The Insight-Driven Leader by Jenny Dearborn How High-Performing Companies Use Analytics to Unlock Value
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The Insight-Driven Leader (2025) explores how companies can use people analytics to solve complex business challenges and drive performance. With real-world examples, it presents a practical framework for turning workforce data into strategic insights that inform better decision-making and lead to measurable impact.
The Insight-Driven Leader
Most leaders today are surrounded by more data than they know what to do with – metrics on operations, sales, customers, and employees flood in from every direction. But having data isn’t the same as understanding it, and far too often, the numbers collected about people end up being ignored, misused, or left disconnected from actual business decisions. Meanwhile, expectations keep rising. The speed of change, the pressure to perform, and the complexity of today’s workforce – from full-time employees to contractors and AI tools – demand sharper insight into how work really gets done.
That’s where Workforce Analytics comes in. At its core, this is the practice of combining data about your people – like skills, performance, engagement, and movement – with business data to understand what’s happening inside your organization and why. Done well, it helps leaders spot patterns, anticipate challenges, and pinpoint what drives results, so decisions are grounded in evidence rather than assumptions. With the rise of AI and advanced analytics, these insights are now easier to generate and more actionable than ever. But turning that potential into impact is a challenge.
In this lesson, you’ll learn how better questions, stronger systems, and a culture that supports evidence-based decisions can turn Workforce Analytics into a powerful driver of business performance. You’ll also see what it takes for HR to operate as a true strategic partner – and why executive alignment is key to making that role lasting and effective.
It all starts with changing what you actually measure.
Most organizations still rely on workforce data that’s easy to collect but hard to act on. Numbers like turnover rates, training completions, or time to fill open roles are common, but they don’t tell you what’s working or where to focus next. And unlike Finance or Operations, HR is rarely pushed to explain the meaning behind the metrics. That’s a missed opportunity – because when you shift your focus from reporting numbers to understanding what they actually mean, you open the door to smarter, faster decisions across the business.
The key is to stop looking only at what happened and start asking why it happened and what to do about it. Activity data – like how many people took a course – has its place, but it won’t help you assess performance, impact, or business outcomes. If you want to improve something, you have to measure the effect, not just the effort. In a call center, for example, tracking the number of agents who got mentors tells you very little. But comparing customer satisfaction and retention rates among those agents gives you a clear view of what actually made a difference.
The same principle applies across learning, hiring, and performance. Learner satisfaction scores, often based on factors like room temperature or catering, don’t predict behavior change or results. Similarly, prioritizing speed in hiring can lead to poor fits, especially in leadership roles. If you want better hiring decisions, look at whether new employees reach full productivity, stay with the company, and perform well in the long run.
One real-world example shows what’s possible. Experian was facing rising attrition and growing costs. Their People Analytics team built a predictive model that assigned a risk score to employees most likely to leave, based on up to 200 data points per person. Armed with this information, HR and leadership took action – and their targeted retention efforts helped cut global attrition by 4 percent, saving over $14 million. Just as importantly, HR earned more influence in the business and began advising other companies on what they’d built.
This kind of result comes from combining workforce data with business data, looking at patterns, and expecting thoughtful analysis from your HR partners. If you want better answers, start asking better questions. That shift in mindset lays the groundwork for what comes next: building the analytics capabilities to make it all work.
You can’t expect real value from workforce analytics if the systems behind it are fragmented, underpowered, or ignored. Sure, the organizations getting real traction are asking better questions, but they’re also investing in the people, platforms, and partnerships needed to answer them. That includes everything from cleaning up messy data to building trust in what it says, and creating cross-functional teams that can actually work together. If you want to move from isolated reports to decision-ready insights, you need to build the capability first.
The challenge starts with the data itself. HR information is scattered across systems, often inconsistent, and locked behind tight legal and ethical restrictions. Job titles, performance scores, and demographic categories can vary wildly between departments and countries. Even when the data exists, privacy concerns and outdated tech make access slow or incomplete. And because HR data has historically been treated as a reporting obligation, it’s rarely earned the same credibility as financials or operational metrics.
One common barrier is poor integration between HR and the rest of the business. Workforce data needs to connect with finance, IT, sales, and beyond to be useful – but only a fraction of organizations do this well. Enabling analytics requires cross-functional collaboration, shared priorities, and leadership that sets expectations for coordination. In one case, a software company used integrated HR and sales data to fix a costly ramp-up problem for new reps. With the right people around the table, they spotted gaps in onboarding, adjusted training and manager assignments, and cut ramp time in half. That translated directly into faster revenue and higher retention.
