Four Lessons Learned in How to Use Human Resource Analytics to Improve the Effectiveness of Leadership Development

The tools and methodologies being developed in the emerging field of human resource analytics can be used both to measure the impact of your organization's investment in leadership development and, perhaps more importantly, to improve the return on that investment. In particular, analytics can be used to move your organization beyond one-size-fits-all competencies by identifying the unique leadership competencies that drive your organization's business results (sales, profits, and employee turnover). Your employee engagement survey is a powerful, but typically underutilized, tool for doing so. By linking it with other, disparate pieces of data (180/360 assessments, Learning Management System (LMS) records, turnover, and financial data), you create the foundation for understanding where leadership competencies explain variation (positive and negative) in your organization's business results. This, in turn, creates a strong evidence base for optimizing your leadership development strategyand is done so using metrics and analysis, which is the language of CEOs and CFOs.