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4 Posts tagged with the authoria tag
Jason Averbook
0

http://www.authoria.com/talent-management-images/authoria-talent-management-logo.gif

One of the vendors that Knowledge Infusion sees in the market quite frequently is Authoria.  They have a great product set as well as leadership team and truly are one of the market leaders in the Talent Management marketplace.

 

Today an announcement about their acquisition which will help them continue their growth.  Some great and reassuring news is that Tod Loofbourrow will stay on as the company CEO as you can read in the press release.  Congratulations Authoria and will continue to watch how you change the HR technology space even more than ever before.  Updated with links to a few good blog posts today:

 

Jason Corsello's Human Capitalist Blog

 

Jim Holincheck's Blog

 

Click here to read press release

 

Also, after talking to many Knowledge Infusion customers today, Authoria appears to have done an excellent job in communicating their acquisition and plans to their clients.

 

Another infusion of knowledge...

1435 Views 0 Comments Permalink Tags: authoria
Jason Averbook
0

Day 2 begins with a keynote by Tod Loofbourrow from Authoria.  Tod was also on the panel that Knowledge Infusion's Jason Averbook moderated last evening in San Diego.

 

Tod begins with "HR Makes Talent Count"

  • Alignment

  • Engagement

  • Leveraging Community

 

Tod next discusses how The World is Connected

  • Discussion on how connected all countries are today

  • Development continues in most economies compared to 30 years ago

  • Great representation using graphics

  • Workforce - new world, connected, global

  • Opportunity is for HR to better manage the connectedness of the new age workforce

 

Prediction that CEO's will come from background in talent, not necessarily traditional sales and marketing backgrounds.

 

Obstacles to "Good Talent Management" discussed

 

  • Sr managers don't spend enough time on talent management

  • Organization is siloed

  • Map not done to CEO strategy

 

CEO Priorities discussed - interview played (video) - Helen Drinan, SVP of HR, Caritas Christi Health Care

 

  • Finding ways to get maximum contribution from people already in organization

  • Work that is meaningful truly drives employees

  • Productivity is one thing - at same time - really need to understand employee engagement

    • Engagement is capitalizing on discretionary effort we give every day at work

  • Good discussion by Tod about need for online identity and "talent profile"

  • Helen identifies need that from moment brought in, think of employees feel like leaders and start to teach them how to lead more and more

 

Interesting comparison of user interfaces between Apple iPod and SAP and discussion of how complex iTunes and iPods truly are, but the interface makes it seem so easy.

  • Don't complicate for complication sake

  • iPod is a database too; very interesting analogy

 

Question from audience:  How does Authoria work with PeopleSoft or SAP?

  • Interface/Integration to ERP's

  • Need to leverage foundation of ERP

  • All other talent information in talent management system

  • Read and Feed

  • If sold business case to executives that PeopleSoft does it all, how to I resell business case

    • All about set of business processes not done in ERP (not always true)

    • Category of software that does more strategic things than ERP that now has to talk to the ERP (interesting statement)

 

Tod showing pieces of Authoria's "talent profile" - giving audience idea of what is a "talent profile"

 

Discussion of how HR must align with line management

 

Good discussion about how talent management must be comprehensive and needs to have three major components

  • "HR power users"

  • "Business Managers"

  • "Employees/Candidates"

 

2 case studies

  • PepsiAmericas

  • Aetna

 

2360 Views 0 Comments 0 References Permalink Tags: authoria, e_hr, conference_board
Jason Averbook
3

 

Since the HR Technology Conference approximately three weeks ago in Chicago, IL; Knowledge Infusion has continually been asked questions about the Shootouts and Battle at the event.  Here are some of the questions that have come in through the COE and other avenues:

 

  • I never knew Lawson had a HCM product

  • Authoria's product looked so much easier than the one that I have installed at my site

  • Why does SuccessFactors interface look so different than Vurv's?

  • The Workday product looks amazing, why are more customers not using it

  • Lawson said in a press release that they won the Battle; is this true?

  • Why does Authoria always win yet they didnt make our short list?

