The Art Of Becoming An Ace In HR Reporting

Far from being reserved for colleagues in the financial department, reporting has spread over the last few years to other company departments. Given the need to remain competitive in the face of competition, diligently monitoring the performance of each function is an effective solution for managing the company and making the best possible decisions.

Yes, but now, as an HR Manager, the figures you make and building an HR report on an Excel table gives you cold sweats (without exaggerating). The good news is that Business Intelligence and Artificial Intelligence are increasingly inviting themselves to the party to make your HR management task more straightforward. But let’s go back to the basics: what are HR reporting and its objectives? We will then give you our advice and tools to create quality HR reporting.

What is HR reporting?

Definition of HR reporting

HR reporting is a communication tool that includes various performance indicators over a defined period to help with strategic decision-making. It offers a clear and synthetic vision of a situation at a given moment, which facilitates the identification of the HR department’s strengths and the blocking points or areas for improvement. With the right choice of indicators and careful visual formatting, HR reporting allows you to make more accurate and informed decisions based on facts.

The Objectives Of HR Reporting

Let’s now talk in more detail about the different objectives of HR reporting. It makes it possible to strengthen the management of the overall performance of the department  :

1. by identifying strengths,
2. To emphasize what already works so that it works even better,
3. And by placing where it “fishes” a little more to determine the cause and intervene to rectify the situation.

Thus, you will be better able to:

1. increase efficiency in the recruitment process,
2. to identify development opportunities,
3. promote your actions to all employees,
4. to demonstrate to management your contribution to the overall performance of the company. Your mission, if you accept it: contribute to the company’s good performance by facilitating strategic decision-making.

HR Reporting Is Different From The HR Dashboard

HR reporting or HR dashboard: same fight? Although they seem similar, they should be distinct. For what? We explain to you:

1. Their role, first. They do not have precisely the same utility because:
2. The entire team uses the HR dashboard daily to check the real-time progress of their tasks (recruitment campaigns, for example) and the achievement of objectives;
3. While reporting allows a summary of the performance of the service to the management and presents an analysis allowing the decision-making (for example, to review the objectives or hire missing skills).
4. The aim of the dashboard is, therefore, operational, while that of the reporting is strategic.
5. Then the content differs. The dashboard is concise and dynamic, updated automatically as progress is made. It consists of HR indicators (KPI), tables, and graphs;
6. The reporting presents fixed results and summarizes the development for a given period. It contains data, may include charts, but above all, includes a written part that comments on the results presented and sometimes recommendations for improving them. Its format is longer than the dashboard, sometimes on several pages.

How To Create Quality HR Reporting? Our Advice

Ensure The Credibility Of The Data Used

It all starts with data! If they are not reliable, your report may ring false (or hollow) and not be very convincing. Whoever hasn’t already spent hours checking for errors or deleting duplicates, raise your hand. Then, from the data, you must select the most relevant indicators or KPIs for your reporting. So, make sure that the HR data used is:

1. from reliable sources,
2. harmonized,
3. no duplicates,
4. up to date.

Automate The Reporting Creation Process

Some companies conduct their HR management by collecting data manually and then doing all the calculations themselves. Unfortunately, this poses several problems:

1.  it’s tedious, 
2. this can be very time-consuming, depending on the volume of data to be processed, 
3. and the risk of error is present. 

To adopt accurate management of your human resources without spending all your days there, you have to go through reporting automation. At stake? Substantial benefits:

1. reliable, centralized, secure, and integrated data, which you can use without doubt;
2. automatic exploitation of data by business intelligence (sorting, filters, cross-referencing of data, automatic creation of graphs, etc.);
3. the generation of a preformatted report in a few minutes, which you have to customize.

We will come back later in the article on the different tools to automate the creation of reporting.

Adapt The Reporting To The Objective And The Recipient.

Before launching headlong into the production of your report, ask yourself the question: who will read my report, and why?

1. the selection of indicators to be presented,
2. And commenting on the results or projections so that each piece of information interests the recipient.

Take Care Of The Presentation.

As a decision-making tool, your HR reporting must be presented so that the recipient understands the context and the situation very quickly to decide on the actions to be implemented. And a neat presentation helps in this sense! Here are some tips for a professional and attractive presentation:

1. Highlight it with color. The goal is not only to “look pretty” but, above all, to highlight essential information. Ideally, choose the colors from the elements of your company’s graphic charter, and use them sparingly (too much color kills the color!).
2. Insert visuals. Whether it’s illustrations, photos (or even emojis, why not), the visuals allow you to air out the reading by taking micro-pauses. Ideal for holding the audience’s attention throughout the lesson.
3. Use graphics. They give another dimension to data and other indicators and are often more understandable than a table. They can take different forms: curves, pie charts, bar charts, etc.

Examples and tools to facilitate the creation of your HR reporting

Examples of reporting use cases

Here are some examples of HR reporting that you may be required to produce:

1. a monthly report for management to monitor the performance of your service,
2. timely reporting for shareholders who need to know the financial projections,
3. a message to show the absenteeism of the company,
4. reporting on the service’s operating costs in the event of the need to reduce the company’s costs.

HR dashboard template

To give more context to your reporting, do not hesitate to put it into perspective with an HR dashboard. Discover our article dedicated to the HR dashboard with several examples to inspire you.

What Tools Facilitate Reporting?

Well, you got it; we try to avoid reporting in Excel so as not to waste time unless you’re a spreadsheet expert, in which case, treat yourself (and respect ). Here are some examples of tools to use:

1. HR data management software,
2. business intelligence software,
3. Some HRIS also have the necessary modules.

We Summarize The HR Reporting

1. HR reporting is a communication tool that makes it possible to report on the performance of the HR department to help in the fastest and most relevant decision-making possible.
2. It should be distinct from the HR dashboard, which has a more operational focus which is helpful for the daily management of the team.
3. To create proper HR reporting, make sure:
4. To have own data,
5. automate processes,
6. adapt the content to the interlocutor and the objective to be achieved,
7. to take Care of the presentation.
8. There are tools to automate your HR reporting, save time, and improve relevance.

Read Also: How To Choose Your Business Management Software?