customer success story
ManpowerGroup Analytics:
Now Faster, Better and More Strategic
With 400,000 clients in 80 countries and territories, ManpowerGroup
(Manpower) had stores of data that it wanted to use to better serve its clients.
Founded: 1948
Headquarters: Milwaukee, WI
Business users were accustomed to
developing ad hoc reports and running
on anecdotal insight rather than data.
Using Tableau, Manpower has
standardized its analytic efforts,
increased the speed and quality of
business review documents, and
enabled truly strategic conversations.
Insight enabled
$100,000
savings for key customer
2+
weeks carved
from report cycle
250+
business review documents
created in time it used to
take to create one
Anecdotes, Queues, and Band-Aids
As one of the largest HR companies
in the world, Manpower realized that it
held a great deal of valuable data. But
it needed to do a better job of using
that information to drive competitive
advantages for itself or its clients.
“Before, a lot of our information
was very anecdotal,” says Anuwat
Raviwongse, Director of Analytics for
ManpowerGroup. “We kind of knew
what was happening.”
Manpower needed to develop datadriven business review documents
that could be used to drive strategic
conversations. “The context for the
documents is different for each client,”
says Raviwongse.
Users asking the IT team to script and
run reports from the Cognos Enterprise
business intelligence solution faced
a long queue. And if the resulting
document answered the wrong
question—or users developed new
questions after seeing the results?
“They would have to go back to IT and
request another report and wait, look at
it, and go back to IT for another report
and then wait again,” says Sarah Nell,
Global Corporate Account Analyst at
ManpowerGroup.
“Updating these reports took a lot of
time,” adds Nell. “You couldn’t just
have them automatically update.” Some
teams tried to avoid the IT queue by
creating their own business review
documents from varying sources. “We
had a lot of one-off solutions that worked
for that Band-Aid moment,” Nell says.
This approach produced its own
issues—the answers to a question
could change depending upon who you
asked. And these homegrown solutions
carried the risk of errors.
“We had people using data incorrectly
and they were creating different
spreadsheet solutions surrounding that
data and then providing that in reporting
format,” says Nell.
Cutting and Pasting:
For Art Class, Not Analytics
“We really needed a
solution that would
meet the needs for
faster deliverables, ad
hoc report requests—
and we needed to make
it sustainable”
— Sarah Nell, Global Corporate
Account Analyst, ManpowerGroup
Manpower has offices in more than 80
locations across the globe. While North
American data is housed in a data
warehouse, data from other locations
could be provided in a number of
different formats.
“Each of our global areas has its own
business intelligence repositories,
whether Excel or Access or something
else,” says Raviwongse. “If we want
to get insight into a global client, we
would go to our data warehouse for
North American data and then try to
blend that with whatever received from
our other locations,” says Raviwongse.
In addition, some presentations
required the team to blend data from
external sources such as the Bureau of
Labor Statistics or the Federal Reserve
to provide a holistic view of a particular
industry.
Blending information from these
sorts of disparate data sources into a
cohesive customer presentation was a
long, manual process.
“It was a lot of cutting and pasting,” says
Raviwongse. “A lot of Excel work and a
lot of Access work.”
Raviwongse estimates that a single
business review report for a large
client would take a team of five people
approximately three weeks to produce.
“Oh, Wow—We Like You”
In 2010, two events occurred that
would change how Manpower
viewed and used data: the company
established an analytics team, and it
acquired TAPFIN, a human resources
managed services provider.
The newly-established corporate
analytics team wanted to align its
efforts with TAPFIN’s analytics—which
was produced and distributed through
Tableau Server.
A few, scattered people within
Manpower were already using
Tableau Desktop for client insight; the
TAPFIN acquisition brought additional
attention to Tableau, and usage
began to mushroom.
“We wanted more flexibility in terms
of the graphs and visualizations that
we use. We wanted to be able to be
independent from IT. And we wanted
to be able to do the analysis and drillthrough and have hierarchies pre-set
based on the data,” says Raviwongse.
“Tableau met those needs, which was
a big contributor to why we started to
expand (our use).”
