Conference shows HR analytics moving closer to mainstream
The 2014 HR Technology Conference was dominated by talk of the data-driven organization and workforce analytics, with social recruiting and mobile also in strong evidence. LAS VEGAS - HR analytics was omnipresent at the 17thannual HR Technology Conference & Exposition, not just as a big idea in general sessions but in case studies, how-to sessions and newly announced products.
Definitions of HR analytics varied as widely as HR managers' readiness to adopt it, though. Meanwhile, social recruiting and performance management software and mobile apps became more firmly established as data sources for the more innovative forms of HR analytics.
The pre-conference general session, "Analytics, Analytics, Analytics -- The Future of HR," was unsubtle in setting the tone, as active deployments vied with high-level concepts and vendor pitches for conferees' attention. HR analytics products on display ranged from big-data sources like the Workforce Vitality Index -- a set of quarterly labor figures that payroll provider ADP introduced at the conference -- to HireVue Insights, which tries to predict the career success and cultural fit of candidates who apply through HireVue's video-interviewing platform. IBM showed a new cloud-based analytics feature in its Kenexa talent management suite called Talent Insights that uses the company's Watson cognitive computing system to comb workforce data and suggest statistics that might help users.