Benchmarking Request from
State Farm – HR Data
Structure
State Farm is collecting information on organizational data structure from
various external organizations to inform an HR effort focused on potential
improvements to our own data structure. All responses will be kept
confidential/anonymous, and we will share the findings with everyone who
participates.
www.retentionconsortium.org
Questions
How should data best be structured (based on reporting needs) to ensure flexibility
needed for reporting in an ever-changing business environment? (e.g., business
unit realignment/hierarchy changes, geographical realignments, product/service
changes, etc.)
Company #1

This is a very complicated question that’s basically “it depends”
o
Make sure all data is relatable to the person as much as possible
o
Ideally, you have a data cube that would allow you to do longitudinal querying over
time using month-end snapshots
o
Your central data environment contains tables that track historical changes that
someone can use to recode historical variables to current equivalent values
o
To make managing org changes a little simpler, we’ll take two year-end files and
re-code the top few org structure nodes to reflect new org structure values
o
We’ve developed a philosophy around historical reporting that basically says we’ll
restate the past using current values (org, bands, etc). It’s not always the “right”
thing to do to restate history as actual. For example, we have organizations that
are several thousand people in size now and were just a few hundred a few years
ago. Sometimes it makes more sense to trend based on the current structure than
what it might have actually looked like
Company #2

2
I recommend an org structure that is just for reporting and not using Finance’s org
structure. The foundation of the org structure should still be the cost center that is issued
by finance but how it rolls up for HR reporting should be determined by HR independent of
Finance. In the past, I have used up to 3 org structures. 1) who reports to who 2) who
pays for who 3) a variation on 1 or 2 to support matrix structures. We ping HR quarterly to
request they review their org structure to ensure it is up to date. Some in HR keep it up to
date without a reminder but others need constant reminders
Benchmarking Request from State Farm – HR Data Structure
FOR ARC USE ONLY
www.retentionconsortium.org
Company #4

The way we do it is by linking data based on what is least likely to change (in our case,
employee ID). Then we use lookup tables for the info that changes. Using VLookups in
Excel is very helpful for when regions or business units change often. You then only need
to update the data table linked to the VLookup formula
Company #5

Not sure we have a good answer for this. When organization structure changes occur, we
end up doing a lot of restating of prior years' data manually
What other data (internal and/or external to the organization) is typically
integrated/combined with HR data?
Company #1

HR survey data

Open-ended responses/unstructured data from social collaboration sources

Benchmarking

Labor market data
Company #2

Internal – business outcomes such as revenue, sales, profit, customer satisfaction, call
handle time, cases closed, etc. Survey data – engagement survey, exit survey, new hire
survey, etc. External – local unemployment rate, local available labor supply by job, race
and gender, benchmarks for turnover, diversity, etc.
Company #3

I do not believe we have any data from outside the HR function that is integrated with our
data. I have never seen sales, revenue/profit, or anything along those lines that is
integrated. It would be nice if it was integrated though
Company #4

3
Talent management data (like potential ratings, succession planning) business metrics
(like safety data), and demographic data
Benchmarking Request from State Farm – HR Data Structure
FOR ARC USE ONLY
www.retentionconsortium.org
Company #5

Bureau of Labor Statistics data, safety data, finance data
What is the best approach for integrating data from multiple systems (e.g., staffing,
finance, employee surveys, etc.) and providing accurate reporting of the integrated
data?
Company #1

Depends on the data. If it’s highly relatable with common key linking fields, use a
relational approach

We’ve started to use unstructured methods (e.g. Hadoop) when data isn’t easily linked
Company #2

A data warehouse that pulls all data needed for reporting into one central place and links it
by unique identifiers. Here data can be held in the format optimized for reporting instead
of just transactions (for example, count of promotions instead of all job changes and
aggregate tables to make rolling up and down the organization quick)
Company #3

I feel it is having the information reportable out of the same system where each database
of information has a unique key that can be utilized to tie the information together from
one process area to another. While we have disparate reporting systems right now, I
think it would be “best practice” to have all data in one system that would allow us to tie
the information together within the reporting system, thereby significantly reducing manual
manipulation outside the system which is prone to error
Company #4

We use employee ID to link individual-level responses, location ID to link location-specific
metrics
Company #5

4
We utilize Microsoft Access to combine the data from Teradata tables or Excel
spreadsheets
Benchmarking Request from State Farm – HR Data Structure
FOR ARC USE ONLY
www.retentionconsortium.org
What are your practices for providing business partners access to reporting tools?
Acces to only “canned reports?” Access to create their own reports? Other?
Company #1

They have access to our analytics system – all metrics and trending for the orgs within
their span of control and horizontally at certain org levels in order to facilitate betweengroup comparison

They can build their own queries in the Analytics system and in our talent management
system (SuccessFactors)

Can only run canned reports in the core HRIS (SAP)
Company #2

We provide Business Partners with interactive dashboards that allow them to select which
metric and which group to summarize over the past 12 months. They can also drill to
detail

We also provide them with raw data that they can manipulate but they use this less and
less as our reporting becomes more robust
Company #3

HR Business Partners have access to only “canned” reports right now, but they are able
to request customized reporting needs to HR. Reports are shared based on role-based
permissions

Unless identified as a “Super User” which goes through extra training to learn how to build
advanced queries in SuccessFactors, HR Business Partners are not granted access to
create their own reports. Super Users are identified by our HR Analytics Center of
Expertise as those individuals who demonstrate advanced knowledge of the tool and
metrics
Company #4

Access to only canned reports
Company #5

5
Access to only “canned” reports and access to create their own ad hoc reports
Benchmarking Request from State Farm – HR Data Structure
FOR ARC USE ONLY