Sinclair Knight Merz: Workforce Performance

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Accenture implemented the Accenture Human Capital Development Framework, an assessment and analytic tool that draws on best practices and Accenture experience in the fields of human resources development, learning and knowledge management, along with state-of-the-art measurement techniques.

In addition to confirming the strength of many of SKM's human capital processes, the analysis identified areas in which further improvements could provide the company with vital competitive advantages in terms of workforce performance.

Sinclair Knight Merz (SKM), one of the leading professional services companies in the Asia Pacific region, was looking for ways to increase its ability to manage and grow its workforce capabilities. In this industry, companies compete largely on the basis of their people—their skills, their ability to provide excellent client service, and therefore the ability of the company's HR function to effectively acquire, develop and retain top talent. In part because it is employee owned, the company is intensely focused on its people, emphasizing an open and independent culture.

Yet it is this independence that posed a challenge. SKM knew that it must keep a finger on the pulse of its culture at all times. What could the company do better? How could it identify and retain its best people? How could workforce planning be done effectively so the right workforce skills could be developed and marketed to clients? SKM had always been a leader in its industry, but company executives knew that maintaining that position would take constant vigilance.

SKM asked Accenture to implement the Accenture Human Capital Development Framework to help its HR function identify ways to enhance human capital capabilities. The framework is an assessment and analytic tool that draws on best practices and Accenture experience in the fields of human resource development, learning and knowledge management, along with state-of-the-art measurement techniques.

The Accenture Framework—developed as part of Accenture's overall research program to determine the characteristics of high-performance businesses across industries and business functions—is unique in that it helps organizations do more than look at levels of spending to get a sense of their human capital development strengths. It also highlights the completeness of the underlying practices and how aligned they are with the organization's competitive strategy and mission. With the framework, an organization can better assess its core human capital processes and capabilities, such as leadership and talent management, identify specific human capital needs and then prescribe the right interventions that can create high performance.

The Accenture project with SKM was also significant because it was part of a larger analysis of the Accenture framework, conducted with 19 organizations from a variety of industries across the Americas, Europe, Asia Pacific and Africa. This analysis, co-sponsored by Accenture and SAP, showed that companies can focus their human capital investments in several key areas that are more likely than others to help achieve high performance. Specifically, the testing underscored the importance of human capital strategy, supportive work environments, and employee development to the financial success of any organization.

The Accenture analysis affirmed the strength of many of SKM's human capital processes. Seven of the 13 human capital processes scored in the top quartile of results. The company also exhibited strong financial results: its capital efficiency and return on invested capital were among the highest of the companies that have thus far used the framework.

However, the Accenture analysis did more than just confirm existing strengths. It also identified a number of areas in which further improvements could provide the company with vital competitive advantages in terms of workforce performance.

Although the HR function had many best practices in place, there were a number of important discoveries for continual improvement of HR's impact on the business. One was the importance of workforce planning and recruitment. Data collected from the framework revealed, for example, that those organizations with more effective recruiting capabilities have superior workforce performance and employee engagement. As a result of working with Accenture on this initiative, the HR department further reviewed its methods of recruiting top talent, and put in place an internal capability in key geographies. The initiative has been immediately effective; it has reduced time to recruit key staff, increased the firm's ability to handle large recruiting assignments, and significantly increased the satisfaction of managers with the HR recruiting service. The initial pilot program has been expanded to more geographies.

Another example relates to a critical HR process found to be strongly linked to business results—learning and development. Through the study with Accenture, SKM learned that it had a much lower investment in learning and development than other benchmark companies. With this information, SKM chose to double its investment in learning and development over three years, with a significant increase in the first year.

SKM executives also learned that while some of its programs are leading initiatives, staff (or employees in non-managerial roles) had a lower level of knowledge about these programs than was expected. This finding prompted HR to increase its communication to staff and review its method of communication of programs to supplement the preferred method of communication through managers.

The employee engagement results from the framework implementation echoed a number of things the company had found in its own internal surveys. Leadership development continues to be a focus item to improve employee engagement, as does rewards and recognition.

According to SKM's vice president of HR, "The Accenture Human Capital Development Framework has delivered important insights about aligning human capital processes with business results. The framework provided us an effective method of determining where we should most focus our resources and energy to have the best impact on the business."