ASDA Valuing your Talent Case Study - CIPD
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ASDA Valuing your Talent Case Study
As one of the UK’s largest supermarket retailers, ASDA recognises the importance
of its colleagues. With a workforce of over 170,000 people, serving 19 million
customers a week and generating £21bn of revenue in 2014, the footprint of the
business is vast.
The changing landscape of retail ‘The challenges are about helping our
colleagues to understand that delivering
Innovation and change are driving great service and meeting future business
forces for organisations like ASDA. needs requires an acceptance that the
Changing consumer behaviour means business must change and adapt quickly.
that for the business to operate in the Therefore, being able to manage with
highly competitive retail market, autonomy and agility is an essential skill
employees must be equipped to and is something to be relished and
operate within complex and challenging prized, not something to resist and be
environments. For example, over half of afraid of.’ Hayley Tatum, Senior Vice
in store transactions at ASDA now go President for People and Stores
through a self-scan checkout;
Rapid growth in online and mobile
employees are now hosting customers,
shopping is also acting as a catalytic
helping with queries and managing
force for the business, pushing for
multiple checkout sites at one time. This
innovation throughout operations and
shift in customer service and customer
people development. Workforce
management within the business model
planning is one particular aspect of
is challenging the traditional
ASDA whereby innovation, and in
supermarket retail skills that ASDA has
particular automation, will radically alter
built ever since its founding in 1965.
the makeup of the retail business. New
Where once repeatable and predictable
skills and capabilities are therefore
tasks could be trained and
being planned into the future workforce,
operationalised through training of
and mapped against current capabilities
customer service staff, now more
– the gaps being addressed through
complex and individual-based skills are
new HR interventions, training and
required. Decision making and
deployment of workforce skills. With this
autonomy are a pair that are thought to
disruption only on the increase, the
be of particular importance to ASDA in
business is tracking its performance
the future, as Hayley Tatum, Senior Vice
through two key HR measures:
President for People and Stores at ASDA
customer satisfaction and engagement:
explains:
www.valuingyourtalent.com 1
‘From an HR point of view some of the key ‘In ASDA we’ve got more than five
questions at the moment are around how generations under one roof. We were
many colleagues we need, and what skills celebrating a gentleman’s 90th birthday
they will need to develop. For example, the other day; he works for us 12 hours a
what is the optimum level of service for week. The best part of the whole story is he
our customers, and how many customers has 10 years’ service, so he was 80 when
should one colleague be serving at any one he joined us. What he might need and his
time? This is not just an operational needs as a colleague versus someone on
question - this also affects who our people our graduate scheme might be quite
are and their suitability with their role... different, so it is very important to me that
our colleagues are dealing with different I'm engaging with the colleague on an
technology, different customer reactions: individual basis and not broad brushing.
their own capability is suddenly being On some things we might all be the same,
challenged. We have to support them to but on others we might not be.’ Hayley
continue to be happy and productive in Tatum, Senior Vice President for People
the future. ’ Hayley Tatum, Senior Vice and Stores
President for People and Stores
As a result the organisation’s HR
strategy is built around the three key
People as the drivers, analytics as pillars of culture, talent and ways of
the enabler working (Figure 1). Engagement in
particular is an area which the business
ASDA’s people are at the heart of the focuses on within the culture and
organisation’s growth and success, and engagement pillars, with considerable
reflecting the diversity of the attention paid to appreciating the
communities in which the business relationship between engagement and
operates is important for the business performance. The organisation has a
to continue to meet the high dedicated role within the function: the
expectations of its customers. Utilising Engagement Analytics Manager, who
this diversity in the workforce is a leads the organisation’s push to better
powerful way then for the business to appreciate this relationship, and is
connect with customers and deliver the responsible for managing and reporting
type of service they desire – as a result on engagement data:
HR strategy and operations are tailored
‘My role is within the engagement space at
