Did you know that HR technology is so popular, there’s a three-day conference surrounding it each year? In this episode of The People Purpose Podcast, Chas and Julie give a recap of the HR Tech Conference & Expo in Las Vegas.  They talk about trends they noticed, the big focus on recruitment and retention products, and just how many HR technology products are out there that can help move your business forward. 

What You Need to Know:

In episode 10 of The People Purpose Podcast, Chas and Julie are back to recap the HR Tech Conference & Expo they recently attended in Las Vegas. They talk about trends they noticed, the big focus on recruitment and retention products, and just how many HR technology products are out there that can help move your business forward. Julie also discusses a small challenge she experienced getting into the conference that is surely a sign of the times!

Key Points:

Today's post is courtesy of Joyce Maroney, executive director of the Workforce Institute at Kronos.

In this podcast, we're talking about best practices in global technology deployments of Human Capital Management and Workforce Management software.  In prior posts and podcasts, we've discussed how to deploy technology in a way that will encourage user adoption and deliver better business results.  The level of difficulty of delivering a successful deployment is even greater when that deployment crosses national borders, encountering differences in labor laws, user attitudes toward technology, and data privacy rules.

My guests today know a lot about deploying sophisticated HR and workforce management solutions across the globe.. Both of them are members of our Workforce Institute board.  Simon Porter is the Vice President of Digital HR at NGA Human Resources where he leads a global team responsible for consulting and implementing HR Technology for large global clients covering Core HR, workforce management and payroll. John Frehse is a Senior Managing Partner at Ankura Consulting Group, and an expert at implementing workforce management solutions for Fortune 500 companies across a variety of industries.

In our discussion, we cover the following topics:

Please listen in on our discussion below and add your perspectives in the comment section of this post.

How much do you know about blockchain? If you're like me, the first thing you probably think about is Bitcoin, or maybe other cryptocurrencies.  While it's true that blockchain is perhaps best-known as the backbone technology for the digital currency Bitcoin, its possible applications are much broader, and include a number of common HR processes.

I asked Kronos Vice President of Global Product Management Jessica Griffin to share her insights about what's possible with blockchain today, and what HR leaders need to be thinking about now regarding where blockchain may fit in their HR technology strategy.

Jess does a great job explaining the basics of blockchain technology.  She provides insights into how organizations are beginning to investigate blockchain solutions for common HR processes (think onboarding, benefits enrollment, payroll, etc.).  And she discusses both the advantages and some of the potential risks of blockchain solutions for HR.

I learned a lot from our conversation, and I hope you will take the time to  listen to our conversation below:

Photo courtesy of NASA.

Today's blog post about the potential of GDPR and HR comes from Roland Axten, Business Analyst at Inter-Ikea in the Netherlands

The potential of GDPR and HR for more effective information management in the workplace

It turns out we are supposed to know what we are doing.  I'm sure many of us have suspected this was the case.  But we are now becoming increasingly legally obliged to know our business, especially in HR.  With the demands of privacy regulation and in particular the impending advent of GDPR (the General Data Protection Regulation) in the European Union we are obliged to not only know what we are doing, but also why, how much, who by, for how long and to various levels of classification. For organizations that have avoided documentation and process mapping or avidly follow the agile manifesto to focus only on creating this may well be seen as both a burden and an inconvenient imposition.  In the case of HR, where our focus is on employee data, we are discovering how widespread that data insinuates across our business landscape.

So GDPR and HR - how do we get a grip on the employee data?

Our people are doing things, things we hired them to do, important things, things of business value and purpose but to achieve that, their information can end up being spread across our estate like butter and jam on toast.  Many of us have been so busy keeping things going that the prospect of tracking where in our multiple ways of working our employee data is used could seem daunting or even overwhelming.  Where do you even start?  Increasing this challenge from an HR perspective is the issue of scope - utilization of this information goes far beyond the standard limits of HR activities.  For many organizations this task will seem so great that reaching a state of compliance would be such a significant end in itself that the option of doing more would be out of the question.  But there could be more beyond compliance.  There may well be some significant benefits in understanding the where and why of our person data.  Do we run the risk of not seizing the opportunity to aim for improvement by seeking only to deliver to privacy regulations?