  • I thought Taleo had a performance/succession product; I guess it wasnt good enough to make it to the finals

 

I find all of these questions interesting, amusing, frustrating and intriguing all together.  Let me explain how Knowledge Infusion would recommend that you use data and opinions from these types of events:

 

  1. These types of events are a great way to see vendors user interfaces and functionality at a 50,000 ft level.  The demonstrations are very scripted and often tied to the vendors strengths, not their weaknesses, and should be looked at through that lens.  One SHOULD NEVER make a vendor decision based on what is seen at these events.

  2. The vendors presentations are a result of an amazing amount of work, scripting and at times; customization of their software.  You SHOULD NEVER think what you see on the screen at these events is what you get as a customer of these vendors.  In some cases it is, in many it is not.  What is true, is that with customization and configuration, the software can do what you saw.

  3. Some of the vendors were showing products that are not generally available today.  This would explain why the look and feel might appear drastically different than the version that you are using.  Check with your vendor to see when the version they showed at the event will be available to you.

  4. Don't read too much into a vendors press release saying that they WON an event.  I thought that there was a lot of chest puffing after this event that continues to add confusion to the enterprise client space.  Authoria was the only VOTED winner at HR Technology by the people in the room and remember even that was a group of approximately 700 that voted in a room after looking at 20 minutes of software.  Of course some analysts liked one vendor better than the other and even proclaimed a winner; but that is in the eyes of one analyst and definitely not the public.  Once again, should be seen as a opinion.

  5. The best software in the world can be deployed wrong and be thought of as a terrible solution and the worst looking software can be deployed with excellence and seen asa great solution.  There is much more to think about such as integrations, supportability, true value creation and deployment to the workforce than what people saw on those screens.

  6. The Shootout and Battle formats can tell you alot about the executives from an organization by their personae on the stage, but Knowledge Infusion recommends you truly understand the vendor and their executives personal goals and cultures before entering into a true partnership.

 

The Shootouts and Battles are great events.  They allow enterprise clients to see software that they would never get a chance to see without entering into a sales process.  THEY ARE NOT A VENDOR SELECTION, A SOFTWARE REVIEW, A FIT GAP, A TRUE BUSINESS PROCESS SCENARIO EVALUATION. 

 

 

Knowledge Infusion thinks that enterprise clients should attend and see as many of these types of events as possible and learn from what you see, but that is where it stops.  Don't overvalue the press releases and the hype; get to know the vendors, understand how they fit into your organizations culture and make a true process based decision.

 

 

Finally, there are many other vendors in the Talent Management and HCM space than who demonstrated at HR Technology 2007.  Stay tuned for more on this topic as Knowledge Infusion works to help you continue to understand this everchanging space.

 

 

Another infusion of knowledge...

 

 

1892 Views 3 Comments 0 References Permalink Tags: hr_technology_conference, hcm_battle, authoria, vendor_selction
Jason Averbook
0

As part of the Knowledge Infusion live coverage from the HR Technology Conference, here is a blow by blow from the Performance/Learning Management Shootout.  Huge audience in attendance showing interest in the space.

 

  • Authoria - Tod Loofbourrow

  • HRSmart - Mark Hamdan

  • SuccessFactors - Lars Dalgaard

  • Vurv - Derek Mercer

 

Vendors CEO's will be following scripts prepared by HR Technology Co-Chair - Bill Kutik

 

3 Segments of Demonstrations

 

Scenario 1 - need to fill a position, put it out there, modify competencies, send to job board

 

Vurv

  • Starts out with sexy dashboard view

  • Good overview of comptencies, storing over 2000 competencies including factors and interview questions

  • Great visual view of talent side by side - drill down by goals

  • Easy to drill into profile details

  • Nice view of interview evaluation form

  • Request feedback right from interview review - very easy to send out emails for feedback (good use of workflow)

  • Easy to add competencies to job model

  • User interface looks very nice

  • Automatic email - Mgr goes right from Outlook email to right place in Vurv application for manager to do their job

  • Good flow, easy to understand

 

SuccessFactors

  • Leads off with some SEXY org charting

  • Great employee profile

  • Easy to take action right from org chart

  • Great view of information right next to org view

  • Easy to use text editing, MS Word like

  • Knockout questions - nice formatting for recruiting

  • Leverage performance data from past to link to recruiting process - value of integration

 

HRSmart

  • Dashboard start

  • Nice gap analysis from succession standpoint

  • Ad Hoc approvals - easy to understand

  • Interface easy to understand - steps easy to understand

  • Not alot of showing of competency libraries, etc

 