You also need the right tools. Some companies build custom platforms, others buy specialized software, and some extend what they already have. There’s no single model that works for everyone, but you do need to pick one and commit. Just as important is data governance – making sure data is handled ethically, shared appropriately, and tied to clear value for the business and for employees. Building that trust is slow, especially if the data has been mishandled in the past, but it’s essential if you want your analytics efforts to stick.
Once the foundation is set, it’s time to raise the bar – specifically, for HR. That means moving beyond compliance and reporting to expect HR to play a strategic role in shaping the company’s future.
If you want better results from your workforce data, you need to expect more from the team that manages it. That means rethinking the role of HR – not as a support function, but as a strategic force tied directly to business performance. The organizations seeing the most impact from workforce analytics are those where leaders hold HR to a higher standard and share responsibility for workforce outcomes.
Other business functions have made this leap. Information technology used to be about fixing hardware, until digital strategy turned CIOs into executive heavyweights. Finance moved from bookkeeping to guiding corporate investment. Marketing expanded far beyond branding and promotions to shape digital customer strategy. These shifts weren’t automatic – they were pushed by leadership expectations and backed by real accountability.
HR is on the same threshold. It’s moved well beyond compliance and hiring into workforce design, employee experience, and people analytics. But it’s up to you to push it further. Today’s best HR teams are influencing culture, advising on growth, and using advanced analytics to solve business challenges.
Consider how one global hotel company reversed its declining guest satisfaction. When their leadership saw a drop in customer scores and revenue across several properties, they asked their HR analytics team to investigate. The team traced the problem to an overreliance on contract front desk workers, who were missing critical training and had weaker ties to the brand. The reason? A software update had made it easier to hire contractors than salaried staff. HR flagged the issue, helped adjust the systems, and guided new hiring limits. Within a few months, guest satisfaction scores rose – and sales soon followed.
Stories like this show what happens when HR is trusted to solve problems, not just execute tasks. But they also highlight the risk of ignoring HR’s input – something other companies in the same industry learned the hard way. Real strategic HR depends on leaders giving it the seat and scope to make a difference.
And that’s only half the equation. You also need to hold yourself and your teams accountable for workforce results. Attrition, engagement, hiring efficiency – these numbers are all tied to business performance and should be tracked just like revenue or margins. When everyone owns people outcomes, HR becomes a better partner and the business gets smarter, faster, and more resilient.
Next, you’ll see how to embed this thinking into your broader organization by building a culture that acts on insight.
To truly compete in today’s business environment, organizations need a culture that expects and supports evidence-based decisions across every level. Becoming an insight-driven company means shifting from isolated pockets of data expertise to a mindset where using data to solve problems is standard operating procedure. So where does that change start? With people.
Leadership sets the tone. Data shouldn’t just track performance – it should be leveraged to shape the business strategy. Companies that think this way tend to perform better across the board. But real impact requires changing habits, building new skills, and challenging old assumptions. Many executives say they want a data-driven culture, but then still rely on gut instinct. That gap has to close, and it starts at the top.
One of the biggest levers here is – surprise! – HR. When HR is equipped with automation, analytics skills, and business fluency, it becomes a force multiplier. AI-powered tools can predict attrition, suggest better pay structures, and streamline hiring and development. Microsoft, for example, saved tens of thousands of hours using virtual HR agents. IBM cut employee churn by a third with AI tools that supported fair compensation decisions. When HR stops reacting and starts analyzing, it plays a real role in driving results.
But even the best tools won’t work without the right culture. Trust, transparency, and access are key. When employees can explore and understand data on their own, productivity and innovation follow. Take the example of a Fortune 500 financial firm, which struggled with digital transformation despite multiple restructures. The real issue? Low trust and cultural resistance. Once leaders addressed this – through leadership training, executive alignment, and a six-month program with 900+ managers – trust scores jumped 12 percent, and the company saw its best financial performance in years.
Building an insight-driven culture doesn’t happen through mandates. It’s reinforced through daily decisions, incentives, and support. That includes training, visibility into data, and recognizing people who lead with evidence. It’s not always fast, but done well, it reshapes how a company operates.
Unlocking this potential in the long term starts with alignment, especially between the CEO and CHRO, or Chief Human Resources Officer. That’s where we’re headed in the final section.
To move the needle on Workforce Analytics, change has to start at the top. Without backing from the CEO and a forward-thinking CHRO, even the smartest tools won’t deliver real results. HR can’t shape business priorities if it’s still treated as purely administrative – and data won’t help if people leaders aren’t part of strategic decisions.
