How Capital One delivers value at scale with People Analytics

Being focused on the impact [of People Analytics] is just going to drive so much more buy-in from your CHRO, from your business partners, from other partners and so just always keep coming back to that.

I first met today’s podcast guest nearly four years ago just before he embarked on his current role. I was hugely impressed. His background as an economist (which inspired his interest first in human capital and subsequently, people analytics), his focus on creating value and his sheer passion for the possibilities afforded by people analytics meant, I judged, that he had all the ingredients to be successful.

Today, as Head of People Strategy and Analytics at Capital One, Guru Sethupathy presides over one of the most advanced people analytics functions in the world. During his tenure, Guru has quadrupled the size of the function to around 100 people, and together with his team has delivered significant value to the business and Capital One’s associates.  

Guru is a deep-thinker and has retained that passion for people analytics I saw four years ago. I know that listeners will enjoy learning from Guru’s experience and vision for people analytics during the next 45 minutes or so.

You can listen by clicking on the image below or by visiting the podcast website here.

At the end of the day, the talent that you hire is one of the most important decisions that a company makes, not just from a talent perspective but also from a business perspective. It is THE thing.

In our conversation Guru and I discuss:

• The key milestones of how people analytics has been scaled at Capital One during Guru’s tenure, which include three steps: i) The vertical integration of reporting, strategy, consulting and data ("[People analytics is] all of those pieces"), ii) Data quality ("[Improving] the quality of our data and the measurement of things that we care about"), iii) Shift to insights and products ("Now that we have got the data in a good spot and our business leaders and HR partners really trust the data coming out of our shop, let's take it to the next level. How do we provide insights, how do we automate those insights and how do we distribute?")
• How people analytics has supported Capital One and its associates during the pandemic ("Polling and surveys are really, really important because otherwise you only hear the loudest voices")
• Some of the key focus areas for the people analytics team at Capital One including: hiring, fairness ("how do we use data, analytics, but then behavioural change to fundamentally make our talent systems: hiring, promotion and pay as fair as possible?", and internal mobility ("how do you build an efficient internal marketplace?").
• Examples of the products the people analytics team has built to support talent conversations ("We have a tool called Workflow, that really allows you to see how a person's career has evolved over time"), and hiring ("We are in the process of transforming our selection process and our interview process, our cases and also using technology to transform our top of the funnel"
• How to sustain behavioural change through people analytics ("If you put the evidence together across those pilots, there does seem to be some evidence that if you nudge people in the right way, at the right time and with the right type of communications, you can actually drive some behavioural change.")
• Three steps Capital One has taken to build a data-driven culture across its HR function: i) exporting talent from the people analytics team into HR, ii) coaching, training and a Community of Practice ("We hold sessions around data literacy, around how to problem solve with data, how do you think about developing hypotheses, how you might use data to test those hypotheses and building a community of practice around it."), and iii) top down clarity from the CHRO ("If you are reinforcing learning with also hearing that, hey, this is where we want to go as an HR organisation and this is where we want our talent to go. That combination is going to be more powerful.")
• How to scale people analytics by developing products that people will use: ("I would just start with like, hey, let's build out a smaller team that is really doing the most important problem solving around the most important questions. Then once you have done that, you move to scaling it up in terms of the data and the product infrastructure.")
• The role of HR in helping to prepare organisations for hybrid ways of working ("Remote means different things for someone who is an individual contributor on a software engineering team versus a people leader who leads a team of 50 people. So I think we have to dig under remote flexibility for who, for when and really develop some principles around it.")

This episode is a must-listen for anyone interested or involved in people analytics, employee experience and hr technology so that’s business leaders, CHROs and anyone in a People Analytics, Learning HR Tech or HR Business Partner role. 

One of the things I look for in my senior leadership team are people who know how to manage stakeholders... and really influence senior executives.

LISTEN TO THE PODCAST

To listen to the Podcast and read the transcript of my discussion with Guru, head over to myHRfuture by clicking on this link: How Capital One delivers value at scale with People Analytics.

WATCH THE VIDEOS

As well as the podcast, there will be a couple of videos available on the myHRfuture YouTube channel highlighting two of the topics Guru and I covered in our conversation. In the video below, Guru explains how Capital One builds data literacy into its HR function.