The potential of going beyond just being compliant

Any endeavor in this area of employee information should certainly be coordinated with a systematic approach to personal data privacy.  Especially as the core personal privacy elements are the same for all groups of data subjects such as employees, customers or suppliers, each could include: name, home address, bank account number etc. The definitions of these terms in our business must be consistent, not only for privacy assessment but for information management as a whole.  Businesses that have already established effective information mapping will still need to secure the privacy dimensions such as governance and securing the rights of data subjects.  Those of us who are not there yet can benefit from going the extra mile beyond compliance and secure an information lead aspect by systemizing our work.  This would be a key component in augmenting a human approach to workforce management with scientific methodology.  Systemics and taxonomy are foundation elements for good science, they enable relevant experimentation in the discovery of consistent best practice.  As we seek to improve ourselves and our businesses surely, we should seek to utilize as many advantageous methods as we can.  And now that we need to align GDPR and HR and do so much analysis of our employee information setup for privacy purposes let's finish that job all the way to delivering business value beyond mitigating risk.

If we did make this investment in resources, time and effort what benefits could we achieve?  As indicated earlier there are immediate values in building a balanced information structure: Process design is greatly improved because the information being used in and created by our processes is consistently and coherently described.  Process descriptions are prone to quite some variety in how they depict our activities, even when they are produced in a professional and collaborative manner.   We often have processes that are well described in terms of their internal functionality but are weak in effectively linking to each other.  It is as if they are in different languages or accents.  Where we apply consistency in the information elements of the processes this variance in style becomes much less of an obstacle in depicting the big picture of our enterprise.   Along with stronger process design having a defined pallet of information content helps us to identify the combinations of information that we use in our business, the information “assets”.  Defining these aggregate objects also requires comparability and consistency which is well served by a standardized model.  The “use” of the asset comes from the process description and the “content” of the asset is made up from the information objects.  This is both very useful for the privacy design to a high level of precision but to know the actual combinations that create business value in our ways of working can trigger insight and form the basis to effectively critique how we link and share our data.  The decision on what words are chosen to create our information model is a reflection of our capabilities, our priorities and our culture.  But we can go further than this rather inert application of our model, the model itself is passive but we can leverage it in combination with our other initiatives to deliver clarity to our whole business operation. To do this our ambition has to extend beyond defining the structure of our information to defining the information itself.  A business glossary becomes both a key deliverable of information management and a valuable resource in improving how we work together effectively.

GDPR and HR: Move towards an integrated information architecture and deliver privacy by design

The possibilities of working well with information go further than creating artifacts and references.  These can also be leveraged to improve our working methods.  The most general benefit is a wide but consistent understanding of our enterprise.  We can leverage this perspective to avoid the inefficiencies of planning in silos and for isolated objectives.  Put simply, the full connection of our information needs to be understood to be exploited.  I used the word asset earlier to describe groups of information with a certain context, the implied value here will not be achieved unless it is realized to maximum impact.  One impact that is heavily reliant on understanding the full context is to deliver privacy by design.  The design element here indicates a broad perspective and directed intention.  Without this you can deliver privacy by default, but not by design.  The relevance of our work is improved not only for managing privacy but also for every potential touchpoint we have with our employees.  We can identify with greater purpose how we share our information and collaborate together. And it is this collaborative effort that will produce our best results.  From practical measures such as shift planning through to sharing the creative development of our objectives we have the opportunity to improve how this is done, with real-time relevant information.  Aside from the personal decisions involved with an “always on” work culture as a business we are obliged to secure the relevance and the immediacy of the data we share.  Part of delivering this is to be certain about what is being shared.

So back to GDPR and HR: it seems we do need to know what we are doing, but how much do we need to know?  There is a risk of going too far, the tone for good information design is balanced by clear visibility which provides business value.  When we start working with our information in this way we need to allow ourselves to make mistakes, but we should challenge ourselves to assess and refine the tone of our work.  We calibrate by doing it in the same way teams synchronize effort estimates in kanban planning - agility is a toning exercise to begin with. So let's be ambitious and really start to know what we are doing.

