Human Capital Management Update

Anyone who still questions how important talent management is to a larger HCM strategy only needs to consider the results of two new research studies. A report just released by technology analyst IDC calls 2006 "a pivotal year" for the workforce performance management market, adding that competition for talent is now a major priority for businesses.

"The war for talent is re-emerging and firms are recognizing that they are once again competing not only for product superiority, but for a high-performing workforce, which is key to competitive advantage," says Lisa Rowan, program manager for IDC's HR and Talent Management Services.

Similarly, Yankee Group forecasts that spending on technology to facilitate talent management is experiencing "exponential growth." The market researcher credited heightened interest in talent retention and more intense focus on acquiring and managing talent as factors in the expansion of talent management technology.

The Technology's the Thing
Also helping to fuel the growth in talent management technologies is the evolution of the applications themselves, symbolized by two important trends: enterprise HCM systems and increasingly sophisticated analytical tools that help managers get the most out of their talent management tools.

Enterprisewide HCM suites provide a central framework that integrates all the various talent management components. This ensures that recruiting, training, performance management, and compensation are part of an efficient, end-to-end business process. In addition to central control, enterprisewide HCM systems ensure that corporatewide policies and procedures are uniformly applied throughout the organization.

The rise of enterprisewide HCM suites is making possible another trend, one that adds a layer of analytical intelligence to the framework. The right analytical tools give companies new insights into their talent-cultivation practices. For example, by examining the incoming skills and follow-on training of past hires, managers can make decisions about what works and what needs improving in future efforts.

The Oracle HCM product lines all offer talent management suites that cover the entire talent lifecycle—from planning and competencies to business intelligence. Both Oracle E-Business Suite Human Resources and PeopleSoft Enterprise HCM use a central information hub that provides a core record of data and transactions for HR business intelligence. The hub lets managers efficiently analyze talent management processes and workforce data to assess the effectiveness of the programs. And rather than being a cobbled-together solution composed of various commercial and homegrown systems, the Oracle solution comes as part of an overall integrated architecture.

Smart Talent
In addition, Oracle Daily Business Intelligence (DBI) for HRMS and PeopleSoft Workforce Analytics offer tools that help managers gain new insights into HR areas that bear directly on talent management, including compensation and benefits, payroll, recruitment, and learning. These business intelligence applications detail the movements of people as they take on new assignments and responsibilities. They display key metrics for tracking trends, changes and exceptions in employee turnover, salary levels, and headcounts against allocated budgets. They can also compare current data points against the previous period or year, and offer insights into seasonal changes or macro changes that occur over longer periods of time.

Because they run within an enterprise framework, DBI for HRMS and Workforce Analytics can consolidate metrics and convert financial data to enable statistics to be rolled up into a single global picture.

Find out more about how Oracle E-Business Suite Human Resources and PeopleSoft Human Capital Management can help your organization.

Alan Joch is an independent writer focusing on business and technology.

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