GET INVOLVED

If you enjoyed listening to this week's podcast episode, I'd be grateful if you could take the following steps:

1. Please subscribe to the Digital HR Leaders podcast and weekly newsletter to make sure you don’t miss an episode.
2. Please take the time to rate the show on iTunes. We rely on your feedback and support to make the podcast, so this is very helpful!
3. Who would you like to see me interview in future episodes? Let me know in the comments below.
4. Lastly, don’t forget to share on social media with your friends and colleagues, your support is always greatly appreciated!

THANK YOU

A huge thank you to Guru for sharing his experience, ideas and insights with our listeners. You can connect with Guru on LinkedIn and follow him on Twitter @gurusethupathy. If you want to read more about Guru's work at Capital One, you might also want to read the articles below:

• How can you scale People Analytics in a Global Organisation?
• Leaders in People Analytics: Capital One’s ongoing quest to advance HR research

Thanks to OrgVue for sponsoring Series 11 of the podcast, and also Ian Bailie, Manpreet Randhawa, Caroline Styr and the myHRfuture team for creating the Digital HR Leaders podcast and video series.

LEARN MORE ON SCALING PEOPLE ANALYTICS

The insights Guru provides on how to scale people analytics in an organisation, such as bringing data, reporting, consulting and strategy together, partnering with stakeholders in the business to identify the most important work, and productising solutions tallies with our experience at Insight222. In research we published in 2020, we recommend setting the operating model for people analytics to flow along a value chain. The people analytics value chain is led by client drivers as inputs and ends with analytics products delivering business outcomes at scale. You can download and read the report here: Delivering Value at Scale: A New Operating Model for People Analytics.

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CATCH UP ON THE DIGITAL HR LEADERS PODCAST

If you haven't listened to all of the episodes of the Digital HR Leaders Podcast, you can catch up now by clicking on the links below.

