People analytics: international perspectives on people data

People analytics is rising up the agenda for organisations globally. With technology providing businesses more and more ways to collect people data, using this information to gain workforce insight, drive business performance and enhance employee experience is expected to grow.

Building on our our recent survey People analytics: driving business performance with people data, these focus reports provide an international perspective on how organisations use people analytics to understand people data. We asked 3,852 business professionals from the UK and Ireland, US, Middle East and North Africa (MENA) and South-East Asia their views on the impact of people analytics, the confidence and capability of the people professional in conducting analytics, and how people data is used to understand risk and tackle business challenges.

This global survey finds that HR professionals across the world using people data to tackle significant challenges, with three-quarters (75%) tackling workforce performance and productivity issues using people data. But, the survey also reveals that how and when organisations use people data differs across region. 

• 6 in 10 UK professionals (57%) report that they have access to people data, compared to 4 in 10 US respondents (41%) and 5 in 10 SE-Asia and MENA respondents (54% and 50%). However, just 17% of UK professionals use this data on a daily basis, the lowest of all the region in the survey.
  
  
• People analytics culture  – where organisations actively use people data to tackle business issues, speak out about the value of people data and seek out data to make decisions  – appears to be stronger in MENA and SE Asia than the UK, Ireland the US. For example, 35% of UK professionals report a strong people analytics culture compared to 54% of SE Asia professionals. 
  
  
• There are marked differences in data use across regions, with MENA and SE Asia respondents far more likely to be frequently using all types of analysis than UK respondents. But there is also untapped potential where HR professionals feel confident in using analytic techniques but don’t apply them in every day practice.
  
  
• The extent to which non-HR professionals value people analytics varies across region. Whilst SE-Asia and MENA respondents report gaining the most value from people data, UK respondents are more likely to indicate they trust the people data they receive.