Mobile Talent Management: PeopleclickAuthoria aka PeopleFluent Introduces iPad Solution

Talent Management software comes to the iPad: PeopleClickAuthoria (which just changed its name to PeopleFluent®) today released a preview of an iPad solution currently called Mobile Talent Management.

PeopleFluent (it will take a little while to get used to this name) is one of the largest providers of talent management software, with revenues close to $90 Million and a full range of solutions spanning talent acquisition, contingent workforce management, vendor management, compensation, performance and succession management, and one of the industry’s most advanced and compelling solution for talent analytics.

The company is well known by its PeopleClick and Authoria roots, companies which were pioneers in high volume recruitment and performance management. Authoria is actually one of the first companies that demonstrated a true integrated talent management suite, and still has one of the most easy-to-use systems on the market.

The Role of Mobile Systems in Talent Management

Today’s workforce uses mobile systems (phones and ipads) more frequently than we use personal computers.  With more than 6 billion mobile devices in the world, there isn’t a company that doesn’t have employees, retail workers, nurses, managers, supervisors, recruiters, engineers, and executives on mobile devices.  Some of the biggest applications for mobile talent management today are:

• Remote workers taking training and compliance courses on their mobile devices
• Supervisors scheduling and managing workforce time tracking on mobile devices
• Employees checking in for their shift, checking out, and asking for vacation hours
• Managers and executives monitoring employee activities and looking up employee phone numbers
• Recruiters capturing resumes, photos, and interview notes from candidates
• Social photo and knowledge sharing.

Unfortunately of course all the talent management software in the world was originally developed for a 1280×1024 computer screen, with user interfaces like tabs, buttons, windows, scroll bars, and various mouse-enabled interfaces.  So except for mobile learning solutions (which have really exploded in the last few years), few vendors have developed complete mobile applications yet.

PeopleFluent Solution

PeopleFluent, a privately held company with a strong technology team, today is previewing one of the first complete end-to-end iPad applications for talent management.  (Call it TalentPad for now, since they dont have a name yet.)

And this is a very exciting application. As one of our technical experts put it, “by creating their mobile application specifically for the ipad, rather than attempting to mobile enable an existing web UI, PeopleFluent has created a solution that will captivate users and is intuitively easy to learn.”

The system has four modules today:

• Executive Explorer (A view of talent and people in the organization, for managers and executives.  This module provides list and picture views of people on the team, including contingent workers; configurable categories that visualize key talent concepts like promotability, flight risk or leadership potential; drill-down into the “talent book” of a talent team member to see work history, education, compensation, performance feedback and other professional details; and other visualization tools including maps, analytic views and org chart views. )
• Compensation  (a compensation review, analysis, and setting system.  This module lets a manager view compensation budget and planning processes including simplifying roll-up budgets; providing a compensation “flip book” that highlights by-person compensation history, investments, and actions; and visual rollups and analytics that show by organization statistics and a “budget cloud” illustrating potential challenges.)
• Manager Coach (focuses on what managers need to know about their HR responsibilities and role within the organization.  Designed for first-time and frontline managers, the solution delivers manager advice on the device to allow personalized coaching to be in managers’ hands at the time they deal with real workforce issues.)
• Recruiting (lets hiring managers to review candidates on their requisitions and provides recruiters feedback on the hiring process).

Each module is built with best-of-breed iPad interfaces (right to left hand swipes, large photos, big buttons, etc).

Let me briefly preview just a few of the modules we have seen.

Fig 1:  Explorer

Fig 2:  Explorer

Fig 3:  View Employees by Location, Demographics, etc.

Fig 4:  View Employees by Flight Risk and other Engagement and Compensation Dimensions

Fig 5:  Compensation Analysis

Fig 6:  Manager Analysis – View Employees

Fig 7:  Manager Employee View

Market Impact

These new modules demonstrate PeopleFluent’s thought leadership in the area of user experience.  Authoria has always had one of the most attractive systems on the market (the company won several awards for its user experience) and this moves the bar higher.  While these modules are not yet available, they clearly show a vision for mobile access which many buyers will like.

The big markets for mobile talent management today continue to be recruiting (recruiters on the road), retail and hospitality (supervisor and workforce management), executives (working at home and offsite to view analytic information), and general use by everyone who has a mobile device.  As more and more professionals use iPads and other devices to browse websites and read news, it will become more natural for HR applications to be available.  (I have found the iPad a very exciting new device, and it actually does encourage people to use their computers more than laptops.)

This announcement also demonstrates PeopleFluent’s strong technology heritage.  The company has now effectively integrated products from the Authoria and PeopleClick brand, and now offers one of the most compelling talent management systems on the market (with the exception of the company’s lack of a learning management offering).  Mercer chose PeopleFluent’s system as its OEM business partner and is now actively selling the solution around the world, under the brand Mercer Human Capital Connect.

A new world of talent management has begun…