In People Analytics in the Era of Big Data: Changing the Way You Attract, Acquire, Develop, and Retain Talent, Jean Paul Isson and Jesse S. Harriott suggest six questions that should be asked in order to develop the most effective employee engagement predictive analytics:
1. “On what outcomes/metrics are the senior leaders in this organization most focused?”
2. “Who owns the specific data/metrics that senior leaders are focused on? How do I connect with these individuals to obtain the data?”
3. “Are the important business data/metrics collected at the appropriate level for me to make apples-to-apples comparisons (i.e. department level or district level)?
4. “Do I have the statistical capabilities in-house, or do I need to look at a university or consulting firm to help me analyze the data?”
5. “Based on the linkage analysis, what is the highest-priority or biggest-return on investment project that I should execute first?
6. “How do I assess the change that has occurred and make adjustments to maximize effectiveness?”
Once the data have been revealed by responses to these questions, Isson and Harriott then observe, “Getting buy-in from internal stakeholders regarding the most important outcomes of employee engagement is critical. This will ensure success as you make your analytics more predictive.”
I presume to add that raw data are essentially worthless unless and until rigorous analysis and evaluation convert them to intelligence data. Only then can predictive analytics be determined.
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Jean Paul Isson is Global Vice President for Predictive Analytics and Business Intelligence at Monster Worldwide, Inc., where he has built his global predictive analytics team from the ground up and successfully conceived and implemented global customer scoring, customer segmentation, predictive modeling, and web mining applications and talent analytics solutions across North America, Europe, and the Asia-Pacific region.
Jesse S. Harriott has been a research and analytics professional for more than twenty years and has held various client- and supplier-side analytics leadership positions. He is currently Chief Analytics Officer at Constant Contact, a marketing solutions company that helps over 500,000 organizations generate repeat business and referrals through email marketing, social media marketing, event marketing, local deals, and online surveys.