The State of Big Data and Analytics

As the hype of big data and analytics enhances, making analytics a booming market, many organizations are utilizing data to facilitate digital transformation throughout every aspect of their organization. While businesses across every industry increase in size, companies are faced with an influx of data at their disposal. Now, organizations continuously seek a solution that alleviates the pain of obtaining and reporting workforce data from multiple, disparate HR and non-HR systems.

To improve efficiencies across the entire organization, companies need good, quality data to improve the accuracy of their analytics.

So, how can this be solved? By employing advanced analytics to convert big data into knowledge and action. Yet, how are organizations using data analytics to inform and improve strategic and operational decisions?

Below are a few statistics showing how applying analytics can unearth new insights, control organizational costs, increase profitability, and manage talent.

Big Data and Analytics Statistics You Need to Know

  • In HR.com’s recent Big Data and Analytics 2019 survey, most HR professionals give low grades to their organization in terms of its overall ability to gather, evaluate, visualize, and share high-quality talent analytics​.
    • Only 36% of HR professionals say their firms are either good (23%) or very good (13%) in these areas.
  • Few HR professionals use talent-oriented reports or dashboards to a great extent.
    • Just 26% use ​descriptive talent analytics​ to a high or very high extent.
    • Even fewer (15%) use ​predictive talent analytics​ to the same extent.
    • Fewer yet (14%) use ​prescriptive talent analytics​.
  • Talent analytics are most important in five key functional areas:
    • Compensation (50%)
    • Recruitment and selection (43%)
    • Organizational development (42%)
    • Retention (36%)
    • Succession planning (33%)
  • In HR.com’s recent Big Data and Analytics 2019 survey, only 22% of HR professionals say they often or always integrate non-HR data with HR data, though one-third (33%) sometimes integrate these types of data.
  • Three practices are cited most widely as being useful for improving talent analytics:
    • Consistent and regular collection of data
    • Turning data into insights
    • Sharing data or knowledge with others
  • Only 9% of individuals strongly agree that research designs help get the most value out of talent analytics, though another 27% moderately agree.
  • The three most widely used HR business intelligence or analytics solutions are:
    • Spreadsheet software (50%)
    • Analytics tools built into HRIS/HCMS (38%)
    • Analytics tools built into other HR systems such as an ATS (30%)
  • Most HR professionals consider these resources as the best solutions to present talent analytics:
    • Graphical presentations (i.e., PowerPoint)
    • Spreadsheets (45%)
    • Interactive visualizations (34%)
    • In HR.com’s recent Big Data and Analytics 2019 survey, only 23% of HR departments agree or strongly agree their organization has implemented a big data platform that is delivering actionable insights.
  • More than two-thirds of enterprises using big data initiatives have seen a decrease in operational expenses. (Leftronic, 2019)
  • About 40% of businesses say they need to manage unstructured data frequently (Forbes, 2019)
  • Businesses using big data saw a 10% reduction in overall costs. (Entrepreneur, 2019)
  • 97.2% of organizations are investing in big data and AI. (Business Wire, 2018)
  • By 2020, 80% of organizations will initiate deliberate competency development in the field of data literacy. (Gartner, 2018)

Without big data and analytics, it will be hard for organizations to achieve organizational efficiency and drive change without a data-driven approach. By utilizing analytics, companies can help managers develop a new mindset to inspire a new set of behaviors and explain how data influences different styles of decision making and how others can engage with data.

Want to learn more about how you can leverage the power of big data and analytics into your organization’s processes? Book a consultation with one of our experts to learn more.

10 Preliminary Findings from Big Data and Analytics 2019. (2019). 10 Preliminary Findings from Big Data and Analytics 2019.