to reflect the individual needs of
ASDA and concerns the measurement and
employees. This is particularly apparent
quantification of engagement, the
when considering workforce
planning and development of engagement
demographics and the very personal
proposals and how we as a business drive
needs of staff which if met correctly can
engagement. I am interested in exploring
drive long-term performance. Working
the return that we get from our employees
at this individual level is just one of the
and which measures we can put in place
ways by which HR analytics is bringing
to track mood, aspirations and
HR teams closer to the needs of
motivations. This is of real importance to
individual employees and is enabling
ASDA as a business.’ Engagement Analytics
them to tailor the function accordingly:
Manager
www.valuingyourtalent.com 2Figure 1: ASDA’s 2015 People Plan
As a driver of performance ASDA is scores and things like shrink performance,
aware that engagement is one of the waste performance, wages, sales and
major levers that can be used to ensure obviously customer satisfaction. This
that customer satisfaction remains high. shows the importance of engagement as
Senior leadership teams are most an HR measure when we are looking to
interested in this because along with create competitive advantage in our
developing and providing quality goods, business.’ Hayley Tatum, Senior Vice
customer engagement is one of the President for People and Stores
most important activities the business
can deliver on to create value. By But whilst many organisations may view
exploring engagement data the surveys as the be-all and end-all of
leadership team is encouraged to sense- engagement, ASDA is clear that it is the
check how HR processes and systems conversation and behaviours that result
are driving the right behaviours in from surveys which are of value. The
employees, and particular aspects of engagement team recognise the value
engagement which are believed to be of this ongoing dialogue and discussion
directly correlated to crucial measures with employees, and therefore
of business performance, including both communicate openly during and outside
sales and customer satisfaction: of the survey period. Instead of forcing
responses and driving the wrong
‘Segmentation analysis is really important behaviours in the line management
to me. It saves me a lot of money if I can community, team leaders are
be precise and tailored about how I am encouraged to lead powerful
talking to my teams. Equally, it helps me conversations within their teams that
with engagement and I've got direct are proactive and open, designed to
correlation between our engagement create dialogue and create the right
www.valuingyourtalent.com 3conditions for high quality customer on how many millions they can take out of
interactions: their cost base as a result to re-invest for
the customer and shareholder.’ Hayley
‘If I just talk about response rates: it’s Tatum, Senior Vice President for People
really important for us to get as many and Stores
people through the surveys that we do, so
they have a voice. That’s what we want to To drive these cost control activities the
encourage in our colleagues, but actually business draws on basic productivity
we know that it doesn’t make a difference and performance measures which help
in terms of the output of numbers that we to illustrate how employees across the
get, because of convergence of the data. business are delivering in their roles.
Based around time to delivery, these
We say to our senior stakeholders, “It’s not measures of productivity play an
really that important if you don’t get 100%, important role in maintaining service
but actually make sure you’re encouraging level standards, and help focus the
your colleagues, as many of them as training and development of staff:
possible, to participate. Don’t force them.”
That can be quite conflicting, I think, for ‘In terms of employee analytics we
our leaders, so we help them to measure service, transaction times on a
understand it as much as possible.’ check out, time to restock, time to deliver
Engagement Analytics Manager etc. We centralise this data and use it to
manage and maintain standards. We can
see optimum pick rates, optimum scan
The people analytics function rates, and transaction times and then we
set targets and standards that we train
Retail, with its significant workforce and towards, encouraging and coaching our
vast geographic footprint, is naturally colleagues to achieve certain levels of
driven by operating costs, one of the performance for the customer.’ Hayley
biggest being its workforce. Payroll then Tatum, Senior Vice President for People
is one of the most important data-rich and Stores
activities within the wider HR function;
and given the desire of the organisation The analytics team has worked hard to
to drive performance whilst efficiently develop core measures that the
using resources, productivity is a key business holds as standard measures.
