The Insight222 People Analytics Trends 2021 study presents a model for a Data Driven Culture for HR. One of the critical elements is to embed data driven decision making across

HRBPs and managers. In summary this involves:

• Democratising data across the organisation by investing in accessible and easy-to-use tools.

• Upskilling HRBPs in data literacy skills, as well as other supporting skills such as consulting and influencing.

• Supporting the change management process in HR by ensuring clear and consistent communication from the CHRO and incentivising career journeys that take a data driven approach.

What is data democratisation?

Data democratisation is the process of making data and insights accessible to a much wider group of people across an organisation who will benefit from its usage. Gartner predicts that by 2023, organisations that promote data sharing will outperform their peers on most business value metrics.

A question that is top of mind for many people analytics leaders is, “what is the first solution at scale I should deliver to democratise data?”. According to “Leading Companies” in people analytics, it is astute to start with insights at scale for managers and HR professionals by investing in Second Wave people analytics technology such as SaaS-based data democratisation systems (for example, Visier, Crunchr, One Model) or building a dashboard suite using tools such as Microsoft Power BI or Qlik.However, many data democratisation programs fail because they concentrate solely on the data and technology and fail to apply the necessary focus on sponsorship, user-centric design, upskilling and change management.

This article will explore eight steps that are important for success when democratising people data with analytics dashboards.

Eight Steps for Success When Democratising People Data

1. CHRO sponsorship and key business stakeholder buy-in

One key stakeholder that rarely needs convincing of the importance of a data driven culture for HR is the CHRO themselves. In recent research by Insight222, 90% of companies surveyed state that their CHRO has made it clear that data and analytics are an essential part of the HR strategy.

It is therefore critical to have the CHRO sponsor a program of people data democratisation with analytics dashboards. This should be part of a broader strategy to build a data-driven HR function, which is regularly communicated to HR colleagues. As Steve Scott, Managing Director and Global Head of Workforce Management and Analytics at Standard Chartered Bank, explains in an episode of the Digital HR Leaders Podcast, the words of the CHRO are important around this, but not as important as their actions:

“a CHRO who role models using data, who is hungry for data, leans in to shape the insights that they are looking for to have the conversations that they are having with their management team peers - that role modelling is really, really powerful…And so everybody else then says, well, look, that is the expectation, that is what we have to do”

The same principle applies if you want to successfully launch analytics dashboards to the business. Identifying several senior business executives who are passionate about their managers having access to people data to make decisions is key to success. If these senior leaders can set expectations with their teams to use this data to inform discussions about their people, this will start to drive behaviour change from the top.

2. Clarify understanding of the business questions

Data democratisation will fail if dashboards only focus on requirements that the people analytics team think are important. It is essential to spend time with HR business partners, key business stakeholders and other user groups to understand the challenges they face, the questions they receive and the conversations they have with their stakeholders where data can drive a more effective discussion. The people analytics team must then consider how these translate into analytical questions that the dashboards can answer. To be successful at this, the Insight222 Operating Model for People Analytics recommends a Demand Engine of people analytics consultants. The consulting team work directly with business and HR stakeholders to understand, make sense of and translate business strategy and challenges into hypotheses that can be tackled by the Solution Engine.

At a large, global financial services organisation headquartered in Europe, the Head of the People Analytics Consulting team interviewed over 50 HR and business stakeholders to gather and prioritise requirements for a self-service dashboard. The aim of the dashboard was to answer key business questions about the workforce and reduce the manual reporting overhead on the people analytics team. The dashboard was scaled to over 2,000 users across HR and the business. It succeeded where previous attempts had failed, because it was designed to meet HR and business requirements. These requirements were understood and prioritised by the consulting leader, whilst communicating directly with stakeholders throughout the project and iterating the design of the product based on their feedback. The savings from reducing manual reports from 3,000 to less than 600 were used to fund the build out of an advanced analytics team. The consultant role would go on to become a key driver in the transformation of that people analytics team and the self-service dashboard was one of the foundational enablers in building a data-driven HR function.

3. Develop user personas and journeys

 Applying human centred design principles to the development of dashboards by focusing on experience and outcomes will help to develop a solution that brings value to all stakeholders. Human centred design can be defined as a way of designing products, processes and experiences that put people first. It is essential to think about the intended users of the dashboard and create personas for each of these. Questions to consider include:

• Who are the different intended users of the dashboards?

• In what situations are they going to be using the dashboards? What might their user journey look like? What are their interests, motivations and needs?

• What challenges do they face? How can the dashboards help to reduce the complexity and friction they experience?

