What is the role of a human resources analyst?
The HR analyst is vital in gathering, organizing, evaluating, and reporting on HR data and processes. In this post, we will go over the essential skills needed by an HR analyst, as well as the steps to become one, potential career pathways, and compensation ranges.
HR analyst responsibilities and skill sets
Here we will outline the primary responsibilities and skills required of an HR data analyst. It is important to remember that the analyst’s responsibilities are varied and can differ from one company to another.
Many companies are on the hunt for a human resources analyst that specializes in interpersonal communication. This positions the analyst similarly to a human resources business partner in terms of their job profile. Still other companies are actively seeking a data analyst. If you’re applying for a position like this, you should know this!
This further suggests that data analysis is typically not an analyst’s primary responsibility. Most of the time, they’re also helping out with other operational responsibilities.
One interesting thing we’ve found is that jobs tend to be more data-oriented when the word “data” appears multiple times in the title. An HR data analyst, who is even less data-oriented than an HR data scientist, is typically less data-oriented than an HR analyst, even though there is no formal job title for it. The second one frequently spends all of their time doing data analysis.
- Business savvy
Human resources positions now require a high level of business knowledge. The HR analyst is no different.
You should be aware of the project you’ll be working on and the business’s expectations before beginning data analysis. Any analyst working on a project involving end-to-end analytics or even basic data analysis must possess business acumen.
- Consultation and communication
The second skill is the ability to counsel and communicate. Even if data analysis isn’t your primary focus, you still need to interact with the company, handle stakeholders and what they want, and share the project’s results with the right people.
- Managing relationships
Managing stakeholders and connections is essential for analysts. Analytics can’t be successful without expectation management. You must also keep the company informed of your analytics project’s progress and any obstacles you encounter.
- HR Knowledge
Human resources knowledge is crucial whether your analyst work has more of a business partner component or whether you do numbers all day. To a large extent, your work is dependent on this knowledge.
Human resources knowledge is mostly focused on three areas:
- Familiarity with the science underlying human resources practices
- Expertise in HR standards
- Familiarity with the fundamental HR procedures
- Analyzing data
The HR data analyst helps with the foundational work of data-driven HR for the company. This often comprises dashboarding and (ad hoc) reporting for most enterprises.
The analyst is responsible for data collection, data quality maintenance, and data analysis to ensure correct reporting on HR data.
The frequency of these reports could be ad hoc, depending on how developed the company’s data is. Manual data retrieval from systems is required for ad hoc reporting and analysis. Additionally, cleansing this type of data is common and can be time-consuming.
Companies with more experience have figured out how to automate this. This frees up the analyst to concentrate on more valuable analysis, such as predictive analyses, and spend less time on routine reporting.
You need to be detail-oriented and highly motivated to use data to solve business problems if you want to be successful in this role.
- HR software and its application
The Human Resources Information System, or HR system, is the source of HR data. The majority of the data used by the HR analyst comes from these transactional systems.
It is the analyst’s duty to install, maintain, and update these systems.
- Cultural and global consciousness
HR information is rarely local. Global data is your playground as an analyst. To know how cultural differences affect HR and data capture procedures and where the data is coming from, one must be culturally and globally aware.
Making the Transition to HR Analyst
Domain experience in human resources is typically required for the role of HR analyst. Most employers place a premium on candidates with degrees in industrial and organizational psychology or human resource management.
Another option is to get a degree in analytics, statistics, or economics. The majority of HRM professionals lack the special set of quantitative abilities brought to the table by individuals with these types of backgrounds. Human resource management (HRM) courses are often necessary for those with this background.
Possessing knowledge of HRIS systems and prior expertise in human resources is always an asset. You will have an advantage over the competition if you have relevant expertise with the systems and technologies that the company uses. Some examples of tools are SAP, SuccessFactors, Tableau, PowerBI, Qlik, and others.
Proficiency with Microsoft Excel is an essential ability. Most companies still use it, and most people consider it basic knowledge how to use Pivot Tables to analyze massive amounts of data and merge worksheets.
Difference between a human resources business partner and a data analyst
The HR analyst’s role is very similar to that of the HR business partner, as we have hinted at before.
Business partners (BPs) are more involved in communicating with line managers and helping them solve HR-related problems, as opposed to analysts whose duty it is to gather, analyze, and report data. Analysts rely on harder (data) skills as much as they do on soft skills—if not more—in practice, whereas BPs rely on soft skills for 90% of their work.