“We only have about six people in the
analytics group, but we support all
of Manpower,” says Nell. “Demand is
really high. We really needed a solution
that would meet the needs for faster
deliverables, ad hoc report requests—
and we needed to make it sustainable,”
says Nell.
The analytics team began to provide
Tableau visualizations for use in
business reviews with clients. “That’s
when Tableau started picking up a lot of
popularity,” says Nell.
“The teams saw our speed and thought,
‘Oh wow—we like you. Let’s use you
more.’ The visuals and the different
drill-downs that we could provide—it
was just leaps and bounds above what
they were getting before,” she says.
Today, more than 20 people are
authoring reports in Tableau and up
to hundred are seeing and interacting
with completed visualizations. The
team is primarily self-taught, through
videos from tableausoftware.com and
power users training newer users.
Manpower recently participated in its
first Tableau Training on-site.
“We can take five or six
different reports and
blend them into a single
business review
document. It’s seamless
in the presentation”
2011
Net Bill Amt
2013
0K
2011
2012
Month of Date
2013
2012
Spend Breakdown
2011
2012
2013
0K
2011
OT Spend
2012
$138,624
$40,984
Month of Date
2013
$82,890
Spend Breakdown
0K
500..
100..
0K
500..
100..
0K
500..
$138,624
OT Spend
$977,679
Net Bill Amt
2012
$452,062
2013
$491,084
$40,984
$82,890
$495,620
$574,802
Reg Spend
$491,084
$452,062
$835,965
Difference in Net Bill from the total of Reg Spend and OT spend could be expenses billed
to the account such as drug screens, background checks or anything else that falls outside of those two categories.
$495,620
$977,679
Net Bill Amt
$574,802
Difference in Net Bill from the total of Reg Spend and OT spend could be expenses billed
to the account such as drug screens, background checks or anything else that falls outside of those two categories.
$0.3M
$0.2M
“We want to be able to provide access
to visualizations to people’s mobile
$0.5M
$1.0M
$0.1M
$0.1M
$0.2M
$0.2M
$0.1M
Q1
$0.1M
Q2
$0.1M
0K
Spend by Location
100..
$0.2M
$0.6M
Q3
$0.1M
2011
$0.3M
2013
500..
$0.2M
EAST ATLANTA,
GA
0K
Q2
2012
2013
$0.6M
$156K
Q3
Q4
2011
$94K
Grand Total
Spend Trend
$81K
$73K
$0.5M
Grand Total
Q4
$0.1M
$38K
Q1
TRACY,GA
CA
EAST ATLANTA,
$0.1M
$0.3M
$0.3M
$0.2M
Spend by
Location NC
CONOVER,
2011
$835,965
Reg Spend
$0.2M
$0.2M
Quarterly spend
$140K
2012
Year o..
2013
2011
100K
UNION,NC
MO $73K $190K
CONOVER,
NEOSHO,
MO
TRACY, CA
UNION, MO
NEOSHO, MO
$94K
$190K
$49K
$81K
$36K
$140K
$1K
$33K
$88K
0K
2012
$36K
$1K
500..
$0.2M
$0.2M
$0.3M
$0.1M
$0.1M
$0.1M
$0.2M
$0.3M
Q1
Q2
$0.2M
100..
50K
$49K
$1.0M
100..
$88K
$156K
$38K
Net Bill Amt
Net Bill Amt
50K
100K
50K
500..
The analytics team has made great
strides in eliminating ad hoc reporting
and standardizing within the company.
$1.0M
100..
2011
0K
Quarterly spend
100..
Year o..
2012
500..
100..
And while the global offices of
Manpower are not yet sharing data the
way Raviwongse envisions, he is able
to use Tableau to work with what he can
get. “We can just call different branches
around the world and have them send
data and we stitch it together using
Tableau.” This is far easier and faster
than the previous process.
TAPFIN continues publish its own
analysis through Tableau Server, while
the Manpower analytics group has
been using Tableau Desktop. The team
has just started experimenting with
the hosted version of Tableau Server,
Tableau Online.
