Crafting Compelling Data Stories that Engage Audiences

How to tell effective stories with data Quit talking about your turnover ratio, no one cares

99 Problems and You Arent One of Them HR is dealing with big issues, but no one will listen Politics in the Workplace Politics in the Workplace Terminations with Clowns Terminations with Clowns Rising Health Care Costs Rising Health Care Costs New Legislation New Legislation

Telling Stories

Stories Have Power The Boy who Cried Wolf The Hare and the Tortoise The Good Samaritan David and Goliath Joe the Plumber

The Five Truths of HR Data HR is the source of critical data HR isn t good about accessing their own data HR may not even be measuring the right data HR worries about the confidentiality of our data HR isn t sure what to do with the data

Key Metrics For Every HR Department Time to Fill Vacancy Rate Cost to Fill Benefits as a % of Salary Turnover Worker Comp cost/employee Early Turnover Training participation Age to Retirement Engagement

Time to Fill # of days position are open/number of positions filled during same period Key thing here is understanding stages of recruitment Time key milestones in recruitment Clearly communicate timing when reporting out this data

Cost to Fill Recruitment and selection costs/# new hires Key here is to include all costs Advertising Interview Time Background checks/Pre-hire testing Relocation Costs

Turnover # employees exiting during 12 months/average actual # employees during same period Track Voluntary vs Non-Voluntary terminations

Early Turnover # of new hires leaving during first year/total # hired during the same period Doesn t have to be first year, use what makes sense Probation Vesting period

Age to Retirement # employee sin age range/total employees Use your DB or retirement rules Age of 75 Early retirement age Age 65

Vacancy Rate # of vacant positions within a classification (or entire organization), divided by the total number of positions within a classification (or entire organization), multiplied by 100 to report as a % Track over time if same positions have high vacancy rates Typically like to break this down also by departments

Benefits as a % of Salary Annual benefits cost/annual salary Use employee costs to calculate Again, monitor this over time

Workers Comp Costs per Employee Total workers comp costs for year/average number of employees Easy way for safety to target problem areas

Training Participation # employees participating in training opportunity/# employees eligible Good foundational training metric

Engagement % of employees stating engaged with a given aspect of the workplace on surveys or other data collection tools Critical piece of information that every organization should be tracking

Where is the data? HR Information Systems Third party vendors Other parts of the organization (IT or Finance) Filing cabinets Or maybe we aren t tracking critical data because we don t have a system that does that for us

Last Word on Metrics If you aren t doing it now, start Don t go back unless it s easy to get Start small, you can always add more later Involve different areas of HR in tracking Demonstrate use of metrics to HR Team

Great, but About my Turnover Rate. Anne is the HR Director at the City of Springfield They have about 1,000 FTE, with roughly another 150 seasonals hired every year Turnover has been increasing since the pandemic Anne has talked to the Executive Team about turnover three times this year, but they only want to talk about pay How do we help Anne tell an effective story that gets the executive team s attention utilizing data and metrics that her organization already has?

Calculating the Cost of Turnover 1. Benchmark Employee Costs 2. Vacant Position Coverage Cost 3. Cost to Fill the Vacant Position 4. Onboarding & Orientation Costs 5. Productivity Ramp-Up Costs

Benchmark Employee Cost The total departed employee s compensation (Salary and Benefits). Break costs into daily or monthly increments to accurately prorate across the time the position is open. If Mark makes $50,000 and his annual benefit costs are $10,000, his monthly rate would be $5,000 and his daily rate would be $260.87.

Vacant Position Coverage Costs The number of days the position remains empty multiplied by the daily rate provided in your benchmark costs. This is basically how much it is costing the company to cover the position. This doesn t include of putting off other priorities that are most likely not getting accomplished because these duties need to be covered. If it takes 45 days to fill Mark s position, we multiply $260.87 times 45 to get $11,739 cost to the company covering that position. $11,739. That is the

Cost to Fill the Position The total cost associated with all talent acquisition (advertising, screening, interviewing, selection). Activity Activity Cost of Advertising Cost to Screen Resumes ($52.17x3) # of Phone Interviews Cost of Phone Interviews ($52.17 Hourly Rate) # of In-person Interviews Cost of Interviews ($52.17x3=$156.51, 156.51x3) Cost of Background Check Total Cost to Fill Position Costs Costs $1,000 $156.51 10 $521.70 3 $469.53 $100 $2,247.74

Onboarding & Orientation Costs The cost of all time spent by a trainer and/or the hiring manager to onboard and get the new hire up to speed. Joe is going to be trained by Samantha who makes $80,000 annually. It ll take one week to get him up to speed so that he can perform the basic tasks of the job. Samantha s daily rate is $417.39 times five days= $2,086.95 $2,086.95 to onboard Mark in the new role.

