It was interesting to read the feedback on the Extend Technologies blog after a preview of Visualization Solutions by Nakisa 3.0. It’s very encouraging to read such positive feedback – so thanks for the shout out! If you have had a preview of the latest Nakisa solution, we’d love to hear your thoughts.

If you have not seen 3.0 yet and would like a preview, you can request a demo in the Nakisa VIP Zone.

Organizational agility is a hot topic in the industry right now. In current market conditions, organizations must learn to respond quickly to change. Large enterprises find this particularly difficult as they continually have to assess current business challenges and align their human capital strategy accordingly. In the article “The Agile Organization,” (Talent Management Magazine, July 2010 issue), the authors discuss the importance of a “nimble” human capital strategy and an adaptive workforce. Speed and adaptability is crucial to using talent to make organizations successfully manage changing scenarios.

So, how do we provide large enterprises with tools that can make the process faster and enable them to be more adaptable to their current environment?
At Nakisa, we specialize in providing solutions and support to organizations for this exact challenge. Nakisa OrgModeler enables users to create “what if” scenarios, providing a clear view of how organizational changes will affect headcount, budget, reporting structures, and so on.

OrgModeler also allows the user to save scenarios, and share them with their peers for review and modification. By visualizing potential scenarios, and achieving buy-in from key stakeholders, an organization can quickly determine the correct business strategy, and execute efficiently. With effective talent management visualization tools, the challenge of achieving organizational agility is much easier.

A recent blog by George Anders of the Harvard Business Review discussed the take-home lessons of a recent talent management conference. Although industries are moving beyond the economic downturn, it is clear to many major organizations that they have yet to “get talent management right.” For example,  attendees mentioned issues with developing an effective internal talent pipeline. Imagine how difficult it would be if your organization does not even have the right people to put in the right place. It would be extremely difficult to optimize talent deployment in this setting- as was discussed in a previous blog.

The most striking statistic from Anders’ post is that 72% of companies consider the war for talent as “an endless struggle in which they are neither gaining nor losing ground.” It is therefore necessary to start thinking of solutions to this challenge.

After having read the blog, I was happy to see the following comment posted by a reader:

“Companies who want to win the very real war for talent need to radically change the way they build talent. They need to make talent practices simpler (so that managers will actually use them) and more transparent (to avoid the negative impacts of secrecy), and enforce managerial accountability (since building great talent is their highest responsibility!)”

I couldn’t agree more. Simplicity, transparency, and increased accountability will be essential for organizations seeking to win ground in the war for talent.

As an aside, I would like to announce to all the readers of this blog that Nakisa has been nominated for an SAP Pinnacle Award in the category of Global Software Solution of the Year. Thank you to all of those who have supported us in the past year and, until next time, remember to Visualize What Matters Most™

I’m sure you’re all familiar with the show You’ve Got Talent where budding entertainers seek to win a contest by unveiling their hidden talents before a panel of judges. Contestants have to pass through several auditions before a winner is chosen. This process reminds me a lot of how some organizations recruit talent from within. The HR department posts a job and prospective employees “audition” in hopes of winning the “talent contest”. This process is reactive rather than proactive.

With a talent visualization system in place, organizations can clearly see and then map employees’ skills to job openings without undergoing a time-consuming series of interviews in order to “discover” the right candidate. Organizations owe it to themselves to adopt a talent management system so as to visualize the “hidden” talent in their midst.

Until next time, remember to Visualize What Matters Most^TM.

I came across an article called Optimizing Talent as Organizations Flatten in the latest issue of Talent Management.  In mapping out the ‘Talent Life Cycle Model’ the article illustrates how the productivity of a role drastically drops with a sudden vacancy. This drop in ‘employee contribution’ is due to ramp-up time of the new hire.  Building on the ‘Talent Life Cycle Model’, it makes sense that effective succession planning can help avoid the downtime associated with a new hire, by enabling succession ‘bench’ employees to ‘ramp up’ in advance.  However, an obstacle to effective succession planning is the lack of connectivity with the other talent management activities (employee reviews, development, career planning etc.).

Best practice organizations understand that organizational competencies are the critical building blocks that connect talent management activities. With competencies used as the standard for measuring both human capital and roles, organizations can clearly identify talent gaps and match the best-fitting employees to fill those gaps. By enabling in-house mobility and bypassing ramp up involved with hiring and training new talent, talent deployment is then optimized to maximize employee contributions sooner rather than later.

Nakisa has produced a video that further discusses the benefits of advanced competency management. I encourage you to check it out on YouTube:

Advanced Competency Management

Until next time, remember to Visualize What Matters Most™

Where did they come from and where are they going?

A question I get asked a lot is “where did the org chart come from?” Well, the first Web-based  org charts came from Nakisa.  

…But I think they meant the paper-based kind.

Actually, I recently came across an article touching on this. The author dates the formal “invention” of org charts to the 19^th century, when they were developed to help “trains run on time.”