That’s where the CHRO comes in – the executive responsible for aligning talent with business strategy. The strongest CHROs go beyond HR basics to shape culture, build leadership pipelines, and steer workforce strategy. But only about a quarter of them are playing that role today. Why? In many cases, CEOs haven’t raised their expectations. Most say HR should drive outcomes, but less than half actually create the conditions for that to happen.
One key shift is rethinking what kind of CHRO your company really needs. Some of the most effective CHROs come from other business areas, bringing sharp data skills, strategic insight, and outside credibility. Others rise through HR by modernizing their function and demonstrating measurable business impact. Either way, the CHRO should report directly to the CEO and be treated as a true partner, not just a department lead.
A clear example of what this looks like in practice is the transformation at Microsoft. When Satya Nadella became CEO, he partnered closely with CHRO Kathleen Hogan to overhaul the company’s culture. They rebuilt it around collaboration, continuous learning, and purpose – all linked directly to business performance. Together, they redesigned systems, introduced shared leadership principles, and used data to track employee engagement and progress. The results were dramatic: revenue and profits soared, and employee satisfaction hit all-time highs.
To get results like these, the CHRO also needs strong relationships with other C-level leaders, especially the CFO and CIO. Workforce planning, technology strategy, and budgeting have to be coordinated. CEOs can drive this by including HR in corporate planning, giving it room to innovate, and protecting learning budgets and time.
The takeaway is simple: if you want your organization to benefit from analytics and future-ready people strategy, the C-suite has to lead the way. The most powerful data won’t mean anything without leadership that knows how to use it.
The main takeaway of this lesson to The Insight-Driven Leader by Jenny Dearborn and Kelly Rider is that turning workforce data into real business value requires a mindset shift across your organization. That means asking better questions, expecting HR to drive results, and building a culture where data informs every important decision.
When HR is empowered and aligned with leadership, it becomes a strategic asset, not a support function. And when data is trusted, accessible, and tied to business goals, it can shape everything from hiring and retention to innovation and growth.
The organizations getting this right aren’t just collecting numbers – they’re acting on what matters. With clear expectations, smart investments, and strong executive alignment, you can make the same shift. It’s a bold step, but one that leads to better performance and a workforce strategy that’s built for what’s next.
The Insight-Driven Leader (2025) explores how companies can use people analytics to solve complex business challenges and drive performance. With real-world examples, it presents a practical framework for turning workforce data into strategic insights that inform better decision-making and lead to measurable impact.
The Insight-Driven Leader
Most leaders today are surrounded by more data than they know what to do with – metrics on operations, sales, customers, and employees flood in from every direction. But having data isn’t the same as understanding it, and far too often, the numbers collected about people end up being ignored, misused, or left disconnected from actual business decisions. Meanwhile, expectations keep rising. The speed of change, the pressure to perform, and the complexity of today’s workforce – from full-time employees to contractors and AI tools – demand sharper insight into how work really gets done.
That’s where Workforce Analytics comes in. At its core, this is the practice of combining data about your people – like skills, performance, engagement, and movement – with business data to understand what’s happening inside your organization and why. Done well, it helps leaders spot patterns, anticipate challenges, and pinpoint what drives results, so decisions are grounded in evidence rather than assumptions. With the rise of AI and advanced analytics, these insights are now easier to generate and more actionable than ever. But turning that potential into impact is a challenge.
In this lesson, you’ll learn how better questions, stronger systems, and a culture that supports evidence-based decisions can turn Workforce Analytics into a powerful driver of business performance. You’ll also see what it takes for HR to operate as a true strategic partner – and why executive alignment is key to making that role lasting and effective.
It all starts with changing what you actually measure.
Most organizations still rely on workforce data that’s easy to collect but hard to act on. Numbers like turnover rates, training completions, or time to fill open roles are common, but they don’t tell you what’s working or where to focus next. And unlike Finance or Operations, HR is rarely pushed to explain the meaning behind the metrics. That’s a missed opportunity – because when you shift your focus from reporting numbers to understanding what they actually mean, you open the door to smarter, faster decisions across the business.
The key is to stop looking only at what happened and start asking why it happened and what to do about it. Activity data – like how many people took a course – has its place, but it won’t help you assess performance, impact, or business outcomes. If you want to improve something, you have to measure the effect, not just the effort. In a call center, for example, tracking the number of agents who got mentors tells you very little. But comparing customer satisfaction and retention rates among those agents gives you a clear view of what actually made a difference.