• How do they need to consume the data and insights, therefore what visualisations will be most suitable

It is important to apply a product mindset to the development of dashboards and put the user (not the people analytics team) at the centre of the design thinking. As Nerys Mutlow, Evangelist in the Chief Innovation Office at ServiceNow, explains in an episode of the Digital HR Leaders podcast:

“People like to consume information in different ways. People like to work in different ways. Some people are very visual. Some people respond better to written type of communication, for instance”.

Understanding that the “experience” itself is the product is central to a product mindset. During this part of the dashboard design and build, it is beneficial to engage a focus group of future users from across the different personas, drawing from the groups that were engaged in Step #2. Experimenting and testing different designs, workflows, and visualisations with these focus groups to obtain feedback and then iterate the design accordingly will help ensure the dashboard meets users’ needs and is more likely to be understood and adopted. As Vipin Sharma, Head HR Strategy, Analytics & HR Innovation Labs at Tata Steel, outlines:

“All our analytics projects, whether a visualisation dashboard, descriptive analytics or predictive model, start with the end user in mind and the business problem it addresses. For all visualisation dashboards, we hold an in-depth discussion with leadership and HRBPs on KPIs and insights that they need in real time to improve their decision making.”  


Getting users involved in building, testing, and iterating the dashboards may be a new way of working for HR. Nevertheless, it will make the product more successful in the long term, and the process of engaging HR in the design and build will contribute to the development of a data-driven culture for HR.

4. Partner with Data Privacy

The partnership with the Chief Data Privacy Officer for HR is critical to ensure the ethical use of people data, and this also applies to programs of data democratisation. Successful people analytics teams have a strong partnership with the data privacy team and meet with them regularly to discuss people analytics projects, emerging data sources and the privacy considerations around sharing data. Jimmy Zhang, formerly the Head of People Strategy and Analytics at Vertex Pharmaceuticals, explains in an episode of the Digital HR Leaders podcast on how Vertex has built a world class people analytics function, that in his team:

“we quickly realised that we had to do more to safeguard people data and maintain that trust. We knew at that point we needed to actually create some standards around how we handle, distribute and analyse people data between the teams, so one of the key early priorities was to put together an Ethics Charter with our guiding principles. At this point we transparently shared the principles with our employees through our intranet site. We also link a lot of our communications to the Ethics Charter, so people know exactly how we are handling, distributing, (and) analysing that data. We also formed a cross-functional governance team, which includes HR, Data Science, IT, Privacy, Legal, Communications, essentially all the representing functions, to review all the studies that we undertake and make sure that we do the right thing by looking at all the angles possible”.

The process of creating personas in Step #3 should also inform the creation of security role profiles for the dashboard. Not all users need the same access to data – they should have access to the data needed for their role, and this will look different depending on their role type and area of responsibility. The partnership between the people analytics team and data privacy is essential to get this right and to manage future requirements when new data sources are incorporated into the dashboard. It is also critical that robust data management is applied, with standard definitions created and documented for the data elements and metrics in the dashboard.

5. Pilot and establish a community of practice

Ongoing adoption and usage of the dashboards can be one of the biggest challenges facing people analytics teams in this type of endeavour. To increase the likelihood of success it is important to pilot the launch of the dashboard to test and learn before rolling out more broadly.  One approach is to launch to a particular cohort or business area first where there is the most support and demand for the product. Another effective approach is to create a network of champions who are the early adopters of the dashboard and go on to champion its usage once it is rolled out more broadly in their respective teams. Creating a network or ‘Community of Practice (CoP)’ has many benefits such as supporting initiatives to upskill HR and managers to become more data driven. Discussion and sharing examples amongst the CoP surfaces use cases that other users could benefit from. Finally, an effective CoP supports the people analytics team to scale their efforts by leveraging the CoP to encourage and mobilise other colleagues on the journey.

At Merck Group, ambassador networks in addition to CHRO sponsorship have been one of the key successes in developing data driven HR professionals. In an episode of the Digital HR Leaders podcast, on creating business impact using People Data and technology, Alexis Saussinan, Group Head of People Data and Technology at Merck Group, explains:

“one of the things that we realised pretty early, especially three-four years ago, is that if you want to increase data literacy forget the tool. It is not about the tool it is about what you can do around it. This is where we have been building communities within HR and even more broadly in the business, that come together to share how they have been getting value out of people data and technology insights. So being able to build some ambassador networks that serve as a multiplier into your up-skilling efforts is something that has been proving to be extremely successful”.