Although the article has a certain level of charm to it, my thoughts focused on how org charts will evolve into the future. The first org charts arose from the need to easily understand and communicate interrelated information – organizational clarity if you will.  By visualizing relationships and hierarchies, as opposed to describing it in a paragraph or lists of text, the basic org chart greatly accelerated insight and understanding into organizational structures. The need for organizational clarity and the power of visualization remain at the heart of tomorrows org chart.   The org chart of the future must provide the given viewer with impeccable clarity into ever-complicated organizational systems. Based on who you are and what you need to do, you’ll see the right picture to enable immediate insight and action.

With the release of version 2.1 of SAP Talent Visualization by Nakisa (SAP TVN), I wanted to highlight a few of the new innovations I’m particularly excited about.

SAP TVN was originally developed to empower users with clarity into their organization and talent with interfaces that visualize core HCM data. Each subsequent release of the solution has incorporated the latest technology and best practices in data visualization, so customers are always getting the most value out of their underlying HCM information. The enhancements with 2.1 are no exception.

We’ve worked to reduce the number of clicks it takes to visualize the right information and take the proper action. Part of this is thanks to the integration of new interactive Flash-powered tools such as our new Talent Grid (9-box) which supports drag-and-drop functionality enabling instant talent calibration on the spot.

We’ve also launched Profile Match for 2.1, an innovative decision support tool for succession planning. Users can quickly and objectively find the right successors for any given role. The Profile Match mechanism uses organizational competencies and qualifications to bring successors and positions together in a way that promotes alignment between global objectives and the talent pipeline.

The new Java Edition will offer our customers many benefits, mainly lowering their total cost of ownership. In addition to running on a .Net platform, organizations are now able to run SAP TVN on the Java platform, eliminating the need to purchase additional Windows servers

I am very excited about these enhancements and I invite you to sign up for a personal demonstration of our solutions in Nakisa’s VIP Zone.

Talent Management Magazine recently highlighted the benefits of adopting sustainable activities within the organization. The feature story highlights how businesses who commit to “green” practices are more likely to attract and retain the best talent, realize savings, and improve their image.  As is common practice these days, the article uses the term “sustainability” to refer to environmental and social responsibility. No doubt, an organization’s responsibility to the planet is very important; however when it comes to defining the key link between “talent management” and “sustainable business,” a key perspective is often overlooked: building a workforce to ensure success that lasts.

Your organization may have all the best intentions to save the planet today, but if it can’t endure competitive, technical, social and economic turbulence in the long run, it won’t be around tomorrow when the planet still needs saving. With effective talent management processes and tools, an organization can devise and maintain a talent pipeline strategy to keep them successful well into the future. A truly sustainable workforce should ensure that the enterprise always maintains the critical competencies that enable efficiency, innovation and agility despite the changes in external forces.

For more information about creating a Sustainable Workforce, I recommend you check out SAPs EcoHub Sustainability Map.

Why the future of data visualization cannot forget its past

Many readers of last week’s blog couldn’t help but relate to the information overload that is present in their everyday lives. Although technology has provided its users with heaps of information, the challenge we constantly deal with is that of finding the right information, understanding how this information affects us, and responding to it in a timely manner. This challenge, however, predates Google, predates ERPs, and (believe it or not) it predates computers.

When it comes to making sense of the world, humans have continually sought to represent their knowledge and experiences in a visual format. Consider the cave drawings in Lascaux, France, Leonardo Da Vinci’s sketchbook, or Churchill’s famous Cabinet War Room during the Second World War. Visualization has always been essential where vast amounts of information are concerned – whether it is for the purpose of telling a story, simplifying new and complex ideas, or managing your organization.

A recent blog posting by John Sviokla at the Harvard Business Review outlined three long-standing objectives of data visualization.    

1. Great visualizations are efficient — they let people look at vast quantities of data quickly.
2. Visualizations can help an analyst, or a group, achieve greater insight into the nature of a problem and discover new understanding.
3. An effective visualization can help create a shared view of a situation and align folks on needed actions.

Although Nakisa prides itself on being an innovator in the field of talent and organizational management, we cannot ignore the fundamental objectives of data visualization. There is no telling what information will look like in the future, but I am confident that our team at Nakisa will continue to provide the tools to help you find it, understand it, and respond to it.

“The only antidote against uncertainty is clarity.”

Léo Apotheker, co-CEO, SAP

I just came back from SAPPHIRE in Orlando and wanted to touch on SAPs new messaging about “clarity.” In his opening keynote, Léo Apotheker discussed at length about how clarity into the enterprise is essential for companies to succeed in today’s new reality. With growing pressures on organizations across the globe to streamline operations and improve the bottom line, companies need to see clearly, think clearly and act clearly.

Reducing headcount may seem like an obvious way to save on costs, however cutting key talent could seriously impact your ability to deliver on business goals. To address the short-term economic challenges while at the same time remaining competitive and innovative in the long-term, it is imperative for companies to have in-depth insight into their workforce in order to make better-informed decisions.

Having clarity into your talent-related data will enable your HR Professionals to analyze the workforce and align talent to business objectives.  Developing and managing your talent will not only improve organizational performance, but will give your company a competitive advantage once the crisis ends.
See SAPs Virtual SAPPHIRE event for more information about clarity:

http://www.sap.com/community/events/sapphire_online_2009/index.epx