More information is not always better information, or leads to better decisions

Quick update for a busy, cold Monday in the Northeast. Over the weekend while enjoying my typical evening of NBA League Pass and catching up on some reading, I ran into this excellent piece on the Behavioural Investment blog titled 'Can More Information Lead to Worse Investment Decisions.'

In the piece, author Joe Wiggins references a research study titled 'Effects of Amount of Information on Judgement Accuracy and Confidence' that was published in 2008 in the academic journal Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, (I trust you are all up to date on your stack of these journals). Long, (really long) story short, the researchers found that having more information available that was meant to help subject make decisions had interesting and counter-intuitive effects. Essentially, more information did not increase the quality of decision making in a significant way, while at the same time increasing the subject's level of confidence in their decisions, which as we just noted, did not in fact get any better.

Here's a simple chart from one of the experiments showing what happened to decision quality and subject confidence when more information and data about the decision was made available to subjects. 

The data above shows how subjects in the study had to forecast a winner for a number of college football games based on sets of anonymised statistical information about the teams  The information came in blocks of 6 (so for the first trial of predictions the participant had 6 pieces of data) and after each subsequent trial of predictions they were given another block of information, up to 5 blocks (or 30 data points in total), and had to update their predictions.  Participants were asked to predict both the winner and their confidence in their judgement between 50% and 100%. The aim of the experiment was to understand how increased information impacted both accuracy and confidence in their decisions/predictions.

Joe at Behavioural Investment sums up the results of the experiment really well:

The contrasting impact of the additional information is stark – the accuracy of decision making is flat, decisions were little better with 30 statistics than just 6, however, participant confidence that they could select the winner increased materially and consistently.  When we come into possession of more, seemingly relevant, information our belief that we are making the right decision can be emboldened even if there is no justification for this shift in confidence levels.

A really important reminder and a kind of a warning for any of us, say in HR in 2019, who are increasingly seeking to and are more able to gather more and more data and information to use and apply in HR and talent decision making. If more information does not always, (or maybe ever), lead to better decisions, then we need to be really much more careful how we plan to gather, process, and apply data for decision making. 

The most basic takeaway from this kind of study is that we probably need to spend much more time thinking about what data and information is meaningful or predictive towards making a decision, rather than increasing our efforts to simply gather more and more data, from all the possible available sources, under the probably false impression that more = better.

There are plenty of reasons why we are inclined to gather more data is we can - we might not know what information is actually relevant, so we look to simply collect data, we want to show we did a lot of research before taking a decision, or we want to be more comfortable with our decision if it is supported by more data. 

But I think it's best to start small with our data sets we apply to decisions, take time to test if the data we already possess is meaningful and predictive before chasing more data for its own sake.

Ok, that's it, I'm out - have a great week!

PODCAST: #HRHappyHour 353 - Transforming the Employee Experience with HR Technology

HR Happy Hour 353 - Transforming the Employee Experience with HR Technology

Hosts:Steve Boese, Trish McFarlane

Guests: Patrick Smith, Elias Medina, Arizona Federal Credit Union

Listen HERE

This week on the HR Happy Hour Show, Steve and Trish were joined by Patrick Smith and Elias Medina of the Arizona Federal Credit Union to talk HR Transformation and the role of modern HR Technology in that transformation. At the Arizona Federal Credit Union, the organization strives to give their members the most technologically advanced products, and the HR organization knew they needed to transform to deliver to their employees and candidates the same kinds of advanced, user-centric HR technology tools they have come to expect. Patrick and Elias shared how this HR and HR tech transformations have made significant impact in recruiting, benefits, payroll and more and how these technologies are driving both modern user experiences as well as improved service delivery and process improvement.  This is a great story of how modern HR technologies can drive change and improve outcomes at a small/midsize organization and how HR leaders at these organizations can lead their organizations forward. 

You can listen to the show on the show page HERE, on your favorite podcast app, or by using the widget player below:

This was a fun and interesting show, thanks so much to Patrick and Elias for sharing the Arizona Federal Credit Union story - "I no longer fear open enrollment" was probably one of the best moments in HR Happy Hour Show history!

Remember to subscribe to the HR Happy Hour Show on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher Radio, Google Podcasts, or your favorite podcast app - just search for 'HR Happy Hour.'

PODCAST: #HRHappyHour 352 - Improving Diversity Recruiting in Technology

HR Happy Hour 352 - Improving Diversity Recruiting in Technology

Host: Steve Boese

Guest: Kylie Gomez, Atlassian

Listen HERE

This week on the HR Happy Hour Show, Steve is joined by Kylie Gomez, Senior Product Recruiter at Atlassian, a leading technology company to talk about how they approach the challenges of recruiting a more diverse set of candidates.

Atlassian has about 3,000 employees worldwide, and has plans to grow to 5,000 in the next few years. A big challenge for Atlassian, and for any company in growth mode, is to improve the diversity of their candidate pools, as well as the people they eventually bring into the organization. On the show, Kylie shared some specific approaches that have been working for Atlassian - thinking about the problem in a holistic way, using modern technology tools that support more diverse and unbiased candidate searches and assessment, and making sure that the company culture and mission are at the forefront in the entire recruiting process.