Productivity Ramp-Up Costs The cost associated with a new employee ramping up and learning all aspects of the role. This is calculated based on 60 or 90 period where the new-hire is doing more learning than producing. To calculate this, we simply use the new hire s daily salary and benefits expense. Joe s annual salary is $60,000 plus a benefits cost of $10,000. That means his hourly cost is $33.65. The daily cost for Joe as he ramps up is $269.20/day. We multiply that by 60 working days to determine his ramp up costs to be $16,140. $16,140.

Final Turnover Cost for One Position Activity Activity Vacant Position Coverage Costs Cost to Fill Onboarding Costs Productivity Ramp-up Costs Total Costs Total Costs Cost Cost $11,739 $2247.74 $2086.95 $16,140 $32,21.69 $32,21.69

Total Cost of Turnover Position Maintenance Worker HR Recruiter Associate Engineer Admin Assistant Maintenance Worker Police Officer Fire Fighter Maintenance Supervisor City Planner Accountant Salary+Benefits Benchmark Cost Time to fill Vacancy Cost Cost to Fill Onboarding Ramp Up Turnover Cost 44,150.00 $ 21.23 $ 41 6,962.12 $ 65,000.00 $ 31.25 $ 50 12,500.00 $ 72,000.00 $ 34.62 $ 58 16,061.54 $ 35,000.00 $ 16.83 $ 41 5,519.23 $ 46,521.00 $ 22.37 $ 37 6,620.30 $ 48,250.00 $ 23.20 $ 46 8,536.54 $ 47,500.00 $ 22.84 $ 51 9,317.31 $ 68,765.00 $ 33.06 $ 48 12,695.08 $ 92,000.00 $ 44.23 $ 45 15,923.08 $ 84,000.00 $ 40.38 $ 49 15,830.77 $ 1,650.00 $ 1,651.00 $ 1,652.00 $ 1,653.00 $ 1,654.00 $ 1,655.00 $ 1,656.00 $ 1,657.00 $ 1,658.00 $ 1,659.00 $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ $ 106.13 156.25 173.08 84.13 111.83 115.99 114.18 165.30 221.15 201.92 1,273.56 $ 1,875.00 $ 2,076.92 $ 1,009.62 $ 1,341.95 $ 1,391.83 $ 1,370.19 $ 1,983.61 $ 2,653.85 $ 2,423.08 $ 9,991.80 16,182.25 $ 19,963.54 $ 8,265.98 $ 9,728.08 $ 11,699.35 $ 12,457.68 $ 16,500.98 $ 20,456.08 $ 20,114.77 $ 145,360.51 $ $

Springfield Annual Turnover Department Finance HR Engineering Police Fire Roads Planning IT Parks Public Works Total Turnover Total FTE Turnover Rate 2017 3 2 8 5 6 12 1 4 10 9 60 975 6% 2018 2 1 6 4 4 13 2 5 8 11 56 1000 6% 2019 1 1 5 4 4 15 4 2 12 10 58 1000 6% 2020 3 3 1 7 2 20 1 3 14 8 62 950 7% 2021 3 0 5 11 4 12 2 5 12 10 64 975 7% 2022 4 3 8 11 7 20 6 9 21 16 105 1000 11%

Springfield Voluntary Annual Turnover Department Finance HR Engineering Police Fire Roads Planning IT Parks Public Works Total Turnover Total FTE Turnover Rate 2017 2 2 4 5 4 8 0 4 8 7 44 975 5% 2018 1 1 5 3 3 9 2 4 7 10 45 1000 5% 2019 1 0 3 2 3 14 3 2 11 8 47 1000 5% 2020 1 3 1 7 2 17 1 3 0 6 41 950 4% 2021 3 0 4 8 4 8 1 4 10 8 50 975 5% 2022 3 3 7 9 6 18 6 9 19 16 96 1000 10%