The same principle applies across learning, hiring, and performance. Learner satisfaction scores, often based on factors like room temperature or catering, don’t predict behavior change or results. Similarly, prioritizing speed in hiring can lead to poor fits, especially in leadership roles. If you want better hiring decisions, look at whether new employees reach full productivity, stay with the company, and perform well in the long run.
One real-world example shows what’s possible. Experian was facing rising attrition and growing costs. Their People Analytics team built a predictive model that assigned a risk score to employees most likely to leave, based on up to 200 data points per person. Armed with this information, HR and leadership took action – and their targeted retention efforts helped cut global attrition by 4 percent, saving over $14 million. Just as importantly, HR earned more influence in the business and began advising other companies on what they’d built.
This kind of result comes from combining workforce data with business data, looking at patterns, and expecting thoughtful analysis from your HR partners. If you want better answers, start asking better questions. That shift in mindset lays the groundwork for what comes next: building the analytics capabilities to make it all work.
You can’t expect real value from workforce analytics if the systems behind it are fragmented, underpowered, or ignored. Sure, the organizations getting real traction are asking better questions, but they’re also investing in the people, platforms, and partnerships needed to answer them. That includes everything from cleaning up messy data to building trust in what it says, and creating cross-functional teams that can actually work together. If you want to move from isolated reports to decision-ready insights, you need to build the capability first.
The challenge starts with the data itself. HR information is scattered across systems, often inconsistent, and locked behind tight legal and ethical restrictions. Job titles, performance scores, and demographic categories can vary wildly between departments and countries. Even when the data exists, privacy concerns and outdated tech make access slow or incomplete. And because HR data has historically been treated as a reporting obligation, it’s rarely earned the same credibility as financials or operational metrics.
One common barrier is poor integration between HR and the rest of the business. Workforce data needs to connect with finance, IT, sales, and beyond to be useful – but only a fraction of organizations do this well. Enabling analytics requires cross-functional collaboration, shared priorities, and leadership that sets expectations for coordination. In one case, a software company used integrated HR and sales data to fix a costly ramp-up problem for new reps. With the right people around the table, they spotted gaps in onboarding, adjusted training and manager assignments, and cut ramp time in half. That translated directly into faster revenue and higher retention.
You also need the right tools. Some companies build custom platforms, others buy specialized software, and some extend what they already have. There’s no single model that works for everyone, but you do need to pick one and commit. Just as important is data governance – making sure data is handled ethically, shared appropriately, and tied to clear value for the business and for employees. Building that trust is slow, especially if the data has been mishandled in the past, but it’s essential if you want your analytics efforts to stick.
Once the foundation is set, it’s time to raise the bar – specifically, for HR. That means moving beyond compliance and reporting to expect HR to play a strategic role in shaping the company’s future.
If you want better results from your workforce data, you need to expect more from the team that manages it. That means rethinking the role of HR – not as a support function, but as a strategic force tied directly to business performance. The organizations seeing the most impact from workforce analytics are those where leaders hold HR to a higher standard and share responsibility for workforce outcomes.
Other business functions have made this leap. Information technology used to be about fixing hardware, until digital strategy turned CIOs into executive heavyweights. Finance moved from bookkeeping to guiding corporate investment. Marketing expanded far beyond branding and promotions to shape digital customer strategy. These shifts weren’t automatic – they were pushed by leadership expectations and backed by real accountability.
HR is on the same threshold. It’s moved well beyond compliance and hiring into workforce design, employee experience, and people analytics. But it’s up to you to push it further. Today’s best HR teams are influencing culture, advising on growth, and using advanced analytics to solve business challenges.
Consider how one global hotel company reversed its declining guest satisfaction. When their leadership saw a drop in customer scores and revenue across several properties, they asked their HR analytics team to investigate. The team traced the problem to an overreliance on contract front desk workers, who were missing critical training and had weaker ties to the brand. The reason? A software update had made it easier to hire contractors than salaried staff. HR flagged the issue, helped adjust the systems, and guided new hiring limits. Within a few months, guest satisfaction scores rose – and sales soon followed.
Stories like this show what happens when HR is trusted to solve problems, not just execute tasks. But they also highlight the risk of ignoring HR’s input – something other companies in the same industry learned the hard way. Real strategic HR depends on leaders giving it the seat and scope to make a difference.
And that’s only half the equation. You also need to hold yourself and your teams accountable for workforce results. Attrition, engagement, hiring efficiency – these numbers are all tied to business performance and should be tracked just like revenue or margins. When everyone owns people outcomes, HR becomes a better partner and the business gets smarter, faster, and more resilient.