performance indicator for both internal These standard measures are applied
and external stakeholders: by HR, the custodians of people data, to
all the information they manage, with
‘Analytics has been used in retailing for the aim of drawing comparisons and
many years because it’s a people business moving the business towards potential
and people are your biggest cost, other benchmarking against peers and
than your cost of goods. The largest bill is competitors. For ASDA the metrics order
your payroll bill. So understanding how into a logical hierarchy of value to the
long each task takes, whether it is done business:
well, and then being able to refine and
value-engineer tasks to modify your wage ‘I think if we were to order them in
costs accordingly is very important. Many importance to the business at present,
retailers challenge themselves every year wages would be at the top, as this tells us
www.valuingyourtalent.com 4how much we’re spending on our utilise global insight and understand if
employees. Then it would come down to somebody else has already cracked a
how much they’re costing us when they problem which perhaps I’m only just
leave, and also absence. Our sector is beginning to face. I’m able to get
highly focused on cost management, and information and guidance from across our
this is reflected in our HR measures. Those expert network.’ Hayley Tatum, Senior Vice
two quantitative sets of data are President for People and Stores
important for us in the financial sense.
Then if we were to move through the This global perspective on people data is
spectrum, measures regarding now helping ASDA to build its own
engagement, performance tracking, and capability and deliver insights across its
qualitative data such as how they feel etc.’ UK operations. Investment for the
Engagement Analytics Manager business is now in building individual
capability by sourcing highly capable
The size and scope of ASDA mean that analysts with a basic understanding of
within the organisation there is real people and the HR function. At present
talent and capability available and ready analytical skills at ASDA are based
to be leveraged. Following ASDA’s around an equal weighting of data
acquisition by American retail giant understanding, plus the ability to
Walmart in 1999, ASDA has been able to communicate and influence using
access people analytics capability which evidence. For ASDA, both skill sets are
was previously unavailable. And whilst needed: one without the other can lead
UK-based ASDA has only recently to misinformation to the business with
started to delve in to HR analytics and potentially damaging results:
explore how people data may help drive
performance, the Walmart team has ‘The skills that I would say my own team
long invested in attempting to answer have, they’re tech-savvy, and so they know
the people performance question. So how to get around quickly and present
much so, that the Walmart function has and get information. They’re disciplined in
a highly capable people analytics team, working through things like algorithms
and is now driving insights in and finding patterns and trends in
collaboration with their ASDA-based information. But they have a very
counterparts: personable style that they can then go and
test. So they don’t only take the
‘I am very lucky because, obviously, ASDA is information at face value, they’re able to
owned by Wal-Mart. There are dedicated then go out and run focus groups and
people inside the analytics team, not only check it, and then present it, which is a
in ASDA, but they can work with and very important skill to have. It gives me
leverage, from a systems and a capability and our leadership team confidence that
point of view, into Walmart. the right tests have been taken to provide
robust and valid insights.’ Hayley Tatum,
It also allows me to share information and Senior Vice President for People and Stores
learning with other markets. Obviously,
ASDA being in the UK is one of 29 countries
in which Wal-Mart trades. So I'm able to
www.valuingyourtalent.com 5Figure 2: Data and analytics is changing the way ASDA serves its customers.
metrics. Accompanying the dashboard
Customer data and employee data will be narrative information which is
to create insight intended to provide a holistic
perspective of ASDA’s people, in the
While measuring standard metrics is context of focusing on business and
important for HR operations, the value customer performance. This tool is now
of data grows significantly once it is in development by the HR team, and is
used in the form of insights across the one which they believe will radically
business. A fundamental role of the HR change the way the business uses HR
analytics team is to build clear reports data:
which deliver timely insights across
‘We’re in the process of creating a
functional teams and senior leaders.
dashboard. We’ve never really achieved
And because data availability is
it…on our retail side we’re looking at how
increasing, the number of potential
our key performance indicators in HR link
reports that HR must develop and
to the overall business performance
understand is also going up. It is for this
indicators. We’ve worked with a
reason that ASDA is now looking to
consultancy that has been able to link
rationalise their HR measures and
output measures back to input drivers.
