As if higher education participation wasn’t challenging enough without the eye-watering fees, the potential academic staffing challenges of Brexit and figures from the ISE suggesting that graduate jobs in 2020 would be stagnant at best, then students are haunted by the increasing prospect of contracting mumps. Yes, mumps. The universities of Liverpool, Nottingham, Nottingham Trent and Hull have all been particularly affected this academic year. Sure enough, the cheeks and glands of our eldest son began to swell just after Christmas and his short-lived return to university. Back he came home to take advantage of warmth, vegetables and anti-biotics.
The medical profession is putting such outbreaks down to parents’ reluctance to embrace MMR vaccinations. However, for mumps, there is little in the way of forewarning or a lead indicator. This is not the case for all disease outbreaks.
Research published this week from analysis of nearly 50,000 Fitbit users in the US indicated that certain individuals were likely to be coming down with flu – some two weeks ahead of any visible symptoms. In this anonymous study, higher heart rates and excessive amounts of sleeping – provided from their Fitbit data – indicated which participants were likely to be coming down with the disease. Having early line of sight of such data provides the opportunity for health officials to understand potential flu clusters and to make efforts to contain the illness and its spread.
The analysis of data trends to pre-empt contagions are anything but new. In 2009, Google searches about flu symptoms in the US were two weeks ahead of the same analysis from the Centre for Disease Control and Prevention. (Subsequent and later issues with Google Flu Trends, however, have seen the side-lining of this particular initiative).
Understanding patterns from data sources are being utilised for more serious illnesses. Voice and text data from 150,000 anonymous mobile phones in Senegal are being used to cope with fresh Ebola outbreaks. Such data provides analysts and medical professionals with the opportunity of identifying population movements and travel routes, in order to optimally site treatment centres and to better understand where the next disease cluster might hit.
All very fascinating – even if you are checking your temperature and analysing sleep patterns as we speak – but what are the learnings for talent acquisition?
I’ve just been researching the Danish juicing and health-food brand, Joe and the Juice. Now with more than 300 global outlets, the brand first saw light of day in 2002. Its founder remains its CEO – Kasper Basse. The somewhat imposing Mr Basse was an international judo exponent for his country and was passionate about consuming the correct food intake for optimal sporting performance.
Enter any Joe and the Juice outlet and the ambience is towards the edgier side of comparable chains. Food is prepared by unfeasibly good-looking individuals, usually with tattoos, tight black t-shirts and a Y chromosome. All food is prepared on the site and the vast majority of senior managers have come up through the organisation, having served energy shakes, tunacados and turmeric shots at the coal face.
There’s a fascinating interview with Kasper Basse and Goldman Sachs doing the rounds –https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=571687186915380. In the interview, Mr Basse talks about both business and people KPIs and metrics. His point is that by the time his EBITDA numbers are available indicating a problem or under-performance at a site or a region, it’s too late. Underlying issues may have been going on for several months and will now take several more to sort out – during which time his business and his brand are suffering.
Instead, for Basse, he is more interested in people metrics – the extent to which his employees are engaged, enthused, passionate and motivated. If such people metrics are declining, then the business knows they have a problem – theirs is a very service-oriented offering. Its people and their ability to provide exceptional customer experiences are why such customers come back.
In 17 years, there has not been one example of an under-performing store that was not the result of either a team not working well together or individuals whose engagement and enthusiasm had nose-dived. And, in all likelihood, both.
Because Joe and the Juice take both the time not only to measure such people metrics but also to analyse such data and pick up the patterns, then they stay much further ahead of their business. Much more so than simply relying on traditional lag indicators such as EBITDA.
Talent acquisition and human resources has never had the access to data and metrics they have today from any number of sources. But examples where such data is analysed effectively to drive not only hiring initiatives but business performance is perhaps less evident.
That we can all recall the fascinating Virgin Media case study – in which the organisation analysed data coming back from unsuccessful applicants, whose impression of the candidate experience was so underwhelming that they subsequently cancelled their customer subscriptions to the company, costing Virgin Media nearly $5m – suggests how rare such examples are.
I’d question, similarly, how much use organisations make of either qualitative or quantitative exit data. Do employers rigorously look for the patterns and pictures that such metrics are able to provide in order to address retention and turnover issues? Do they analyse which sites, managers or environments are seeing a revolving door of talent? Or are such opportunities passed up?
And listening to an employee base isn’t simply about metrics. There’s a fascinating story about Toyota taking over a Californian car plant from General Motors. It must have been some leap of faith for Toyota as the Fremont factory in question was considered ‘the worst workforce in the US automobile industry’. There was evidence of alcohol consumption, workplace sex and rampant absenteeism, to the extent that the production line could often not be started for lack of workers. Employees, clearly hugely motivated, would also put Coke bottles behind door panels. Once sold, the cars would then rattle horrendously, doubtless much to the delight of their new owners.
Undeterred, Toyota introduced a new set of values, more autonomy and committed to listening to their employees – they ended up implementing a staggering 80% of employee suggestions each and every year. The plant’s productivity shot up and it became a star performer – so much so that Tesla bought the site for its own operations in 2010.
Toyota spent time listening to its people, who in turn felt valued and part of the process. Its people became part of the solution, rather than the source of the problem.
The UK employment market has clearly been hit with uncertainties over Brexit and December’s election. However, despite slowing down for the second half of 2019, it remains relatively (and head-scratchingly) strong. The most recent KPMG/REC survey from earlier this month pointed to sharp increases in starting salaries and temp wages. London, the Midlands and the North also saw rises in permanent appointments.
Talent then, has choice, options and a healthier pay packet.
Talent acquisition also has a choice.
Your people are an asset in so many ways. Quite apart from anything else, the data they could provide has the opportunity of pointing to opportunity, of heading off issues and of communicating the extent to which you listen to them.
The example from Joe and the Juice underlines the very real business impact people metrics, people analysis and people decisions can have.
What kind of stories could your people metrics be telling your business?
Getting to the heart of your employee mindset 