This practical text consolidates the years of experience our Sales, Consulting, and Customer Success teams have gathered in countless customer projects. It demonstrates how HCM master data can be used to gain deep insights into your own organization and increase organizational effectiveness.
When prospects or new customers see the dashboard views of our Ingentis org.manager, they often react with: “This looks great in the demo, but it can’t be implemented in our practice – we don’t have the data.”
Really? The truth is: Every organization that uses one of the common HCM systems – whether from SAP, Oracle, Workday, UKG, or a comparable provider – has all the data needed to populate dashboards with meaningful content. HR, organizational development, and management can thus keep an eye on all relevant organizational KPIs, quickly identify undesirable developments, and take corrective actions. Apparently, many of our contacts are unaware of the value their HCM master data holds. Consequently, they do not realize that they can use these readily available metrics for measures in Org Analytics and Org Effectiveness. With this post, we aim to change that.
Your HR data exists but is flawed?
That’s unfortunate because a reliable data foundation is crucial for precise reporting and meaningful dashboards. But no problem: our Data Quality Screening extension provides a solution. With this tool, HR managers can quickly identify and correct errors or gaps in the HR data landscape.
Before we get started, let’s address one question: Why should you bother to visualize your HR data at all? The answer is simple: because it makes sense. More specifically, because it engages our sense of sight. Eighty-three percent of all information processed by the human brain is delivered through the eyes (see Braem 2004: The Power of Colors). Additionally, the Picture Superiority Effect states that after three days, people remember 65 percent of the information they received visually, but only 10 percent if they received it auditorily (for more on this, see here). You see: there are good reasons to present HR data in a visually appealing way.
Alright, let’s get started: How can you create appealing, meaningful dashboards with “ordinary” HCM master data? We’ll start simple. With the employee. And their data. For example:
ID | Hire date | Birthday | Gender | Nationality
From this data, additional information can be derived for the ‘object employee’ object, such as:
Age | Years with the company
When applied to the organizational level, exciting metrics can be aggregated from the individual employee information:
Headcount | Demographics | Average age | Average years with the company | Other average values (gender, nationality, etc.)
Another important – and almost always available – piece of data for initial org-analytics measures is the information about a hierarchy. Once this is stored in the HR system, all metrics can be recursively calculated along the structure. The existing ones are thus supplemented with the following information:
If additional, standard object types – such as positions – are then added, further options arise:
It is undisputed that the data collected so far is available to the vast majority of HR staff, isn’t it? And here’s the thing: a meaningful dashboard can already be derived from this basic information. The following screenshot comes from our HR Insights Board module and is made up purely of the HCM master data mentioned so far:
Before we move on to discussing how organizational effectiveness can be increased through the smart use of HCM master data, let’s clarify what we at Ingentis understand by this term. McKinsey defines organizational effectiveness as: “[…] the shift from episodic, large-scale transformations to the continuous improvement of organizational efficiency.” We see it similarly.
Since organizational effectiveness is an ongoing process, we recommend working with the smallest possible data sets, ideally those that are constantly accessible. The span of control fulfills these criteria. To calculate it, you only need the employee ID and the manager ID. If a target state – an ideal span of control – is also defined, this benchmark can easily be compared with the actual state and visualized, for example, in the form of a traffic light logic. You see: not many pieces of information are needed to create perspectives like our Span of Control Heatmap.
In addition to analyzing spans of control, other metrics that reveal how far the current situation in the organization is from the desired target can be visualized in similarly simple ways. Think, for example, of reviewing micro or macro teams, the proportion of female leaders, or existing succession plans for critical positions.
HCM master data are valuable pieces of information that can be effectively utilized through proper visualization. On the one hand, to gain deeper insights into the structure of your own organization. On the other hand, to increase organizational effectiveness while promoting a culture of continuous improvement and data-driven decision-making.
Looking for the right tools?
Join our free webinar and discover how to visualize, analyze, and actively shape your organizational structure with Ingentis org.manager. We’ll show you practical ways to make data-driven decisions, simulate reorganizations, and uncover hidden potential.
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