present them as a simple dashboard
Now we’re going to look at some of the HR
which illustrates key performance
angles in that data, for example, what
indicators connected to the three HR
makes the difference in terms of our home
strategic priorities. The business is
shopping picking accuracy, and how that
working with external experts to use HR
impacts on sales. What we want to do now
data within the dashboard report which
is join everything up. At the moment we
will feature alongside other business
don’t bring everything together, for
www.valuingyourtalent.com 6example, by talking about data holistically You can then compare a lot of that
and how it impacts wider business. We information with competitive market
tend to be quite siloed in the way that we information so you can see how we sit by
work. We need to develop greater comparison. We’ll do a whole variety of
integration between our different types of things, for example in our stores where
data. we’ve got focus groups and listening
groups with our own customers and with
The dashboard that HR is building will help our competitors’ customers, just to
to change this as it will use HR data and understand different reactions and
engagement data to tell the story clearly. It behaviours. Then we’ll analyse this data
will show absence and turnover, etc. We’re and choose what to do in our business
also working on how we would reduce that might affect competitive service.’
some of the reporting of requirements, Hayley Tatum, Senior Vice President for
which are very manual, to feed into that so People and Stores
that it would then be a very holistic view.’
Engagement Analytics Manager This direct action from market insight
through to alterations in customer
It is clear then that ASDA recognises the service or operational delivery models,
importance and value of high quality is driving real value-creation in the
people data. Across the business data is business. Leaders too are now using this
used in multiple ways and is now being data in various ways, and it is during its
utilised alongside other types of combination with employee data when
business information. ASDA has put in truly powerful people insights can occur.
place senior leaders with oversight and ASDA has recognised this and is
governance responsibilities within the focusing much of its analytical
data and analytics space, predominantly development on building this
around customer data, where value is multidimensional analytics capability -
driven from insights through to and whilst there is some way to go until
increased sales. Market insight in the business is able to benefit from
particular is important in the highly these insights, there is definite belief
competitive retail environment, where that utilising data in this way will drive
customer loyalty is shrinking and business performance in unique and
customer behaviour is increasingly innovative ways.
fickle.
‘We have a Chief Customer Officer whose Data as the weapon in the war for
role is to oversee customer insight and
talent
intelligence and how the business uses this
information. This capability provides data
ASDA then is very much future-focused,
frequently. For example, it provides an
and in preparation for the increasingly
ongoing pulse of what our customers are
competitive retail environment the
saying and how they’re behaving. Because
chain is building its capabilities in
what customers say isn’t necessarily what
analytics and focusing on modifying its
they do, you have to continually measure
human capital through various HR
and monitor their actual behaviour.
activities and interventions. Through all
of this, data is playing a vital enabling
role, and the analytics that HR is
www.valuingyourtalent.com 7applying to data is uncovering fascinating concepts the business is now building into its workforce, engagement and customer service plans. Management capability is one area of focus which the business now believes should be enhanced and made to be future proof. The new context and evolved business model mean that managerial roles are expected to decline in number, but the need for strong capability to innovate and drive customer service will continue to grow: ‘In the future I believe we will have fewer managers and more engaged, contributing teams of colleagues who figure stuff out for themselves. I’m certain those closest to the customers will come up with brilliant and the best solutions.’ Hayley Tatum, Senior Vice President for People and Stores For Hayley and her colleagues it is HR analytics which holds the key. By applying the same techniques of customer segmentation and analysis to their engagement and people data, the team believe that they will unlock the ability of employees to behave and engage with customers in such a way that they deliver high quality service every time, and deliver the competitive advantage the business needs to succeed today and well into the future: ‘I’d like the data to tell me how to get the most engaged colleague that I possibly can to give the best level and noticeable, industry-leading service in the market. If I could find that, that would tell me, “What does that colleague do, say, and sound like?” From a behavioural point of view I believe that would give us as real competitive advantage.’ Hayley Tatum, Senior Vice President for People and Stores www.valuingyourtalent.com 8
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