Seriously, are HR Metrics really ‘all that?’

I was teaching a group of senior HR Executives at a top management school in India recently. Though our topic was ‘leveraging digital technology for business transformations,’ as we were discussing challenges about driving strategy in HR, we shifted to a lengthy conversation on analytics.

What does it mean for HR to have KPIs? How can we better quantify the outcome of our work? Should we be measuring our work in all aspects? Or else what should we build metrics against, etc.?

The truth is we need to start liking analytics. I know it’s easier for some of us to say that because we like numbers – I certainly do! But even if you’re not exactly a numbers person, when we’re talking about organizational effectiveness, should we not be measuring the return of our investments?

I also do not believe we have it any harder than any other function. I think, if anything, other functions have it harder when it comes to building and measuring KPIs. They’ve just been doing it longer and stronger…

Returning from India, I shared this short summary with our participants. I know it is only a teaser and there is so much more to be said about metrics and measures, but, well, there’s always another day… We’ll bring the topic back. ☺