Workforce analytic tools make data more useful - From The Editors - International Finance Corp - Brief Article

HR Magazine, Oct, 2003 by Julie Britt

International Finance Corp. (IFC), a division of World Bank Group based in Washington, D.C., had a problem: Many of its loan officers were leaving the organization before they had been on the job for five years, the point at which they were likely to become most productive.

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

IFC helps finance private-sector projects in developing countries; last year it approved $3.1 billion in financing for 204 projects in 64 countries. Loan officers are an integral part of the 2,000-employee workforce.

IFC had reams of workforce data in its HR management system, but all that raw data wasn't very useful because the systems lacked integration, and the analysis was not reliable, says Joe Fucello, IFC's human resources program officer.

Fucello and his team remedied those weaknesses by implementing workforce analytics software and by improving the quality of the source data. Analytic tools can combine and compare raw workforce data, present it graphically to allow users to see historical trends and run "what-if" scenarios. The tools helped Fucello identify and repair weaknesses in recruitment and retention of loan officers.

In one of the three articles in this month's HR Technology Special Report, freelance writer Drew Robb details IFC's workforce analytics challenges and the steps the organization took to analyze data to improve decision-making and shore up the bottom line. The IFC feature, on page 70, also includes an overview of workforce analytic tools.