Concept: Metrics in People Analytics
Metrics help you measure, organize, and make sense of your data. People Analytics offers out-of-the-box metrics for most topics and uses these metrics to provide:
- Key performance indicators (KPIs).
- Answers to key business questions in the form of focus insights.
Certain metrics serve as both KPIs and answers to business questions (focus insights).
People Analytics uses a set of metrics to calculate VIBE Index insights. These metrics are unique to the VIBE Index topic and are not used as KPIs or answers to business questions (focus insights). For more information on metrics for VIBE Index insights, see Concept: VIBE Index in People Analytics.
Metric Process
The People Analytics Administrator determines which configuration inputs to apply to the application configuration. These inputs include:
- Topics. For example, the topic Diversity and Inclusion offers metrics on female representation.
- KPI metrics. People Analytics enables the administrator to select which metrics to display on the KPIs tab and to choose how to arrange their order of appearance. Which metrics are available for selection depends on the included topics.
- Fields. People Analytics requires specific fields in order to generate KPI metrics.
- Population Filters. The administrator chooses which worker populations to include or exclude from all content in the application.
The automated analytical engine, that we refer to as Storyteller, uses these configuration inputs against the metric formula that is assigned to a given metric in order to calculate the metric for a KPI or focus insight.
These configuration inputs, the methods Storyteller uses to generate content, as well as automatic filtering, determine which metrics are available for analysis in the
People Analytics
report.Metric Calculation
Each metric in People Analytics uses a designated formula. Most formulas use a ratio structure, where the numerator represents a slice of the population and the denominator represents a whole population. This ratio structure enables you to view how specific areas of the organization are performing in relation to a given metric.
Example: The KPI metric Female Representation for the focus group Marketing shows the percentage of female workers out of the entire worker population for the organization Marketing.
Example: The metric Offer Decline Rate, which answers the business question [What areas do we need to focus on to stay competitive with offers?], for the focus group Marketing shows the percentage of candidates who declined an offer out of all candidates who were offered a position and replied to the offer.
Some metrics simply count the number of workers or events within a given population.
There are 5 different metric types for People Analytics metrics. These metric types determine the metric time frame that the metric formula uses when calculating the metric and the unit of measurement used for the metric value.
The values of the required fields Report Effective Date (Worker) and Status Month (Hiring) determine which worker records are included in the metric time frame. Note: The People Analytics Administrator configures these fields when configuring and installing the application.
When reviewing the metric type table below, note that the:
- Current snapshot period value is the fiscal period for which People Analytics displays data.
- ocus group is the area or areas of the organization for which the metric is calculated.
Metric Type | Metric Time Frame | Value | Details | Example |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Average | Current snapshot period value | People Analytics expresses the value in one of these units, depending on the metric:
| Sums the numerical attributes of workers and divides the sum by the count of unique workers in the given focus group. Shows the result in the appropriate unit of measurement. | Average Tenure = Sum of length of service in years for active workers in the Marketing organization during the current snapshot period / All active workers in the Marketing organization during the current snapshot period |
Ratio | Current snapshot period value | Expressed as a ratio, written as Number:1 Example: 9:1 Note: Ratio metrics are always displayed as an average. For example, Average Span of Control. See the row above in this table for details on the metric type Average. | Compares 2 different metric values. | Span of Control = Number of active direct reports in the Marketing organization during the current snapshot period / Number of active managers with direct reports in the Marketing organization during the current snapshot period |
Events Over Time | Specific time frame period. The time frame of the period depends on the specific metric and the:
The specific time frame period includes the current snapshot period and can be:
| Expressed as a percentage | Divides the number of events in a given focus group by the count of unique workers in a given focus group. Multiplies this value by 100. Shows the result as a percentage. Note: Annualized metrics convert a fiscal year to date value into an annualized rate by multiplying it by the ratio of 12 to the number of months passed in the current fiscal year. | Attrition Rate = Number of terminated workers in the Marketing organization for the 12 month period / Average active headcount in the Marketing organization for the 12 month period Annualized Attrition Rate = Number of workers terminated from the Marketing organization in the fiscal year to date / Average active headcount during the fiscal year to date (Count of active employees for each month in the fiscal year to date / Number of months in fiscal year to date) * (12 / Number of months in fiscal year to date) * 100 |
Rate | Current snapshot period value | Expressed as a percentage | Divides the subset of a population in a given focus group for the current snapshot period by a whole population in a given focus group for the current snapshot period. Multiplies this value by 100. Shows the result as a percentage. | Female Representation = Number of female active workers in the Marketing organization during the current snapshot period / All active workers in the Marketing organization during the current snapshot period |
Count | The time frame can be:
| Expressed as a numerical value | Shows the subset of a population for the specific time period. | Manager Active Headcount = Number of managers in the Marketing organization as of the current snapshot period |
The metric Headcount Growth Rate uses a unique calculation formula and therefore does not use one of the metric types in the table above. We find the difference between the active headcount for the current snapshot period and the active headcount for the period 6 months ago (or 3 months ago, depending on your data history). We divide this value by the active headcount for the period 6 months ago (or 3 months ago) and multiply the value by 100. The value is expressed as a percentage.
Comparison Points for Metrics
People Analytics offers comparison points for metrics. Comparison points enable you to determine how the areas of the organization you support are performing, in comparison to a historical period, to another organization within the company, or to the entire company.
Comparison Point | Used For | Calculation |
|---|---|---|
Historical snapshot period Depending on the metric and the data history currently in People Analytics, the historical snapshot can be either:
| KPIs and Focus Insights | Metric formula applied to the historical snapshot period. |
Current snapshot period for the comparison group | Focus Insights | Metric formula applied to the current snapshot period for the comparison group on a given focus insight. |
Company KPI Comparison (Current snapshot period for the company) | KPIs Unconstrained users see KPIs at the company level and therefore KPIs for these users do not include the company KPI comparison by default. Unconstrained users can apply filters to view KPIs for specific areas of the organization and see the difference to the company value. | Metric formula applied to data at the company level. Workday rounds this value to the nearest tenth decimal point. |