Year o..
Spend Trend
“Today we can take five or six different
reports and blend them into a single
business review document. And if they
don’t blend the way we need them to,
we can just connect to another data
source through Tableau,” says Nell. “It’s
seamless in the presentation and the
connection time is much less than it was
previously,” says Nell.
“I just recently connected to a data
source with all of our client data in it,
and I’d estimate that has more than
100 million rows,” says Nell.
Quarterly spend
100K
Better Blending, Fewer Band-Aids
The analytics team usually works with
data extracts for increased speed and
performance, but occasionally will
connect to larger data sources.
— Sarah Nell, Global Corporate
Account Analyst, ManpowerGroup
Spend Trend
devices, and we want to unplug from
having to manage the infrastructure,”
says Raviwongse of the choice to move
to Tableau Online.
500..
0K
$0.5M
$0.1M
100..
$33K
2013
0K
2011
2012
Month of Date
Quarterly spend
2013
500..
$0.6M
0K
Q3
Q4
Grand Total
Year o..
$1.0M
100..
2011
500..
Quarterly spend $0.2M
0K
Year o..
100..
100..
2012
500..
2011
$0.1M
500..
0K
$0.2M
0K
100..
100..
2013
500..
$0.2M
2012
500..
0K
$0.1M
0K
Q1
2013
2013
2013
$82,890
$0.2M
$0.3M
$0.1M
$0.3M
$0.1M
$0.2M
$0.1M
Q3
$0.1M
Q4
Spend by100..
Location
2013
500..
$0.2M
$0.5M
2011
$0.3M
0K
EAST ATLANTA, GA
Q1
Q2
2011
2012
2013
$138,624
$40,984
$82,890
Reg Spend
$835,965
$452,062
$491,084
Net Bill Amt
$977,679
$495,620
$574,802
Grand Total
TRACY, CA
2012
$38K
$73K
$81K
2013
$156K
$140K
$88K
$94K
$0.6M
2013
2012
$38KQ3
2011
EAST ATLANTA, GA
CONOVER, NC
$0.6M
$0.3M
$0.1M
Q2
Spend by Location
OT Spend
$0.2M
$1.0M
$0.5M
$0.1M
$0.2M
Spend Breakdown
Q4
$156K
Grand Total
UNION, MO
$190K
$49K
$36K
$1K
$33K
Spend by Location
2013
$491,084
$82,890
$574,802
$491,084
uld be expenses billed
g else that falls out$574,802
uld be expenses billed
ng else that falls out-
CONOVER, NC
EAST ATLANTA, GA
TRACY, CA
CONOVER, NC
UNION, MO
TRACY, CA
NEOSHO, MO
UNION, MO
NEOSHO, MO
$73K 2011
$94K
$73K
$190K
$94K
$190K
$81K 2012
$38K
2013
$140K
$156K
$88K
$81K
$49K
$140K
$36K
$1K
$88K
$33K
$49K
$36K
$1K
$33K
Difference in Net Bill from the total of Reg Spend and OT spend could be expenses billed
to the account such as drug screens, background checks or anything else that falls outside of those two categories.
NEOSHO, MO
“We took all of these different client
reports that were utilized by different
teams and brought them into analytics
so we could create the solution through
Tableau,” says Nell.
“It’s seamless in the
presentation and the
connection time is
much less than it was
previously.”
— Sarah Nell, Global Corporate
Account Analyst, ManpowerGroup
Now teams turn to the analytics
department for their reporting needs,
and they receive consistent answers
based on standardized and validated
data.
Internal adoption of the Tableau reports
is higher than for previous reporting, a
change Raviwongse attributes to the
ease and value the Tableau reports offer.
Nell agrees, saying “Other departments
see what we can do with Tableau and
they think, ‘Oh, how can this impact
what we’re doing as well?’ Those one-off
solutions, those Band-Aids, they don’t
exist nearly as frequently anymore.”
50x the Reports, Weeks Faster
Even with this increased demand, the
analytics department is delivering better
insight, faster than before.
