Talent Management is Broken and it’s Time for Data Analytics to Help.

By Serena H. Huang, Ph.D.

Welcome to my newsletter! I share practical tips to help you go from Data to Action so join the thousands of readers and subscribe to my monthly newsletter today. If you find it valuable, I hope you'll consider sharing it with your network.

~~~

In one of my previous organizations, the leadership team assured me they had an excellent retention strategy for senior women because all the high-potential women were in a special leadership development program with free executive coaching, and they were also all highly-compensated.

I showed them a couple of data points that quickly got their attention.

1) Hi-Potential retention post these coaching programs is actually worse. Many almost immediately resigned upon “graduating” these programs over the past 5 years.

2) The current engagement and intent-to-stay scores for senior women is much lower than their male counterparts in the latest survey.

This LinkedIn post of mine generated real conversations and was featured on LinkedIn News last week. I realized I didn’t share my experience leveraging data analytics in Talent Management as much and it is time.

Many organizations had a challenging time attracting, developing, and retaining employees since the COVID-19 pandemic drastically changed how we worked. Ultimately, this is the core of an effective talent management strategy.

What is Talent Management? You all know how I feel about buzz words, so let me share a buzz word-free definition from McKinsey: “Talent management includes all the ways that organizations bring employees on board, keep them happy and productive, and help them continue to develop their skills over time.”

How can data analytics help? Here are a few ways I’ve leveraged data analytics in my previous roles as the Head of People Analytics.

1. Evaluate the High Potential and Leadership Development Programs

(1) Look backwards: One simple analysis is to compare the retention rate of the participants in the high potential and leadership development programs to those outside the programs. Another is to look at whether the performance and retention improve within a year of graduating from the programs. In my experience, the analysis is easy but finding good data historically is not. Some of the programs are not tracked in the HR system consistently so it may be challenging to identify the start and end time of certain programs, for instance.    

(2) Look ahead: If Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) is important to your organization, it’ll be helpful to use data to understand the demographic composition of individuals selected into the high potential and leadership development programs. Given these programs are the pipeline for future senior leaders, it’s critical to see whether the demographics mirror the current workforce. More importantly, if the data reveal that fewer women and BIPOC employees are represented in these programs, a deeper analysis of the selection process may be required.   

2. Proactively Identify the Flight Risk and Retain Top Talent

Most mature people analytics teams now have a predictive employee attrition model, and several HR tech vendors also offer out-of-the-box attrition prediction capabilities.

One area of application I’ve found that resonated with my stakeholders is with top talent. Imagine if you knew some of your top talent might be at risk of leaving due to workload, wouldn’t you use the opportunity to at least have a conversation and see what would make them feel engaged again? Once you have implemented a retention strategy based on flight risk, it'd also be important to monitor the effectiveness of the plan.

3. Identify Skill Gaps and Create a Strategic Workforce Plan

Do you know which specific skills your sales team needs to close the deal? Do you know what work experiences are best at developing those skills? Do you know where you have skill gaps in the current sales team? These are the questions I was able to answer with data. As many organizations shift their business model and operations after the COVID-19 disruptions, their sales team had to develop new ways to generate leads and close deals. These shifts meant developing new skills as well. Since you can’t improve what you don’t measure, the measurement of skills data for existing employees becomes the critical first step to understanding your current workforce.   

If you want to learn about how to do this in practice, my latest people analytics course on LinkedIn Learning is now live! It took me several months to put my passion for “skills” into a condensed course. Please check out this practical course and let me know what else would be helpful in the future.

These 3 use cases from my experience are of course not the only areas of Talent Management, nor are they the only ways data analytics can help. I’d welcome your comments to keep this important conversation going on LinkedIn or offline.

~~~

🔔Coming up next 🔔:

My passion project finally goes LIVE after months of planning. I've designed a very special retreat to help my community relax, rejuvenate, and ignite their creativity in just 3 hours. There are only a few spots left so please sign up or share with your network!

The Fall Data With Serena US Tour will be finalized soon and I'm looking forward to meeting my community in Seattle, D.C., NYC, L.A., Miami, and Atlanta.

The Data With Serena Tour for Europe and Asia will be announced in the near future.

~~~

Dr. Serena Huang is an accomplished thought leader and professional keynote speaker who also regularly guest-lectures at top MBA programs including Kellogg, Wharton, and Haas. She coaches executives in financial services and tech on personal branding. She most recently served as the Global Head of People Analytics & HR Tech at PayPal and previously built the people analytics functions at Kraft Heinz, GE, and Koch Industries.

Dr. Huang is the author of a popular LinkedIn Learning course “The Data Science of Using People Analytics” with more than 10,000 learners, recognized as a Top 15 LinkedIn Expert in Chicago and a Leadership LinkedIn Top Voice in 2023.

Join her 12K+ followers on LinkedIn for her inspirational and educational content everyday! You can also message her and book 1:1 time with her directly here.