The revealing truth about people analytics

People analytics, also called workforce or HR analytics, is the data-driven approach to optimising your people processes. It combines quantitative and qualitative data to help recruit, onboard, manage, and develop employees effectively. 

It involves collecting and analysing data to improve decisions about your workforce and employee experiences.

People analytics is essential for organisations that are scaling, developing leaders, or prioritising their culture. Understanding the benefits of people analytics helps to ensure your workforce planning aligns with business goals.

It supports:

• Talent attraction, recruitment, and retention

• Staff attrition analysis

• Identifying skill gaps and productivity questions

• Workforce planning initiatives

• And much more…

By leveraging data, organisations can recruit the right people, develop them, and anticipate challenges before they become issues.

Personio is designed to help organisations no matter their size or journey. Our Human Resource Information System (HRIS) offers a compendium of features that grows with your organisation.

Start with a GDPR-compliant HR analytics platform. Combine this with qualitative measures like pulse surveys to build robust data foundation. 

Platforms like Personio make it easy to store, organise, and analyse employee data securely, helping HR teams save time while providing actionable insights.

McKinsey’s “Stairway to Impact” outlines how organisations evolve from basic data collection to advanced analytics and predictive models. At advanced stages, analytics forms a trusted foundation for HR and organisational decisions.

The future of people analytics lies in predictive capabilities that anticipate trends, workforce needs, and turnover risks, enabling proactive interventions rather than reactive measures.

Personio helps companies stay ahead of the competition with a progressive suite of HR analytics, accessible at the click of a button.

You don’t have to be able to have the statistical knowledge to make reliable predictions in order to benefit from great people analytics, though.

Sometimes it’s just great to start by gathering data that gives you a line in the sand – for example, by using employee surveys.

• Google’s HR team (known as People Operations) uses analytics to measure productivity, ‘check the pulse’ of their organisation, and turn feedback into meaningful change that aligns processes with company culture. 

• SSE’s own in-depth analytics found that fully trained apprentices return £4.29 for every £1 invested, helping to justify training program to leadership.

• The Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS), meanwhile, combined engagement surveys, interviews, and 360-degree reviews across 4,000 managers to uncover that employees often leave managers, not companies.

These case studies show how people analytics data drives measurable impacts across organisations.

Yes, people analytics can identify red flags such as absence, performance issues, and disengagement. By combining these metrics, HR teams gain a holistic view of potential attrition risks.

But the most important part is then turning that data into action. People analytics can signal that your HR team needs to put together the initiatives to help decrease the chances of people turning over.

For that, you need time. Discover how Personio can get time back for your team today.

Understanding people analytics goes beyond reviewing reports. Skilled analysts connect HR data with other systems to uncover actionable insights.

HR leaders benefit most when analysts answer the question, “So what?”. This enables strategic decisions that improve performance, engagement, and organisational culture.

Your HR or People Team is going to be the main ones responsible for managing your repository of people analytics. After all, these are the same experts who are going to turn that data into concrete initiatives to help optimise your workforce.

For that to occur, your HR team needs the time to be able to focus on what comes out of analysis. This means saving time on their core tasks, while also being able to rely on a rock-solid analytical foundation of clean, reliable employee data.

Speaking of data, let’s talk about reports in one click with Personio.

People analytics can help root decisions firmly in reality and can help power your overall people strategy. Think of it as the navigation system for your people strategy, grounding decisions in data and guiding action.

Great HR leaders have both the data and time to make predictions about the future of work and act on them. This combination is essential and is why having trustworthy people analytics is a core element of strategic HR. Now, you just need the time to take action.

Ethical people analytics requires balancing organisational insight with employee rights. Companies must ensure data privacy and security, obtain informed consent, maintain transparency about how data is used, avoid bias in decisions, and use analytics to support development rather than surveillance or punitive actions.

Key metrics in people analytics include recruitment metrics like time-to-hire and quality of hire; employee engagement measures such as satisfaction scores and survey participation; performance metrics like productivity and goal achievement; retention metrics including turnover and absenteeism; learning and development metrics such as training effectiveness and skills gaps; and diversity and inclusion metrics like pay equity and representation in leadership.