3 Evolutions In Talent Analytics That Lead to BDAS

Manual to Automated

The first big change in HR and Talent Analytics that had to happen for BDAS to exist was the shift from manual technologies to automated ones. Back office tasks used to be run by IT folks, who might see improvements in employees but couldn’t necessarily quantify or measure them. As more automated products became available, companies were able to take advantage of the benefits of not requiring as much manual input in order to work. Alan Hall, Senior Vice President of IT at Jacobus Consulting, Inc., offers us a good example of how businesses took advantage of automated systems. 

"One example of the quick improvements the company has made: Monthly financial closings had always been a challenge, but a two-week, largely manual process has been slashed in half. What's more, people have been freed up to focus on customer interactions instead of back-office tasks, enabling the company to sign a number of new and extended customer contracts it hadn't planned on addressing yet.” Alan Hall, Senior Vice President of IT at Jacobus Consulting, Inc.

Automation has become such a large part of business now that 72% of HR people say a lack of automation hinders their business success. It’s a large part of how many businesses have been able to make their business work, and couldn’t get on without it today.

Onsite to On the Cloud 

As companies around the world became better connected through the internet, cloud-based storage was simply a matter of time. Today companies can use cloud-based storage to keep all of their information in one location, accessible by all no matter what time zone they live in. Moving to this kind of storage has also been a source of savings. In 2015, companies plan to reduce their in-house IT spending from 54% to 37%, while increasing their cloud usage from 38% to 45%. 

Making information this accessible has made for a few minor concerns, however. Companies wary of adapting cloud-based storage are wary of the security risks placing all of a company’s information in one place would pose. They’re also concerned about properly integrating it into their business, as well as the difficulty of measuring the ROI on switching to cloud-based storage. As the technology continues to catch on, the problems should give way to better solutions that will allow companies to work with all their employees to a better degree. 

Products to Services 

The latest, but no less profound, change in the talent analytics space is the switch from products to services. Rather than selling a single product as-is, then updating that product and expecting customers to purchase it again, companies have begun selling their software as a service (giving rise to the acronym SaaS), and providing support and having customers subscribe to using that software. This allows companies to provide constant updates to their tech in order to better serve their customers. 

The change to services is a boon to companies, but customers are also more inclined to try something provided as a service. 60% of adults would consider paying for an online service if they were offered a trial. Both sides are willing to adapt to a changing market, as long as it offers them benefits to both. Customers don’t have to worry about their software being outdated, while companies are free to provide updates on an incremental basis rather than worry about cramming updates into a single package on a regular basis.

Source: Dominic Barton at Broadbean