Kronos launches Big Data for Workforce Management Practice Group

Kronos Incorporated has announced the launch of its Big Data for Workforce Management practice group. Built upon the promise of advancing the ability to explore, understand, and act on workforce data to improve financial and operational results, the group will serve as the main point of contact for customers and partners worldwide that want to leverage big data for workforce management.

With a dedicated approach to simplifying complex workforce data for customers and partners, the new Big Data for Workforce Management practice group provides insight into costly workforce issues, synthesising volumes of overtime, absence, scheduling, productivity data, and time clock entries against key performance indicators (KPIs). This enables specific uses of big data for workforce management such as:

• Industry-Specific Solutions: Organisations across diverse sectors including healthcare, manufacturing, public sector, and retail can now gain instant visibility into the workforce and productivity intelligence that matter most to them. Examples include a healthcare planning tool that enables hospitals to efficiently align resources with fluctuating demand while maintaining service and quality levels. And in retail, a store manager's workday is simplified through automated guided decision-making about how to balance working hours, employee availability, and demand through a store performance dashboard.

• Actionable Insight: Visualisation technology and actionable insight drives progressive discovery and multi-dimensional analysis. With more than 45 visualisation options, incorporating internal and external data in different ways, the Big Data for Workforce Management group's data scientists and researchers brings clarity in high-volume workforce data to drive business transformation.

• Advanced Partner Solutions: Through availability of the Kronos big data expertise and a powerful labour analytics solution, Kronos partners can now accelerate their big data developments to address timely industry issues. Examples include Presence of IT, a workforce management advisory and technology consultancy, which has developed an Affordable Care Act application, leveraging the Kronos labour analytics solution, to assist organisations in balancing their objectives regarding service levels and benefits strategies.

The new group is led by Gregg Gordon, author of Lean Labour: A Survival Guide for Companies Facing Global Competition, a guidebook that provides step-by-step recommendations for cultivating a highly-effective workforce. Lean Labour is currently being transformed into a course by the American Payroll Association. Prior to his new role, Gordon led the manufacturing business practice at Kronos for eight years and traveled around the world counseling large, global brands on workforce management best practices.

Comprising of strategic consultants, business intelligence designers, and data scientists, the Big Data for Workforce Management practice group combines research and development as well as consultancy. Through technology, deployment, and change management support, the team is committed to helping organisations make big data for workforce management part of their operational strategy.

Holger Mueller, vice president and principal analyst, Constellation Research, said: "We are increasingly hearing that organisations need solutions that can help them translate heaps of information into digestible and actionable bits of information. There is a huge opportunity to mine big data for workforce management to uncover opportunities and pitfalls in current practices. This will become a growing area of importance for organisations as part of their overarching operational strategy."

Gregg Gordon, senior director, Big Data for Workforce Management practice group, Kronos, commented: "The opportunity for organisations of all sizes, across all industries to leverage big data for positive business outcomes and improved employee engagement is now greater than ever. At Kronos, we recognise that there exists a wealth of workforce data that can be aligned with operational and financial data to monitor processes, improve outcomes, and plan for the future. We are positioned to provide superior value to our customers through our newly formed team of outstanding industry experts and data scientists."

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