 6. Launch alongside a program of upskilling

The most successful programs of data democratisation in HR are launched in parallel with a program of education and upskilling for HR professionals. These programs are designed to help HR professionals understand what it means to be data driven and how to apply this in their everyday roles. Data literacy skills are vital for effective data driven decision making, however they are one of many skills that the future HR professional needs. Others include business focused skills such as organisational acumen, stakeholder management and storytelling.

Recent research by Insight222 found that only 43% of organisations believe their HRBPs are developing data literacy skills, even though over 80% of CHROs expect them to do so.

Deliberate decision-making in a digital, data driven environment that is constantly evolving does not mean that every HR professional must become a data scientist. However, every HR professional will need to be digitally literate and analytically capable. It is crucial for HR professionals to collect data and insights to inform decisions and ensure that a fresh perspective is applied to a challenge in new and innovative ways.

Equipping HR professionals and managers with the right tools so they can use data and insights to guide decisions with key stakeholders is a central part of building a data-driven culture. However, it will not be successful unless it is accompanied with a program of learning that focuses on the application of analytical thinking and data literacy.

7. Intentionally manage the culture change

in an episode of the Digital HR Leaders podcast on Why Companies Need to Interrupt Bias to Truly Create Inclusion,  A Joan C. Williams puts it:

It is important to launch dashboards with a communication plan that includes messaging from the CHRO, senior business stakeholders and a well-thought through marketing campaign to create excitement. However, programs of data democratisation do not finish once a tool is launched. To be successful, it is critical that they are accompanied with an ongoing change management process.

The business and people strategy will continue to evolve, and dashboards should go through ongoing development and release cycles to ensure they reflect the changing needs of the business and HR. Similarly, there will be turnover in the organisation and new joiners, so ongoing marketing, communication and upskilling is required to ensure the tools continue to be used. It is important to consider how the dashboards can be incorporated into employee journeys and programs, such as new joiner onboarding and giving recognition for displaying data-driven behaviours.

In an episode of the Digital HR Leaders podcast, Anshul Sheopuri, Vice-President and Chief Technology Officer at IBM Workforce, shares his thoughts on creating a culture of data literacy:

“The most important thing, I think in my perspective, is actually not the tools or the platform or your webpage, however swanky it may look, it is about the culture in the organisation and do you have a data driven culture in your organisation, it is beyond HR it is certainly at the company level. Perhaps the one smallest but most powerful tactic that I have seen, to propel that culture a bit forward, is celebrating individuals for embodying what you want to be amplified across the organisation. So, we try and celebrate individuals who are exhibiting this data driven culture in all hands call with our CHRO and other forums, to really point people towards the north star, so there is clarity around what the north star is".

8. Measure the impact

A step that is often overlooked is measuring the impact of democratising data. This can be applied in many ways depending on the program’s original objectives. For example, it may have been an objective of deploying dashboards that the number of ad-hoc requests into the people analytics team reduce, thus creating capacity for the people analytics team to focus on more value adding analytics projects. It is important to measure over time if this has been the case and focus on continuous embedding of the dashboards to ensure adoption. Usage data will identify where pockets of high and low adoption exist among HR and business users. This data can be used to inform further upskilling programs in HR, as well as identifying champions and use cases among high adopters that can be used to help educate and promote usage of the tools. As part of best practice in governance for people analytics, establishing a partnership between Finance and the people analytics team is also important to agree how to measure business value and the return on investment for the data democratisation program and other analytics projects.

Final thoughts

Democratising data across the organisation by investing in accessible and easy-to-use tools is a critical part of developing a data-driven culture for HR. Recent research by Insight222 found that in companies where the people analytics function provides data that is easy to use for making in-the-moment decisions, over 80% have a data driven culture for HR.

As Dawn Klinghoffer, Head of People Analytics at Microsoft, shared in an interview for this research, “we don’t just provide the data; we work with teams to create the right type of readiness materials that help them get their work done effectively. It’s not just about the data, it’s about how you use the data”. While mastering data quality issues and selecting the right technology are important, the eight steps outlined in this article are critical and should also be incorporated into a program of work to ensure successful democratisation of data with analytics dashboards.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Naomi Verghese is currently the Senior Director for Insight222's People Analytics Program®. This unique program develops the knowledge and skills of People Analytics leaders and their teams to increase value, impact and focus through bundled learning, networking and advisory solutions. Prior to joining Insight222, Naomi built out and led the People Analytics Consulting team at Barclays. She has also held roles in HR Business Partner teams and in Reward.

To learn more about Insight222's People Analytics Program® or how Insight222 can support you in productising people analytics in your organisation take a look at their website or click here to contact them.