It's been raining all week here in the Boston area, but the sun is finally out today and the BLS says unemployment has dropped to 7.8% - a 3 1/2 year low. The main thing I'm thinking about as this week draws to a close is my trip next week to Orlando.  No, I won't be visiting the divine rodent, but I will be enjoying our annual sales kickoff with several hundred revved up members of our field organization.  We had a great FY12 and all signs point to an equally successful year ahead.  Higher employment is good for everybody, but especially if you make your living in workforce management.

Interesting stuff on the radar this week:

We think of using customer testimonials to get new customers…but what about to inspire employees?

Finding a link between HR and the history of tuna fish is no small feat.

Regardless of who you were rooting for, the presidential debate on Wednesday night was all about jobs - and who considers who a “job killer”. The Kronos Retail Labor Index came out this week and showed that hiring remains sluggish in the retail industry - at least for now.

SHRM is doing a cool video series. This one has an interview with Tom Brokaw about generational differences in the workplace, a topic we've talked about in the past with Meagan and Larry Johnson, authors of Generations, Inc.

Technology: Finding the Better Way http://ow.ly/e7GMM via @Ray_anne @blogging4jobs

More jobs for class of 2013 than class of 2012 http://ow.ly/e9udE via @TodayMoney

The Technology Storm: Where We Learn http://ow.ly/e9v0g via @Ray_anne @blogging4jobs

RT @HRTechConf: Build your daily #HrTechConf schedule, browse sessions & exhibitors. - ow.ly/dmllv

RT @williamtincup: Thanks to the #hrtechconf sponsors: @Globoforce @Peoplefluent @RandstadSRUS @UltimateHCM @KronosInc @HireIQinc @Dayforce @Decusoft

What Does It Take to Create a Successful Company: http://ow.ly/ebrBG via @hrbartender

RT @williamtincup: #hrtechconf - Speakers bit.ly/QZ9rIl - Sponsors bit.ly/UPyB0c - Exhibitors bit.ly/Pfwz6X

Employees Make It Clear: Here's What They Need to Really be Engaged ow.ly/ebv97 via @TLNT_com

Survey: 75% of Workers Are Accessing Social Media While on the Job http://ow.ly/edqCa via @TLNT_com

In tech jobs market, data analysis is tops http://ow.ly/edtNF via @USATODAY #bigdata

Check out my fellow social(media)ites at Kronos:

Stop by the #Kronos booth (820+822) & learn more about our solutions for #logistics http://ow.ly/e9tur #supplychain #CSCMP2012

New Time Well Spent #Cartoon: http://ow.ly/e9to2 #Cloud #KronosCloud

The Forecast is Cloudy - and That's Good http://ow.ly/e9vd5 via @WF_Institute #Cloud #KronosCloud

The Times They Are A-Changin' - Part 2 ow.ly/e9vik via @SmarterCafe

#Kronos Announces Latest Version of #TeleStaff Public Safety #Scheduling Solution: htt://ow.ly/ebwKb

A miracle doesn't occur after a training course to produce business results. http://ow.ly/ebJhz via @SmarterCafe

Fewer People Applying For #Jobs In The #Retail Sector http://ow.ly/edqLe

New from @TheCurveInsider: Don't Bring a Pillow to a Knife Fight http://ow.ly/edq3K

Cloudy Dayz - The latest reports and predictions: http://ow.ly/edr8b via @ToddBlackHRMS #Cloud #KronosCloud #CloudComputing #HRTechConf

Joyce Maroney at Lunch with DriveThruHR 10/04 by Wempen and Tincup | #dthr #hrtech #saas http://ow.ly/edD58 @WF_Institute

Welcome to the city of sin (which is actually Lynn, Massachusetts), but I'll let Las Vegas take the honors this week. According to organizer Bill Kutik's opening remarks, this is their largest turnout yet at over 4000 attendees.

The keynote speaker, John Boudreau, gave a solid talk on evidence-based change efforts as a teaser for his new book, Transformative HR. I had the chance to speak to him briefly after the opening session and thanked him for his endorsement of our soon-to-be-published book Elements of Successful Organizations.