Springfield Time To Fill Metrics Month January February March April May June July August September October November December 2017 56 58 44 59 48 50 49 46 50 42 40 41 48.6 2018 49 47 51 53 51 46 45 40 48 39 40 42 45.9 2019 41 40 49 50 46 47 44 39 44 40 38 36 42.8 2020 44 40 36 71 70 65 70 55 52 56 50 53 55.2 2021 46 48 44 44 45 48 50 48 44 51 40 42 45.8 2022 50 40 51 48 56 50 50 55 49 47 45 52 49.4

Springfield Turnover 96 Voluntary Terminations Average Cost of Turnover $14,536.05 Total Cost of Turnover in 2022= $1,395,460 $1,395,460 2021 Cost of Turnover= $626,800 Difference= $768,660 $768,660

What is Causing the Turnover? 1. Employees overwhelmed by the amount of work 2. Lack of Recognition 3. Company Culture 4. Poor Relationship with Manager 5. Lack of Flexibility 6. Compensation & Benefits 7. Poor Learning and/or Development Opportunities

Reviewing Exit Interviews Anne reviews the exit interviews and finds three common themes in the reasons people are leaving the City: 1. Lack of Flexibility (Employees wanting remote work opportunities) 2. Lack of Development Opportunities (Employees don t see a future) 3. Lack of Recognition

Key Elements of a Story 1. Interest the audience 2. Value added 3. Strong information/data 4. Presented in an engaging way 5. The story is complete

Beginning Paint a picture of the current reality Introduce the pain point (why we are here) Describe the goal or the future state

Middle Describe the Methodology Describe your analysis and results you discovered If the analysis led you to a hypothesis, what is it?

End Describe Conclusions List proposed action steps that are expected to resolve the issues we talked about in the Beginning Describe what results are expected from the action

Turnover at City of Springfield Anne Nilsson

Turnover Costs Have Doubled Last year we had 50 employees leave the City voluntarily, this year we have had almost double that (96 employees so far). 3/18/2025 40

Employee Turnover Costs Millions Includes Vacancy Costs Hiring Costs Training Costs Relocation Costs Doesn t Include Overtime Burnout Stress Other projects 3/18/2025 41

Driving Factors of Turnover The #1 driving factor for turnover at the city has been our lack of flexibility when it comes to work hours. I want a job where I can work from home on a regular basis The company I m going to allows for 100% remote work It doesn t make sense that I could work from home in 2020, but now I have to be in the office every day 3/18/2025 42

Driving Factors of Turnover In fact, of the 96 employees who left the city in 2022, 45% of them listed flexibility in work hours as the #1 reason for them leaving, while 84% listed it as one of the top three reasons they are leaving. 3/18/2025 43

Need for Change at the City We need to take a serious look at our work schedules and how we can build in more flexibility for our employees, or we are going to continue to lose great employees and have even more problems hiring new ones. 3/18/2025 44

Flexible Schedules What they can do for our employees

Benefits of Flexible Schedules According to a George Washington University study: Employees with flexible working arrangements tend to be more satisfied with their jobs and typically work harder 80% of employees would use flexible work 3/18/2025 46

Benefits of Flexible Schedules According to a Boston college study: 70% of managers and 87% of employees stated working from home has a positive or very positive impact on productivity Employees with flexible schedules reported the highest life satisfaction scores (65% compared to 58%) 3/18/2025 47

Peer Organizations Other municipalities have moved to more flexible schedules: Smithfield has moved to hybrid schedules Lewiston has moved to a standard 4-day work week Banner and Havana are both expecting to move to 4 80 s or 9 80 s schedules in next few months 3/18/2025 48

Plan for flexible work schedules 1 2 3 4 5 Train Ensure Create a culture of Informed Trust Get board buy in Continue to track hours Managers on new schedules accountability through data 3/18/2025 49

Summary By us making this change we can dramatically improve our current employees job satisfaction and hopefully decrease turnover. 3/18/2025 50