You can listen to the show on the show page HERE, on your favorite podcast app, or by using the widget player below:

This is a really interesting and enlightening conversation with a recruiting leader at one of tech's most successful and innovative companies, and one from which any HR and recruiting leader can take away some important insights around improving diversity and reducing bias in the recruiting process.

Remember to subscribe to the HR Happy Hour Show on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher Radio, Google Podcasts or your favorite podcast app - just search for 'HR Happy Hour.'

HRE Column: HCM Trends for 2019

Heading into the final stretch of 2018 and I wanted to share with you, gentle reader, the latest installment of the monthly Inside HR Tech Column that runs on Human Resource Executive Online.

The piece is titled HR Technology Trends You Can't Afford to Ignore, and is a look at some imporant HR and HR Technolgy trends inspired by a recently released report, 2019 HCM Trends Report, from three of the best independent HR and HR tech analysts in the space.

Here's an excerpt from the piece on HRE:

With the end of the year fast approaching, it is natural to turn our attention to the coming year, which means reading, thinking and talking with HR-technology leaders about the trends, developments and new technologies they think will have the most impact for HR organizations in the new year. Fortunately for me, three industry experts who are regular speakers at the HR Technology Conference—George LaRocque, Ben Eubanks and Trish McFarlane—recently released the 2019 HCM Trends Report, which identifies several of the big-picture HCM and workplace trends that will impact organizations and shape the direction of HR-technology innovation in 2019.

I recommend downloading and reading the entire (free) report here, but I also wanted to highlight three of what I think are the more important HCM trends that the authors lay out in the report. I’ll also suggest some ways HR-technology innovation will reflect these trends in 2019 and offer recommendations for HR leaders on how to move forward.

Practical Applications of AI at Work

If there was one term that seemed to shape much of the HR-technology conversation in 2018, it was artificial intelligence. Like many macro-technology trends that have come before (SaaS, mobile, UX, etc.), AI is now increasingly applied to support HR and talent-management functions. But like many emerging technologies of the past, AI seems more like just a cool set of capabilities still in search of the right problems to help solve.

In the 2019 HCM Trends Report, Eubanks makes a great point about where the AI conversation needs to head in 2019 stating, “The thing that’s going to change in 2019 is a greater focus on the actual, practical impacts of AI. It’s no longer enough to shout that your technology has machine learning or automation capabilities if you want attention—you’ll have to explain the problems it solves, or risk being overshadowed by those that do.”

The takeaway for HR leaders who are thinking about how to make AI-enabled HR-technology plans for 2019? Make sure you press any potential technology provider for demonstrable examples of real-world applications of these AI tools, and the ability to see quantifiable results of these projects. In 2019, AI must move past the “hype” and begin to deliver real returns, or as Eubanks correctly implies, the technologies—and your efforts using them—will not be successful.

Read the rest at HRE Online...

You can also subscribe on HRE Online to get my monthly Inside HR Tech column via email here. I promise it will be the most exciting email you will ever receive. 

Thanks for checking out the column, the blog, the podcasts, the 'Alexa' show, and all the nonsense I'm now in my second decade of churning out. 

Have a great day!

HRE Column: Navigating #HRTech Mergers and Acquisitions

Shaking off the post-Thanksgiving holiday turkey coma to share with you, gentle reader, the latest installment of the monthly Inside HR Tech Column that runs on Human Resource Executive Online.

The piece is titled Navigating Mergers and Acquisitions in HR Tech, and is a look at some recent M&A activity in the HR Tech space, and offers some suggestions for HR leaders as to how to best protect their organization's investments in HR tech in this climate.

Here's an excerpt from the piece on HRE:

Recently, several significant mergers and acquisitions in the HR-technology market have made news. From Ultimate Software acquiring PeopleDoc to Saba Software acquiring Lumesse (and Halogen Software before that) to the latest and largest announcement that SAP will acquire Qualtrics for $8 billion in cash, there has been no shortage of wow-inducing developments in HR tech.

But while these announcements certainly produce headlines and get analyzed for their impact on share prices, market share and the software company’s long-term futures, we often tend to overlook one really important constituency that is impacted by these M&A events: the customers of the company that gets acquired.

While the M&A announcements and subsequent comments from executives of the acquiring company usually talk a little about what the future may hold for the acquired product and its customers, there definitely can be some uncertainty about the future direction of an acquired company and product set. For customers of those products, it is important to understand what an M&A event may mean for them, and to be as prepared as possible for any impacts—including changes that can significantly alter the customer’s HR technology platforms and future direction.

If your company is a customer/user of an HR-technology solution that has been acquired by another HR-tech provider, here are three things to consider as you react to the news:

Read the rest at HRE Online...

You can also subscribe on HRE Online to get my monthly Inside HR Tech column via email here. I promise it will be the most exciting email you will ever receive. 

Thanks for checking out the column, the blog, the podcasts, the 'Alexa' show, and all the nonsense I'm now in my second decade of churning out. 

Have a great week!