The New AI in Workforce Transformation: Agility and Insights

Imagine a world where your team takes a proactive approach to business – regardless of the constant state of change going on around them. 

A world where collaboration is seamless and effortless. A world where businesses can make data-driven decisions at lightning speed, with insights that are always up-to-date and relevant. 

This type of workforce transformation is not only possible, but unfolding right before our eyes by people-centric organizations connecting operational workforce plans to workforce strategy for greater agility, particularly when that strategy pivots.

The New World of Work Calls for AI

I write a lot about artificial intelligence, which is typically shortened to AI. Today, however, I want to open your eyes to another meaning: agility and insights. The changing workforce and economy – inspired by the pandemic, supply chain challenges, international strife, and economic pressures – demand new solutions. Poor data quality, buried information, reactive decision-making, uncertainty on how to go forward are common maladies for organizations. Solutions, however, may be found in prioritizing agility and insights.

To illustrate this, let’s rewind two decades. I was working as an accountant and financial analyst. Closing out the books at the end of a reporting period was, in a word, tedious. This process required our IT team to consolidate data entries while we waited for results to complete our work. For about 10 to 15 days, my colleagues and I would sequester ourselves in a conference room, working 12-hour days, ordering takeout for lunch and dinner with an attempt to complete a month-end close on time.

Today, new technology allows for the possibility of a zero-day close — a feat that was once only possible in our wildest of dreams. The enterprise systems software company, Workday, has found a way to not only drastically increase the pace of the month-end close process, but also provide better business insights for workforce plans. With Workday’s enterprise cloud applications for finance and human resources, access to the latest up-to-date information allows people to spend more time uncovering what the numbers mean, rather than verifying individual transactions. This gives companies much greater agility to be proactive by using data to make more informed decisions, faster. 

In the world of business, two weeks can make a big difference. Data allows powerful multi-dimensional modeling and continuous planning across the company. This is strategic operational efficiency and agility. 

Workforce strategy – freeing up people’s time so they can do more important tasks and innovate while gaining critical insights faster – connects with operational workforce planning. This is the new world of work. Today, closing the loop from data to actionable insights helps organizations adapt and thrive in a changing world. No question there is an abundance of data all around us. The challenge is that data without proper analytics slows organizations down, makes them less adaptable to change, increases the possibility of errors, requires more time and creates siloed, outdated data.

Modern HR and people analytics leaders are choosing a different road. 

Now, let’s take a look at what is driving the bridge between workforce planning and strategy. I call it “AI”: Agility and Insights.

Agility is a Productivity Catalyst

Workforce planning technology can help enhance productivity by breaking down silos, automating repetitive tasks, updating financial and operating reporting based on changing information and identifying inefficiencies in workflows. For instance, cloud-based Workday solutions help Netflix make informative decisions based on real-time data. The automated capability enhances cross-functional communication between IT, Finance and HR, and allows Netflix to collect data, pivot and make decisions with speed and at scale. Proactive decision-making is a byproduct of an agile organization. Cross-collaboration helps identify workforce needs and enables active participation across the company.

Agility also means having flexible workforce scheduling and resource allocation. By analyzing data on employee availability, workload and skill sets, Workday solutions can suggest optimal schedules and task assignments. This reduces the time and effort required to manually create and manage schedules, leading to better workforce efficiency.

Lastly, keeping top performers engaged and identifying areas of greater potential in teams and individuals have long been ambiguous issues for many companies. Workday People Analytics uncovers deeper trends, top drivers, relevant risks and opportunities, and detailed data sets across a company-wide team using multi-dimensional modeling, AI and machine learning. Imagine the possibilities for improving areas such as diversity and inclusion, organization composition, retention, and attrition, hiring, talent and performance and skills.

Insights Create Greater Meaning

AI – agility and insights – are paramount for maintaining a productive workplace culture, one where people see how they are contributing to growth through follow-through on initiatives. Workday enables the ability for people to plan, execute and analyze securely. By accelerating action with real-time data for multi-dimensional analysis and tailored insights, information becomes “unburied.” This makes way for more strategic planning and decision-making. 

Greater insights lend greater meaning to one’s work. Every technology decision is a culture decision. With millennials reaching 75% of the workforce by 2025, companies are looking to adopt cloud-first and mobile-first solutions to better engage with digital natives. CarMax, the largest US retailer for used cars, creates a people-first culture by leveraging Workday. In a video interview, Shamim Mohammed, CarMax’s SVP, Chief Information and Technology Officer, says it best: “Technology plays a huge role in creating and cultivating culture.”

How Will You Employ the New AI in Your Organization?

An innovator in the field of human resources, Workday’s Vice President, People Analytics Phil Willburn sits at the HR table every day. In his five years with the company, he has seen the workplace narrative change dramatically. 

On the Workplace Stories podcast, produced by RedThread Research, he says the last few years have been “crazy challenging” for HR and is a true “area of transformation” for companies. The real game changers? Agility and insight relative to your workforce. 

I’ll be interviewing Phil on CXO Spice, and we’ll be talking about why people analytics are driving impact for people as data is accelerating. On the podcast, Phil says that all this helps people insight for “swifter” decisions. 

Automation is not a nice to have any more, it is a must have for companies to gain insights in real-time.

For example, Workday uses personas to understand what people need to thrive. These personas help Workday “scale” solutions by developing a product across multiple personas, including SVP, VP-Plus, Director, People Leaders, and ICs. While some personas might need a link and a click into a dashboard, others, like the VP-Plus and SVP groups get a monthly digest to give them insights about their team. This is where data becomes true insight. According to Phil, these high-level leaders might see something like: “turnover is up, it’s up compared to your parent organization. Your goal for turnover for this year is to maintain a certain percentage. Your diversity hiring was positive, this is on par with meeting our goals for the end of the year. The number of people coming to the office is about this percentage; this is lower than what we see across Workday.”

As we look to the future, we can unlock new levels of AI (Agility & Insights) for employees and customers. From personalized training and development programs to real-time data insights that drive growth and innovation, the possibilities are endless. Businesses can streamline workflows, break down silos and automate repetitive tasks — allowing employees to focus on more strategic work that truly creates value.

The intersection of technology and humanity is where our power lies, and right now we’re merging onto a most exciting path powered by the new AI: agility and insights.