An organisation’s people are its unique resource. People can learn, develop and grow – they are the only part of a business that can improve itself and they are fundamental to creating value in organisations.

People measures, and the field of human capital analytics, can help business professionals to understand how purposeful investment in the workforce can create and preserve this value, and in doing so, improve productivity, innovation and business performance.

The Valuing your Talent framework enables business leaders, managers and investors to better understand an organisation’s people management strategy and the ways in which it drives business performance. It provides a basis for conversation between all parts of the business to understand how best to "join the dots" and unlock the value of their people.

The Valuing your Talent framework

The framework is made up of the four levels corresponding to an organisation’s business model: its inputs, activities, outputs and outcomes. The first level represents basic people data and fundamental aspects of people strategy. As organisations move up the framework, each level offers greater insight, moving from people strategy to business strategy and increased business impact.

The framework describes the measures that an organisation may use and illustrates their value to the organisation by positioning them in a business model hierarchy. The four key stages in the framework are inputs, activities, outputs and outcomes, which ties directly to the business model stages as discussed earlier.

Inputs

Inputs are the fundamental building blocks for achieving value through people. At any point in time, this is the stock of human resources that an organisation needs to build from to sustain and improve overall organisational performance, and to respond to new opportunities and challenges. This is the most basic level of measures available to an organisation.

  • Workforce composition and diversity.
  • Workforce costs.
  • Regulatory compliance.
  • Workforce potential.

Activities

Activities are the key investments and processes that organisations choose to make to ensure their people are able to work productively and healthily, and deliver value for all of the organisation’s stakeholders. Data at the activities level includes tangible information about the processes through which human capital is mobilised through people management processes.

  • Attraction and recruitment.
  • Performance management.
  • Learning and development.
  • Reward and recognition.
  • Employee relations.
  • Employee welfare.
  • Knowledge management.
  • Organisational design and development.
  • Workforce planning.

Outputs

Outputs are the results of the investments in activity-level processes. They provide the means for evaluating the impact of the human capital development and people management processes at the activities level, and describe how the return on those investments can be improved, optimised and adapted to meet an organisation’s ongoing needs.

  • Leadership capability
  • Workforce performance and productivity
  • Engagement and well-being
  • Business operating model

Outcomes

Outcomes tell organisations and their stakeholders whether outputs are translating into value. Value to the organisation will include financial, human, intellectual, social, enviromental and customer value, and will be prioritised according to the business model operated by the organisation. Outcomes measures describe how the organisation is sustaining itself to deliver value not just for today, but into the future.

  • Innovation, agility and resilience.
  • Culture.
  • Organisation performance.

Conclusion

Valuing your Talent is designed to be a flexible tool for organisations to apply in various situations and contexts. The framework does not propose a one-size-fits-all solution, given the simple fact that organisations will all have different needs.

The flexible approach means that organisations are not encouraged to apply the methodology in a tick-box fashion. Instead, professionals should look to apply the concepts of the framework to their business and, through using their own professional judgement, decide which areas of the framework are most appropriate.