People Analytics Is The New Big Thing & Here’s Why You Should Know About It

All about Data & Analytics on people at work

People Analytics can be defined as a process of working with HR data and translating that into data-driven actionable insights to improve the way business is done.

People Analytics (aka talent analytics or worforce analytics) is a deeply data-driven, evidence-based stream of data analytics where professionals are tasked with using concepts of data science, implement data models, and visualize data to recommend actionable insights. Simply put, People Analytics is the end-to-end data lifecycle from extraction to communicating to the business, but on HR data.

People Analytics is quintessential to an organization in this time and age when now, more than ever, an organization can make or break with its people. People Analytics is associated with what the business can become by the impact the people within create on business goals, mission and vision and evaluate the effectiveness of human resources initiatives.

People Analytics is not a small, niche team; rather, it folds the entire organization in and plays a pivotal role in driving workforce strategies.

Why People Analytics?

More than 70% of companies now say they consider People Analytics to be a high priority and yet, only 8 percent of organizations report they have usable data, while only 9 percent of the companies believe they have a good understanding of what talent dimensions drive their performance— that’s an ocean of opportunities for more companies to consider People Analytics right there!

Organizations today are facing a radically shifting context for the workforce, the workplace, and the world of work. In that age of change, where the organization of the future is arriving now, talent acquisition and employee experience are key contributors in business KPIs.

The interplay between data and people looks promising for a lot of reasons but primarily because —

• the raw material for people analytics already exists with companies — human resources track, store, maintain everything
• much of the data does not change over time — facts about individuals like ethnicity, gender, and work history do not change as often
• human capital is an appreciating asset for a business and can either save you money or cost you the business

For anyone with a knack for analyzing HR data, to optimize talent management and organizational performance, studying the human psyche, and correlating it with the employee experience, People Analytics is for you!

Life In A Day: People Analyst

A People Analyst is responsible for understanding, analyzing, executing, and resolving business and HR concerns and identifying opportunities for existing and new workforce.

A People Analyst follows more or less the same day in life as any other data analyst, the difference being the data worked on— people analysts work with HR data, including but not limited to —

• talent acquisition
• attrition (the rate at which people leave the company)
• employee roster
• employee sentiments
• employee retention and engagement

A People Analyst is responsible to lead the design, development, and implementation of the data models, tools and procedures, statistical analysis, quantitative and qualitative research, and predictive modeling to drive the discovery and articulation of HR impacts and insights for the business.

People Analytics serves as an advanced analytical support/resource for the leaders to brainstorm and create effective and efficient talent strategies.

What Does It Take To Be A People Analyst?

• The basic analytics toolkit — proficiency with the end-to-end data lifecycle from data extraction to data visualization using tools like SQL, Python, R, SAS, Qlik, Tableau, Power BI, Microsoft Excel, Alteryx, and a good understanding of database architecture
• Business Acumen
• Good communication and people skills (with a pinch of sense of humor)
• Storytelling with data — creating and conducting informative presentations to recommend and influence decision-making
• Be able to solve complex problems by taking an outside-in perspective to think out of the box and innovate mundane processes
• Can work independently and in teams with minimal guidance in the most complex situations
• Be able to translate data for the business — running a predictive model is easy but making the business understand what it means is the real deal
• Consulting skills — problem definition, hypothesis building, project management, solution development, change management, stakeholder management, and such
• Networking — to get a pulse check from the real-world
• Have a background in psychology? Get that money!!!

What Does People Analytics Do?

• The People: provide a high-level overview of key HR metrics like employee count, talent mix, demographics, attrition, talent acquisition funnel, and more to relevant audience
• Attrition & Turnover: provide insights on turnover, internal movement, role transfers (lateral and promotional), new hire/high performer turnover, voluntary or involuntary attrition
• Headcount Breakdown: provide a neat insight into employees with a leader, division, manager level, job title, etc. across internal and contractor workforce
• People Utilization: showcase a talent mix of existing employees, including demographic information of internal and external hires, promotions, and terminations, and ensure fair compensation packages
• Talent Acquisition Funnel: showcase a talent mix of candidates as they progress through the talent stages in an application process
• Equitable Workplace: work on employee retention and engagement and address the need to understand what drives the employee experience to create a happy workplace
• Improved Hiring Opportunities: analyze where candidates spend the most time in the hiring process from application to an offer letter and identify areas of opportunities and improvements
• Cost-Effectiveness: save money by predicting who will quit
• Employee sentiment: measure employee sentiments through a Pulse Survey and test the hypothesis against the results from the survey and identify areas of opportunities and improvements

That’s it from my end on this blog post. Thank you for reading! I hope you found it an exciting read. Let me know in the comments about your experience with storytelling, your journey in data, and what you are looking for in 2023!

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Happy Data Tenting!

Rashi is a data wiz from Chicago who loves to analyze data and create data stories to communicate insights. She’s a full-time healthcare data analytics consultant and blogs about data on weekends with a cup of coffee…