Amin Venjara, General Manager, Data Solutions, ADP, joins Cheddar to discuss how data has influenced the role of Human Resources and how to learn to conquer it to become fully 'data confident.'

On the Job

How Data Has Changed the World of Human Resources

Welcome back to on the job presented by ADP Well businesses big and small have been utilizing the latest tech and innovation to make the new remote and hybrid working environments possible. And one of the major drivers of this revolution is data. So joining us now is a mean man Jara general manager of data solutions that ADP with all the shifts in the world of work. I mean how does data influence the role of human resources? I'm glad you asked because the last few years have really thrust HR teams into the spotlight. Think about, think about all the changes we've seen managing the onset of the pandemic, the return to the workplace, the great resignation and all the challenges that's brought and even the increased focus on diversity equity and inclusion. HR has been at the focal point of responding to these challenges and in response we've seen a real uptick in the use of workforce analytics and benchmark. HR teams need the data to be able to help make decisions in real time as things are changing and they're using it with the executives and managers. They support to make more data driven decisions. Well, clearly data driven solutions. I mean critical in today's workforce as you've been discussing, where has data made the most significant impact? It's a great question. I mean when we talk to employers we continuously hear about four key areas related to their work force, attracting top talent retaining and engaging talent, optimizing labor costs and fostering a diverse equitable and inclusive workforce. So let me double click on that last one just to give an example of the kind of impact that data can have. We have a product that helps organizations calculate and take action on pay equity and they can see gaps by gender and race, ethnicity based upon internal and market data. Over 70% of active clients using this tool are seeing a decrease in pay equity gaps. And what that means is that and if you look at the size of this, they're spending over a billion dollars to close those gaps. That's not just analytics and data that's taking action and think about the impact that has. What message that sends about equal pay for equal work and also the impact it has on productivity and also the lives of those individual workers and their families. Well in today's tight talent market employers increasingly need help recruiting and even retaining workers. So how can data and machine learning alleviate some of those very pressing challenges? I'm glad you raised this like, here's the interesting thing about what's happening in the current labor market, right us. Employment numbers are back to pre pandemic levels with about 100 and 50 million workers on the payroll, however, were at the lowest unemployed workers to job openings rate we've seen in over 15 years. So to put it simply, it's a candidate's market out there and jobs are chasing workers and so two things to keep in mind. I mean, employers really have to employ data driven strategies to be competitive. So we're seeing with labor markets, changing remote work hybrid work expectations on pay and even the physical locations of workers. People have moved a lot people, employers need access to real time data, accurate data on supply and demand of labor and on compensation to hire the right workers and keep the ones they have. The second thing is really about the adoption of machine learning in recruiting workflows. We're seeing machine learning being adopted in chatbots for personalizing the experience and even helping with scheduling, but also a I based algorithms to help score candidate profiles against jobs. Overall the best organizations are combining technology and data with their recruiters and their hiring managers to decrease the overall time to fill open jobs. Well, becoming data confident might be a concern or even perhaps intimidating for some. But what's an example of how an organization can use data? Well, Yeah, and I get asked this question a lot because a lot of organizations are trying to make this happen. We recently worked with a leading quick service restaurant about 2000 locations across the us. And in light of the supply chain challenges. Um and demographic shifts over the last couple of years, they wanted to know how to combine and optimize their supply at each location based on expected demand. Now their research enabled them to correlate demographics, things like age and income and even family status to items on the menu, salads and sandwiches and kids meals right? But what they needed was a stronger signal on what's happening in the local context of each location and there they use internal data for so long. But things have shifted By using our monthly anonymized and aggregated data. Nearly 20% of the US workforce. They were able to optimize their demand forecasting models and increase their supply chain efficiency. So there's two lessons here really to think about right. They had a key strategic problem and they work backwards from that. That's a key piece of becoming data confident, focusing on something that matters and really making data driven decisions about it. But the second is really about going beyond the four walls of your organization there's so many different and new sources of data available. But the digitization of the economy in order to lock the insight and the strength of signal, you need you really need to be looking for the best sources to get there as such great insight. I mean how do you see the role of data evolving as we look toward the future of work? Yeah. I mean data has become just the language of business right now and so I see a couple of trends as as we look out. The first is just the acceleration of data in the flow of work. You know when you when you look at a lot of organizations today, when people need data they have to go to a reporting group or a business intelligence group request the data takes a couple of cycles to get it right and then in order to make a decision um the cycle time is can be high. What I expect to see is now data more and more in the flow of work where business users and decision makers are working immediately have the right data inside of their fingertips. You'll see that across domains. Um Second is just the separation between haves and have nots. Like with the increasing speed of change data halves are going to be able to outstrip data have nots um And those that have invested in really building the right organizational technical and cultural muscle will see the spoils of this in the years to come. All right. I mean venjah a general manager of data solutions at ADP I mean thank you so much and tell me more about the top trends that are reshaping the future of work, visit ADP dot com.