Next, you’ll see how to embed this thinking into your broader organization by building a culture that acts on insight.
To truly compete in today’s business environment, organizations need a culture that expects and supports evidence-based decisions across every level. Becoming an insight-driven company means shifting from isolated pockets of data expertise to a mindset where using data to solve problems is standard operating procedure. So where does that change start? With people.
Leadership sets the tone. Data shouldn’t just track performance – it should be leveraged to shape the business strategy. Companies that think this way tend to perform better across the board. But real impact requires changing habits, building new skills, and challenging old assumptions. Many executives say they want a data-driven culture, but then still rely on gut instinct. That gap has to close, and it starts at the top.
One of the biggest levers here is – surprise! – HR. When HR is equipped with automation, analytics skills, and business fluency, it becomes a force multiplier. AI-powered tools can predict attrition, suggest better pay structures, and streamline hiring and development. Microsoft, for example, saved tens of thousands of hours using virtual HR agents. IBM cut employee churn by a third with AI tools that supported fair compensation decisions. When HR stops reacting and starts analyzing, it plays a real role in driving results.
But even the best tools won’t work without the right culture. Trust, transparency, and access are key. When employees can explore and understand data on their own, productivity and innovation follow. Take the example of a Fortune 500 financial firm, which struggled with digital transformation despite multiple restructures. The real issue? Low trust and cultural resistance. Once leaders addressed this – through leadership training, executive alignment, and a six-month program with 900+ managers – trust scores jumped 12 percent, and the company saw its best financial performance in years.
Building an insight-driven culture doesn’t happen through mandates. It’s reinforced through daily decisions, incentives, and support. That includes training, visibility into data, and recognizing people who lead with evidence. It’s not always fast, but done well, it reshapes how a company operates.
Unlocking this potential in the long term starts with alignment, especially between the CEO and CHRO, or Chief Human Resources Officer. That’s where we’re headed in the final section.
To move the needle on Workforce Analytics, change has to start at the top. Without backing from the CEO and a forward-thinking CHRO, even the smartest tools won’t deliver real results. HR can’t shape business priorities if it’s still treated as purely administrative – and data won’t help if people leaders aren’t part of strategic decisions.
That’s where the CHRO comes in – the executive responsible for aligning talent with business strategy. The strongest CHROs go beyond HR basics to shape culture, build leadership pipelines, and steer workforce strategy. But only about a quarter of them are playing that role today. Why? In many cases, CEOs haven’t raised their expectations. Most say HR should drive outcomes, but less than half actually create the conditions for that to happen.
One key shift is rethinking what kind of CHRO your company really needs. Some of the most effective CHROs come from other business areas, bringing sharp data skills, strategic insight, and outside credibility. Others rise through HR by modernizing their function and demonstrating measurable business impact. Either way, the CHRO should report directly to the CEO and be treated as a true partner, not just a department lead.
A clear example of what this looks like in practice is the transformation at Microsoft. When Satya Nadella became CEO, he partnered closely with CHRO Kathleen Hogan to overhaul the company’s culture. They rebuilt it around collaboration, continuous learning, and purpose – all linked directly to business performance. Together, they redesigned systems, introduced shared leadership principles, and used data to track employee engagement and progress. The results were dramatic: revenue and profits soared, and employee satisfaction hit all-time highs.
To get results like these, the CHRO also needs strong relationships with other C-level leaders, especially the CFO and CIO. Workforce planning, technology strategy, and budgeting have to be coordinated. CEOs can drive this by including HR in corporate planning, giving it room to innovate, and protecting learning budgets and time.
The takeaway is simple: if you want your organization to benefit from analytics and future-ready people strategy, the C-suite has to lead the way. The most powerful data won’t mean anything without leadership that knows how to use it.
The main takeaway of this lesson to The Insight-Driven Leader by Jenny Dearborn and Kelly Rider is that turning workforce data into real business value requires a mindset shift across your organization. That means asking better questions, expecting HR to drive results, and building a culture where data informs every important decision.
When HR is empowered and aligned with leadership, it becomes a strategic asset, not a support function. And when data is trusted, accessible, and tied to business goals, it can shape everything from hiring and retention to innovation and growth.
The organizations getting this right aren’t just collecting numbers – they’re acting on what matters. With clear expectations, smart investments, and strong executive alignment, you can make the same shift. It’s a bold step, but one that leads to better performance and a workforce strategy that’s built for what’s next.
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