John's remarks called out five key areas that HR professionals need to master to drive meaningful change in their organizations:

Logic Driven Analytics- Is the data used, sought out by the business?
Do leaders use the data to make better decisions? Tap mental models that business leaders already use; i.e. supply chain for talent management. This point disturbed some of the tweeters in the audience in audience who see perjorative implications to treating humans as "capital" but the point stands that data is the language of business.

Optimization - Focus investments where you can drive the greatest incremental return.

Segmentation - No one size fits all answer for HR? You need to segment talent strategies according to needs of business.

Risk leverage - How can HR systems better serve creative risk taking that leads to innovation? Many of the social networking conversations here make it clear that leaders are still shy about increasing transparency, yet harnessing the wisdom of your organization to drive innovation depends on it.

Integration and Synergy - John's point here was about the importance of deeper and meaningful integration across HR systems. The really interesting example he shared, however, point to the opportunities to radically rethink your systems. Shanda Games rebuilt it's talent management system as a massive multiplayer game, awarding points for employee contributions to the business.

I enjoyed John's talk. The more HR folks seek a seat at the table, the more the answer remains the same - speaking the language of business and leveraging successful models from outside of HR is the key to relevance.

I saw Matthew Hanwell from Nokia speak on their social media strategy a couple of years ago, so it was interesting to get an update on the progress of social media programs at Nokia. Their key drivers remain the same - openness, participation, interaction and engagement. What they've also found is that as tools proliferated, their utility declined as isolated islands of information were the result.

In response, Nokia simplified and standardized their social media portfolio. They've also stressed the need for senior leadership to legitimize the tools through their own participation - soliciting, reflecting on, and commenting on employee communications. They use tools to visualize where active conversations are happening, identify opinion leaders, and note conversations that are growing - and then feed that insight back to leadership team. This was an interesting link back to John Boudreau's talk this am re: how HR tech can help connect leadership to the wisdom of the team.

There were jugglers with chain saws at lunch, but this was not as exciting as the best product award Kronos won for our mobile product. I had the pleasure of spending time with China Gorman, former COO of SHRM, talking about her personal social media projects.

The final session of the day I attended was a success story with Lowe's talking about their successful deployment of Kronos for workforce management. One of their big payoffs has been in their use of accessible Analytics to guide decision making at the store level.

A long but energizing day. Off to dinner with a dozen Kronites...

Here are a few pictures from the Kronos booth at HR Tech. Can you spot any familiar faces?

Steve Earl, Molly Beams and Aron Ain

I'm currently in Chicago for HR Tech.  Here are a few impressions from the sessions and conversations I participated in today:

If you're at HR Tech, what are you learning this week?

This has been a very busy week - Dallas Sunday through Tuesday for our annual Sales and Service kickoff and Chicago Wednesday through Friday for the HR Technology show. I wrote this post sitting at Gate K8 at O'Hare waiting for a flight to Orlando where I'll spend the next 5 days at our annual customer conference, KronosWorks.

I don't travel a lot in my current job, and it's energizing to get out of the office and have the chance to talk to coworkers, customers and old friends in person. HR Tech, in particular, was old home week for me as many friends and former colleagues and partners from my BrassRing days were there.

Mitzi Adwell, James Sale, Kelly Cartwright and Ed Newman of the Newman Group- thanks for the fun dinner and great conversation Thursday night.

Tom Kramer, John Haworth and Mark Lange - you were all great marketing leaders in your turn at BR. It was wonderful to catch up with you.

Mike Hennessey - looks like Smashfly is taking off. I'll keep watching and wishing you great success!

Gary Gang of HRMC- Keep on keeping on - in Phoenix or Atlanta.

Starr Tincup Lads - thanks for the drink and for the introduction to Jerome Ternynck from Kronos partner MrTed. I hope Hilary Clinton makes it home safely!

George Larocque, sales leader extraordinaire - I wish you well at Arbita

Elaine Orler of Knowledge Infusion - looking forward to talking to you more about the Workforce Institute board of directors.

Judy Duff and Amy Tatarka of Salary.com - even though you didn't win the Talent Management shootout, your application looks great and I was truly impressed with the breadth of your offering.

Now, off to KronosWorks. If you're going, or wish you were, join our Facebook group.

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