Deck 6: Human Resource Metrics and Workforce Analytics

Question 1

The met?rics that focus on how well the HR department accomplishes its critical processes to support organizational effectiveness are:

A)Strategic realignment
B)Predictive analysis
C)computing infrastructures
D)administrative process efficiency

Answer 1

D

Question 2

HR metrics that focus on developing leading indicators of performance from several impor?tant perspectives are called:

A)Dashboards
B)Data Mining
C)Workforce Modeling
D)Operational Experiments

Answer 2

A

Question 3

The primary purpose for the use of HR metrics and workforce analytics is to:

A)measure the effectiveness of HR programs
B)help managers make different and better decisions
C)compare the differences among operational departments, e.g., finance, marketing
D)provide qualitative information about the functioning of the organization.

Answer 3

B

Question 4

The use of HR metrics and workforce analytics is mostly driven by reduced computing costs.

Question 5

The most important factor that has led to increased emphasis on HR metrics and analytics is:

A)the costs involved in employee transactions
B)the quality revolution in the U.S.
C)the increased use and implementation of integrated HRIS
D)the growing interest in evidence-based management

Question 6

An important test of the appropriateness of outcome metrics is the "why" test.

Question 7

Metrics are data (numbers)that reflect some detail about given organizational outcomes while analytics are:

A)used to calculate costs and benefits analyses
B)used to predict the future strategy of an organization
C)strategies for combining metrics and examining changes in metrics
D)efforts to align real-time analysis of organizational and HR processes

Question 8

Which of the following sets of expertise is not needed for excellence in human resources functioning?

A)centers of excellence
B)internal and external business partners
C)computing infrastructures
D)HR process efficiency

Question 9

The balanced scorecard approach focuses on what will happen in the organization.

Question 10

Attempts to understand how an organization's human capital needs would change as a function of some expected change in the organization's environment is called:

A)strategic alignment
B)workforce modeling
C)operational experiments
D)data mining

Question 11

The Saratoga Institute/SHRM Human Resources metrics are:

A)the HR metrics most frequently used in organizations
B)the foundation for the HRM benchmarking programs
C)the metrics used to measure or audit HR programs and activities
D)all of the above

Question 12

Using HR metrics to measure the effectiveness of one company's HR programs against other companies is called:

A)organizational enhancement
B)baseline functionality
C)benchmarking
D)risk avoidance

Question 13

An example of a push communications channel is:

A)memos from top management
B)posting metrics and analytics on company websites
C)offering access to searchable information repositories
D)emails to managers on metrics and analytics

Question 14

The technique used to identify causal mechanism within data and identify patterns of relationships is called:

A)data mining
B)computing infrastructures
C)operational experiments
D)strategic realignment

Question 15

Strategic realignment involves the set of activities most commonly known as:

A)predictive analysis
B)benchmarking
C)Total Quality Management
D)human resource planning

Question 16

Administrative process efficiency refers to the capacity to conduct existing HRM processes accurately and on time while minimizing costs.

Question 17

A common concern among individuals who construct metrics and analytics reports is:

A)they can lead to erroneous managerial actions
B)whether anyone pays any attention to their reports
C)poor reporting of data elements to form metrics by the HR department
D)that the computer software is capable of handling the magnitude of data

Question 18

Posting HR metrics and analytics analyses reports on internal company Web sites is called:

A)Putting HR Metrics and Analytics Data in Context
B)Push systems of reporting
C)Bottom line reports
D)Benchmarking

Question 19

One of the useful things to remember about HR metrics and analytics is "Don't Do Metrics." This advice means that:

A)organizations without an integrated computing infrastructure should not do metrics
B)not focus on small, narrowly targeted metrics
C)developing HR metrics should be focused on increased organizational effectiveness
D)both push and pull communications should be used

Question 20

Centralizing HRM processes, e.g., recruiting employees, training employees, directly affects organizational effectiveness.

Question 21

A common and effective approach in identifying choices for outcome measures are based on
personal theories.

Question 22

What is meant by HR administrative process efficiency? Provide an example of this characteristic of an HR department's functioning.

Question 23

What are the differences between metrics and analytics?

Question 24

Many managers perceive the increased interest in metrics and analytics as simply a mandate
to compute and report more metrics.

Question 25

Relying on intuition or "expert judgment" about organizational problems is the basis of
operational experiments.

Question 26

What is the difference between data mining and predictive analyses?

Question 27

When undertaking a metrics and analytics effort, the first question is the cost.

Question 28

Common perspective and literature advice indicate that data elements lead to metrics.

Question 29

Assessing and reporting HR metrics will result in better organizational performance.

Question 30

Organizations must have access to the knowledge in "centers of excellence" to change
activities of the HRM function.

Question 31

What was the importance of Huselid's (1995)work on high performance work systems that resulted in the development of the HR scorecard?

Question 32

What is the most important use of HR Metrics and Analytics?

Question 33

What is workforce modeling and what is its use in an organization?

Question 34

No information system generates any return on the investment unless managers change their
decision behavior for the better.

Question 35

What is the primary determinant of the success of a metrics and analytics project?

Question 36

What metric of HR effectiveness is calculated by "the sum of external costs (recruiting)and internal costs (training new employees)divided by the total number of new employees in a specific time period?"

Question 37

Trying to identifying what metrics should be reported without considering an organization's
problems and opportunities misses the reasons for the metrics.

Question 38

Dashboards are an enriched component of reporting.

Question 39

Why is it important to put HR metrics and analytics in context?

Question 40

What is the difference between "push" and "pull" methods of communicating HR metrics and analytics?