DORIS WONG VICE PRESIDENT AND HR GENERAL MANAGER PEOPLESOFT
Understanding the global workforce, the ageing workforce, and theavailability of talent to do tomorrow's jobs are the three areas ourdevelopment teams are concentrating on. Within these, talent managementis receiving the heaviest treatment. The drive is to integrate training,recruitment and succession planning.At the heart of this is our PeopleTools facility, which takes our IT system into the world ofweb-management. Staff can see - in dashboard-style - their own skillsscorecards while managers can see where their pools of talent are, andwhat training or development deficits there are. The crux of the matteris that we want to work with the business, not try to shoe-horn thetechnology into it. Most people will have heard of Web 2.0. Now Employee2.0 is under development - which presents everything staff will everneed on their own desktops. We want to be able to merge collaborativetechnology with HR technology,, and we don't think we're too far offfrom doing it."
ARVINDER DHESI HEAD OF TALENT MANAGEMENT, AVIVA
We need to know what we have today in order to plan for the future. Myrole was created 15 months ago, and the Aviva way is to treat everyoneas talent - not focus on the few. We talk about the sum of people'sexperiences as well as their skills. This year we are rolling out one ofour largest IT projects- a talent management system from StepStone. All39,000 staff will have their own talent management profile. It is beingphased in gradually: first to 1,500 managers: then to the rest of theorganisation by the end of 2009. The aim is for managers to filter thisdown throughout the company themselves, so that they see the importanceof the project. We want them to think about what sort of talent theywill need to achieve goals, who they will need to keep, and ultimately,who they will need to replace. People will be moved as a result of thisexercise, but we call it 'talent matching' rather than 'talentmanagement'.
DAVID WOODWARD CHIEF INFORMATION OFFICER, CERIDIAN UK
The HR profession will no longer accept traditional software solutionsthat over-promise and under-deliver. Some of the next- generationSoftware as a Service (SaaS) or on-demand solutions offer the chance tobreak the pattern of expensive implementations that over-run and fail tomeet expectations, by delivering projects on budget and on time. A keycharacteristic of this new breed of SaaS solution is the continuousservice offer built into the subscription service that enablesbusinesses to flex their HR IT solution and enhance their human capitalmanagement initiatives without being dependent on expensive consultancyor internal IT support. These solutions have to step up to the challengeof supporting HR functions in driving efficiency and adding value tobusinesses. Doing the basics well is key for HR to be heard and becredible at the top table. HR has been let down by systems that aremerely expensive filing cabinets. The next generation of systems andservices will change all that. Some SaaS/on-demand offerings avoidcostly enforced upgrades, and free HR's dependency on its own internalIT department. It is predicted that 25% of new software developed overthe next five years will be SaaS solutions.