Authoria

  • starts with story about how Authoria can help with conversations

  • User interface and dashboard incredible - easiest to understand

  • Nice org chart view

  • Drill down to profile to allow for meaningful conversation

  • Take actions right from Org Chart

  • Great wizard to add positions

  • Designed for managers, not HR department - big difference between Authoria and other vendors in that area

  • Slide bar to ratchet up rigor around compentencies and knockout questions

  • Wizard makes it looks easy, standardization or processes

 

 

 

 

Scenario #1 Voting: Authoria 66%, Vurv 25%, SuccessFactors 5%, HRsmart 2%

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Segment 2: Finding the best candidate for jobs

 

 

 

 

SuccessFactors

 

 

 

 

 

  • Starts out with Google Maps view of where positions and people are

  • Great alerts with flags - drill back to Google Maps - see in candidate Chicago, not San Jose and not willing to moveherefore not really a candidate

  • Left Axis - Average cost of driving candidate into org (HotJobs, Monster)

  • Bottom Axis - Performance - AMAZING way to see where the best candidates have come from integrated into performance management - At this point, best I have seen - not only how they did, where they came from, but how much it cost to recruit

  • More use of dashboards - showing ratings by colors, with drill down into details

 

HRSmart

  • Good view of searches

  • Look back in past, people I have interviewed

  • Not as graphical, but good amount of detail per search and view screens without drilling around

  • Easy to navigate tabs

  • Nice view using graphs - pie charts, spider graphs

  • More sophisticated views - different approach from SuccessFactors - harder to compare (text vs. graphical with successfactors)

  • Good compare functionality

 

Authoria

  • Once again, great opening dashboard and similar starting spot - good for deployment

  • CNBC looking User Interface - tying in content with metrics / analytics

  • Drill down on metrics and analytics to data

  • Blinking yellow star - alerts

  • Task based actions from task lists

  • Drill to resume and find search terms - google desktop type approach

  • Nice compare - side by side

  • Ad hoc workflow for sending of data off to managers

 

Vurv

  • Concept search

  • Easy to understand interface

  • Good compare functionality

  • Not as detailed from an analytical standpoint

  • More user friendly than HRSmart for recruiters

  • Consistent UI throughout

 

Scenario #2 Voting: Authoria 70%, Vurv 14%, SuccessFactors 10%, HRsmart 6%

 

Major discussion about time left for each candidate - CONTROVERSY (smile)

 

HRSmart

  • Nice dashboard view of hiring history

  • Good Integration to training summary in one place

  • Career development - nice views

  • Good transactional application - consistent look and feel

  • Not as sexy as others, but based on guy sitting next to me, we arent looking for sexy

 

Authoria

  • Same dashboard and interface - consistently the best looking (doesnt mean a ton to everyone)

  • Very task based allowing for automation of processes

  • Development plan - training / mentor

  • Built in change management - Just in time coaching (VERY COOL FOR DEPLOYMENT PURPOSES)

  • RAPID ASSIST COACHING - Microsoft Dog like

  • Metrics and Analytics are easy to understand, drillable, detailed

 

Vurv

  • Great interface - tabs showing goals, development plans

  • Attendee sitting next to me likes the interface better than the best - perfect level of sexiness

  • Pre delivered coaching ideas - nice feature

  • Compare sources to performance - basic compared to Authoria and SuccessFactors, but enough for some

 

SuccessFactors

  • Nice color coding and alerts

  • Great point on driving accountability across organization

  • Everything done in one view - easy for a leader

  • Creating goals (good mentions of DDI, PDI, Lominger - gives much credibility to SuccessFactors

  • Make real not just look good - a bit of a rip on someone?  hmm

  • Dashboards from SuccessFactors tie it all together - amazing graphical views without multiple clicks

 

 

 

 

Scenario #3 Votign: Authoria 45%, SuccessFactors 31%, Vurv 14%,HRsmart 9%

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Overall winner - Authoria

 

 

2869 Views 0 Comments 0 References Permalink Tags: successfactors, hr_technology_conference, talent_management_shootout, vurv, authoria, hrsmart


Jason Averbook

Jason Averbook

 Member since: Sep 5, 2007

A blog by Jason Averbook, CEO of Knowledge Infusion

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