say that in some cases the cloud is more secure than the on-site, on premise solutions that companies currently have.  But not everyone is as willing to except this reality.  Which is why our Pando solutions can be hosted in the cloud or live on-premise behind a firewall.

Virtualization and globalization are transforming the workplace. Remote working arrangements will force employers to be more innovative in how they use collaboration tools.  Decision making is a collaborative process.  How we collaborate with our colleagues is changing and advancing every day.  If the tools we use to collaborate aren’t really built for collaboration, then the decision making process is slow and unwieldy. Pando not only allows for collaboration, but encourages it!  Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter are popular because people are social beings.  We have an innate need to share with others and converse.  Check out this short video to see how Pando encourages collaboration through sharing and conversation.

Cross functional innovation teams will become the norm.  HR needs to collaborate with other departments to see what’s working and apply those best practices to help achieve HR goals.  Correction, HR needs to collaborate with other departments to see what’s working and to help achieve company and business goals. No department within a company can just worry about themselves.  If sales doesn’t care what marketing does, and marketing doesn’t care what HR does and HR doesn’t care what operations does, then what kind of business decisions can really be made? Some think that they can just float along with an analytics tool that allows them to see their HR data and that’s it.  We believe in integrating HR data with sales, marketing, operations and other data so everyone can see the whole picture.

Cloud and business process outsourcing support business goals by reducing infrastructure costs while freeing up HR resources for strategic innovation.  Some people feel productive sitting in front of an excel spreadsheet and spending hours typing in calculations and entering data. But that is not productive.  Productive is making data-based business decisions that move the company forward.  When you have a tool, like Pando, that automatically pulls in the data from disparate systems, you can get real work done.

Mobile tools become even more prevalent. Anywhere, anytime access to information speeds up recruiting, boosts productivity,  and increases efficiencies that benefit not just employees but suppliers  and customers.  And that’s why we make sure all our solutions are available on any mobile platform.  There’s just something so cool about analyzing metrics and data on an iPad. And that’s why we love it!

HR needs to harness and analyze Big Data for business performance results. HR leaders need to do this and do it soon.  But they also have to be careful about rushing in and not fully understanding which metrics they should be using and what data questions they should be asking.  It’s more than just purchasing analytics tools and plugging in.  Companies need partners in ventures like this.  Otherwise, it can turn out to be a complete waste of time.

Global, standardized definitions for HR terminology, metrics, data models, and systems will emerge as technology unites HR professionals worldwide.  We strongly believe in having international standards for HR.  Our work on the ANSI HR Standards committee is devoted to establishing professional HR standards.  To further the adoption, comparison and benchmarking capabilities of the ANSI Cost Per Hire standard we have created a central data-set where companies can submit their demographics and CPH data and compare with other companies.  Check it out here.

When HR leaders can prove how their processes directly affect business outcomes, they’ll get the recognition they deserve and be able to contribute to the important data-based business decisions.

For the full list of the Top 10 HR Technology Trends of 2014, click here.

Big Brother and Big Data

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When we talk about ‘big data’ we’re often referring to our business intelligence platform that allows companies to pull data from disparate systems and see their information and metrics more clearly. It now seems that what we’ve been excited about for a while, is just starting to catch on in the rest of the business world.

Rachel Silverman of the Wall Street Journal sheds light on an interesting experiment that some companies are adopting to track their employees movements, collect the data, and change policies and practices to improve productivity.

Initially, Silverman’s article, titled “Tracking Sensors Invade the Workplace” elicited my eye-rolling uh-oh response. How ridiculous and paranoid can companies get, I thought. First we have Marissa Meyers reversing Yahoo’s work-from-home policies and now employees are being tracked at the office?  Does anyone trust an employees good old-fashioned work ethic anymore?  But Silverman goes on to explain that the data gleaned from these employee tracking devices was used to help managers and team leaders better understand interactions between team members and improve the office working conditions.

One pharma company combines the tracking data with email-traffic data and self-reported weekly employee surveys to determine that higher face-to-face interactions among employees actually ment more productivity. This prompted them to make a couple of small environmental changes in the workplace to try and enhance productivity.  And it worked.

There are of course always the outliers. Every office has a slacker, a flirt, and someone who spends a little too much time stirring the sugar into their coffee. If you’re going to start analyze your data in a way you never have before, you have to be ready to see the good and the bad.

Once our clients have ultimate data visibility through our business intelligence platform, we craft a project plan based on proof from the data and are able to target improvements.  Seeing your data is only the first step towards improvement and change.

Open Innovation Applied to Talent Acquisition

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Henry Chesbrough does a nice job in this video segmenting the 5 Paths to Open Innovation, based on his 2003 book of the same name.

But how to apply to a corporate Talent Acquisition Organization or a Talent Acqusition Service Provider…hmmm.

As you conduct this exercise, you need to really open up your mind as to how you can innovate your business. Realize that these your ideas have to be feasible for your organization order to execute. Use the feasibility project management analysis tool that we provide to help you understand how far away you are from installing some of these ideas.
  1. The Fortress – these are the ideas that you’re going to build internally. Really should tap into who you’re trusted stakeholders are inside your business to help you understand how to innovate. This may not only include your direct talent acquisition team, but don’t forget about your internal customers who trust you, and human resource personnel around those customers who also have given you credibility. However sometimes we forget about the other people in the organization that we should be tapping on. Don’t forget to look to the sales organization, research and development, technology, or just very smart or innovative people who exist in your business. Bring them into discussions on how to innovate and how to advance your service and product offering to your clients.
  2. Open Sourcing – you’re going to develop ideas that may not be feasible for your organization, but they may still be very good ideas. You need to find trusted external partners that you can bat ideas around with. Have regular engagement with colleagues that do not work in your organization, and they don’t even have to work in your industry. They are having some of the same thoughts and ideas that you may be having and you should literally have non-disclosures signed and have the ability to discuss openly ideas that your talent acquisition organization has with their talent acquisition organization and vice versa.
  3. External Ideas and Collaboration – there are lots of service providers that are willing to talk with you and help you understand what you can do to innovate. However, many are focused on their product model. That is fine. However go beyond just working with your vendors, and start working with academics. Start working with chief executives or general managers of other companies. Start working with consultants or at least go to places where innovation can spark because of the speech or a lecture. The concept is to ferret out what could be done that is beyond the scope of your current internal organization and to see if that can be done to extend service or make a better service for your customers either now or later.
  4. Bridging Gaps – as talent acquisition organizations, we typically do not provide specific or new technology. Usually they are purchased. Same goes for certain types of human capital services, like background check services. If you have a roadmap or a vision of where you want your talent acquisition organization to go, start identifying the places where you have gaps currently because of your current resources. Start going into the marketplace and look for technologies or service providers to bridge that gap to that vision even if that means not having a long-term relationship with them. What this does is help you understand the competencies and the mechanics that you will need in order to have those gaps bridge with internal resources longer-term and whether or not that’s feasible.
  5. Spin Out and Spin In – there are ideas that you want to execute because you think they may be beneficial to your business. But that will take some experimentation and some time. I recommend think can about having a subgroup within your business and coming up with the charter for that project or that experiment. Get it funded separately, do not have it part of your overall budget. Have other members of your internal organization to be part of it and watch it, but don’t necessarily make it part of the standard service offering that your talent organization has. This is slightly different than a pilot. Pilots typically pull from the current budget that you have and they are designed to see if you’re going to expand. This is not quite that. You want to separate this from the core value of your business. In the event that this group then gets some good traction and during that time they have had free reign to develop those processes, you can then bring those processes or tools that they have developed back inside your talent acquisition organization for wider use.