“Five people and three weeks for one
client was yesterday’s reality. Now with
Tableau, it is two people, fifty clients, in
a day or two,” says Raviwongse.
Nell appreciates that Tableau
enables her to automatically update
visualizations by simply refreshing her
connections at the data source. No
re-work is required as long as the data
formatting remains the same.
“If I needed to update business review
documents with Excel just two years
ago, the time it would have taken
me to do something like that is just
astronomically different today,” says Nell.
“It’s a complete night and day change.”
“Now with Tableau, if we receive a
request for a client review, I could have
it to them before the end of business,”
says Nell. “We can respond with a level
of immediacy and urgency that was not
possible previously.”
Nell points out that it isn’t just the
analytics team’s opinion that quality
has improved.
“I had a conversation with one of our
client teams last week and they were just
astounded at what we’re able to provide
them now,” she says. “We’re providing
greater insight into what is going on
behind the scenes. So the client teams
are getting better quality for even less
effort than what we did before.”
“We’re Having Strategic
Conversations Instead of Story Time”
Anecdotal or instinct-based decisionmaking is no longer the norm. “Now
we’re actually seeing what is driving a
client right now,” says Nell.
“These conversations have evolved
over the last few years due to how we’re
using Tableau—they never would have
existed before. We’re having strategic
conversations now instead of story time.”
This access to timely, accurate
information has increased
accountability among customer teams.
“Data—or lack of it—is no longer an
excuse,” says Raviwongse. “We have
the data. And we can crunch it quickly,
look at it and move on.”
“Customer teams are more cognizant
of how the program is running overall,”
says Nell. “They’re trying to be
more efficient in how they manage
placement and how people are going
into their assignments.”
For example, client teams have
started requesting Tableau analysis of
placement turnover to get a better sense
of the reason behind assignments that
end. Teams can see visualizations of
the various entry codes for assignment
closure by specific time period,
geography, and other data dimensions.
“We’ve become a lot
less transactional.
Today we are lot more
strategic for our key
customers.”
“This enables us to get
ahead of the talent
needs of our clients.”
— Sarah Nell, Global Corporate
Account Analyst, ManpowerGroup
“This enables us to get ahead of
the talent needs of our clients,”
Raviwongse says, a change which has
led to distinct benefits for Manpower
as an organization.
“We’ve become a lot less
transactional. Today we are lot more
strategic for our key customers,”
says Raviwongse. “We are more of
a partner to our clients around the
workforce and not just having ‘I need a
temp tomorrow’ kind of conversations.”
For example, Manpower has worked
with a consumer products company
for 20 years. Over that time, the
conversations were typically about the
speed and quantity of Manpower’s
temporary worker placement.
“Using Tableau, we were able to
talk about how efficient it would be
to blend multiple production lines
and multiple warehouses—a sort
of workforce leveling plan across
factories,” says Raviwongse.
“This could help this key customer
obtain close to $100,000 in cost savings.
We were able to uncover this because
with Tableau we could regularly see and
understand the different demand levels
across different factories.”
New Opportunities
The Manpower analytics team has
begun piloting analytics as a service.
“We are using Tableau as a platform
to offer internal analysis to a hospital
client, for example. They are in
the Access-Excel world and were
struggling with how to blend the data,”
says Raviwongse.
“I said, ‘Hey, we can use Tableau to
blend some of that data, visualize it,
and match it up to what we have in our
internal databases to give you a sense of
how far off or on you are and how difficult
it is to hire certain roles, and so on.”
Manpower is also testing Tableau
for forecasting its own performance.
The team has started to compare
its regular IBM SPSS forecasting
results with forecasts using the same
measures within Tableau.
“We have found that there is some
variation, but it’s very close,” says Nell.
“So we feel that it is viable and that we
can work with it. Now we just need to
build it out and make it more robust.”
In the future, the team is thinking
about embedding visualizations
into the company-wide SharePoint
site. Manpower has recently begun
using the Salesforce CRM solution
company-wide, so the analytics team
also has begun experimenting with
the Salesforce direct connector that
became available in Tableau 8.
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