• EP 54: Ethan Bernstein - How Can HR Help Organisations Prepare for Hybrid Working?
• EP 53: Wagner Denuzzo - How HR enables business transformation at Prudential Financial
• EP 52: Wenshan Xu - How Singapore uses skills data to support lifelong learning
• EP 51: Dave Ulrich, Brigette McInnis-Day and Rupert Morrison - The Future of HR: How can HR can be more value and business focused?
• BONUS EPISODE: David Green & Ian Bailie - 'All Eyes on HR' - HR Predictions for 2021
• EP 50: Renil Kumar - How Wipro uses People Analytics to enable hyper-personalisation
• EP 49: Michael Arena - How ONA can help understand the impact of virtual and hybrid working on innovation and wellbeing
• EP 48: Daniel West - How to Democratise People Analytics to Drive Agile Decision Making
• EP 47: Melissa Harper - How Bayer is redefining the workplace around Purpose, Innovation & Culture
• EP 46: Chin Yin Ong - How people data can drive better business and employee outcomes
• EP 45: Vidya Krishnan - Making learning a habit that matters at Ericsson
• EP 44: Simon Brown - How Novartis promotes learning curiosity to drive business value
• EP 43: Kat Kennedy - Improving Employee Experience through Learning, Skill Development & Mobility
• EP 42: Gianpiero Petriglieri - How Do You Create a Learning Culture in the Workplace?
• EP 41: Lynda Gratton - How can HR help shape the re-skilling and learning agenda?
• Bonus Episode: Diane Gherson - How IBM is Reinventing HR with AI and People Analytics
• Summer Special #5: Sophie Rwegera Khadhraoui - Building a People Analytics Function in a Humanitarian Organisation
• Summer Special #4: Dan Cable - How to help people love what they do at work
• Summer Special #3: Torin Ellis - What is HR's Role in Creating Diverse and Inclusive Organisations?
• Summer Special #2: Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic - What is the role of leadership in times of crisis?
• Summer Special #1: Amy Edmondson - How to create Psychological Safety at work
• EP 40: David Green - How can People Analytics drive business value?
• EP 39: Jeremy Shapiro - How People Analytics has progressed in the last ten years
• EP 38: Heather McGowan - How Covid-19 is accelerating the Future of Work
• EP 37: Thomas Rasmussen - How National Australia Bank has scaled People Analytics
• EP 36: Ravin Jesuthasan - Six imperatives for HR in the Future of Work
• BONUS EPISODE: Amit Mohindra & Dawn Klinghoffer - What is the future of People Analytics?
• EP 35: Peter Hinssen - What is the role of HR in driving and enabling innovation?
• EP 34: Bruce Daisley - What do business leaders want from HR?
• EP 33: Dirk Jonker - Why People Analytics needs to behave like a start-up
• EP 32: Cole Nussbaumer Knaflic - The role of storytelling in People Analytics and Data Visualisation
• EP 31: Piyush Mathur - How Johnson & Johnson uses People Analytics to drive business outcomes
• BONUS EPISODE - Heather Whiteman, RJ Milnor & Ian Bailie (Live at PAFOW) - How to develop the HR skills of the future
• EP 30: Katy Gray - How Arup uses reward data to drive behavioural change
• EP 29: Uri Ort - What is the future of talent assessment?
• EP 28: Zara Nanu - The role of People Analytics in Gender Pay Analysis
• EP 27: Julia Shaw - How can technology reduce bias in the workplace
• EP 26: Stela Lupushor - How HR can be a Catalyst for Change
• BONUS EPISODE: Volker Jacobs - How to scale Employee Experience
• EP 25: Julie Digby - How HR Drives Transformation and Org Design at Mars
• EP 24: RJ Milnor - How McKesson uses ONA to identify what drives high performance in sales
• EP 23: Rupert Morrison - Rethinking Workforce Planning & Organisation Design
• EP 22: Dawn Klinghoffer - The Evolution of People Analytics at Microsoft
• EP 21: John Boudreau - Reinventing Jobs: The Future of Work and it's impact on HR
• EP 20: Tanuj Kapilashrami - How Standard Chartered designed an exceptional Employee Experience
• EP 19: Anna Tavis: What is Agile HR and how are companies adopting it?
• EP 18: Sarah Johnson: How to use employee surveys to create strategic value
• EP 17: Leena Nair - How HR drives business value at Unilever
• EP 16: Keith McNulty - HR 3.0: more data driven, more agile and more business focused
• EP 15: Jason Corsello - The Shift From HR Tech to Work Tech
• EP 14: Jill Larsen - How does the CHRO successfully partner with the CEO
• EP 13: Frida Polli - How AI and Behavioural Science can reduce bias in recruiting
• EP 12: Ian O'Keefe - The Workforce Analytics journey at JP Morgan Chase
• EP 11: Dave Ulrich - The role of HR in the Digital Age
• EP 10: Jordan Pettman - How Nestlé uses People Analytics to measure Gender Pay Gap and Equity
• EP 9: Catalina Schveninger - The Evolution of Corporate Learning at Vodafone
• EP 8: Richard Collins - How is Automation, AI and Analytics changing recruiting?
• EP 7: Katarina Berg - Spotify's CHRO on Leading HR in a digital world
• EP 6: Nick Holley - How HR can become more business relevant 
• EP 5: Eden Britt - How to build a People Analytics team in a global organisation | The People Analytics journey at HSBC 
• EP 4: Yvette Cameron - How Blockchain will disrupt the Future of Work and HR Technology 
• EP 3: Didier Elzinga - How to Create a Culture First Company 
• EP 2: Edward Houghton - The Head of Research at the CIPD on Driving Business Performance with People Data 
• EP 1: Sharon Doherty - How to transform HR to be more digital and building a culture of diversity

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

David is a globally respected writer, speaker, conference chair, and executive consultant on people analytics, data-driven HR and the future of work. As an Executive Director at Insight222, he helps global organisations create more cultural and economic value through the wise and ethical use of people data and analytics. Prior to joining Insight222 and taking up a board advisor role at TrustSphere, David was the Global Director of People Analytics Solutions at IBM Watson Talent. As such, David has extensive experience in helping organisations embark upon and accelerate their people analytics journeys. David also hosts the Digital HR Leaders Podcast on myHRfuture.

SEE ME SPEAK AT THESE EVENTS

I’ll be chairing and/or speaking about how to drive business value and employee experience through people analytics as well as the Nine Dimensions for Excellence in People Analytics model at the following upcoming events:

• 5 March - HR Core Lab: People Analytics
• 19-22 April - People Analytics World