In other words, the HR BP acts as a consultant within the company, assisting managers in reaching their goals. The nature of the task varies from operational to tactical, but it is always directly related to the company’s needs. The HR analyst steps in if the BP and management encounter data-solvable challenges.
The analyst uses the aforementioned abilities to aid in problem definition and then uses data to address the problem.
A corporation may advertise for an HR analyst when they are really seeking a business partner, as the jobs become more blurred due to the BP’s growing analytics training and the need to actively advise managers based on data interpretation.
The typical compensation for an HR analyst at the mid-level
Salary ranges for human resources analysts can be extremely broad based on factors including analyst experience, geographic region, and organization size. The average salary for a mid-level human resources data analyst in the Midwest is $51,000 to $68,000 per year, whereas the salary for the same position in New York City is $67,000 to $88,000.
Half of the human resources analysts surveyed by Payscale.com had four to five years of relevant work experience. 24% have been in the field for 5–9 years. This is more proof that the analyst’s role has grown in significance and frequency; just fifteen years ago, it was practically nonexistent.
Path to become an HR analyst
In today’s world, it is challenging to plot out a clearly defined career route. As a general rule, one can work their way up the ranks from junior analyst to senior analyst.
Management positions are increasingly seeking candidates with the data-driven mindset of analysts.
Horizontal routes lead to positions such as senior human resources generalist, human resources information system analyst, or human resources information systems manager; vertical paths lead to positions such as human resources director or manager of human resources information systems.
An overview of the position
We did a quick analysis of some current HR analyst job openings to identify similarities and differences. We now have a much clearer picture of what an HR analyst does. Several noteworthy details attracted our attention:
- You need “excellent” knowledge of Microsoft Excel to land most jobs. True enough, an Excel whiz is what ERG is seeking in their job description!
- Some familiarity with internal tooling and HRIS is necessary for most job descriptions.
- But no position called for expertise with advanced analytics software like R, SPSS, or STATA. These are a few of the most popular tools for HR analytics.
- This confirms what van de Heuvel and Bondarouk found in 2016: HR analytics is primarily concerned with routine administrative work and basic reporting.
- Additionally, most functions are junior-only. Having a bachelor’s degree and one year of relevant work experience qualifies you for five of these seven positions. It seems like these businesses aren’t interested in hiring HR experts who can analyze data, but rather Excel whizzes who want to work in HR.
- Some job descriptions make it sound less like an analyst role and more like an administrative HR one. In today’s HR department, it seems that every employee with Excel skills is also an HR analyst. It seems like a Business Partner should have the talents listed above for many of these roles. With the correct system architecture and HR dashboarding that allows for easy slicing and dicing, the HR analyst can also reduce a lot of their workload.
Sample job description for an HR analyst
For your added convenience, we have prepared a sample job description that you may easily customize. Note: Please review the requirements and make any necessary adjustments to include or exclude company-specific requirements.
Job Duties
- Strong business sense and gifted communicator.
- Improving and establishing (new) methods and procedures for handling data.
- Retain reports and dashboards that relate to human resources data.
- Make and send out HR reports as needed as well as those that adhere to conventional formats (monthly, quarterly, and annually).
- In response to sporadic requests for HR data, compile, analyze, and publish relevant data from a variety of sources.
- Make sure all HR data is accurate and consistent to keep it all in good standing. Evaluate human resources records and identify any inconsistencies. Assist with procedures for data governance.
- Create and update a data dictionary
- In charge of entering master data.
- Collaborate with Payroll and Human Resources to analyze and improve the system
- In charge of handling a large number of system-related tasks efficiently while ensuring internal customer satisfaction and high-quality standards
Required education, experience, and skills
- Graduate degree in business administration, social science, economics, industrial/organizational psychology, or human resources
- X+ years of direct human resources work
- X+ years of expertise with an appropriate HRIS system
- Experience in data analytics spanning X+ years
- You can evaluate both existing and newly gathered data.
- Fluent in Microsoft Excel
- Proficient in R, Tableau, or Power BI for data visualization
- Proficient in both descriptive and modeling statistics
- If automation is possible, you will
- Proficiency in SQL
In sum
There you have it for the HR analyst. There is a wide range of expertise required for this position, and job descriptions can be fairly different from one company to another.
