Trust, Data and Unlocking Value in the Digital Workplace
Businesses are waking up to a rich new source of growth: vast amounts of data on work and the workforce that have the power to unlock the true potential of their people. This new data can unleash higher levels of business performance—including greater agility, productivity and innovation—and can improve the lives of employees. Almost eight in every ten business leaders we surveyed said using workforce data will help them grow their existing business.
But collecting data (via new technologies such as wearables, online activity and workplace applications) is risky. Misuse of data could compromise privacy or individual rights, prompt incorrect decisions or a misapplication of skills and, ultimately, drive a very consequential loss of employee trust in the organization.
Our research reveals that 62 percent of businesses are using new technologies and sources of workforce data extensively. But only 30 percent of business leaders are very confident that their organization is using the data in a highly responsible way. While employees have concerns, however, they are overwhelmingly in favor of the practice, if the data is collected responsibly and benefits them.
The cost of decoding organizational DNA irresponsibly is high, as are the rewards of getting it right: the difference in growth rates between losing and earning employee trust through the use of workforce data is as much as 12.5 percent, or U.S. $3.1 trillion globally.
62%
of businesses are using new technologies and sources of workforce data extensively.
Only 30%
of C-level executives are very confident that their organization is using workforce data in a highly responsible way.
92%
of employees are open to the collection of data on them and their work in exchange for an improvement in their productivity, their wellbeing or other benefits.
12.5%
of revenue growth at stake.
The difference in growth rates between losing and earning employee trust through the use of workforce data. It equates to U.S. $3.1 trillion globally.
3 MINUTE WATCH
Video
Eva Sage-Gavin talks trust, data and the digital workplace.

The High-Stakes Pursuit of Trust
If companies build trust in the workforce, they’ll create value—for the business and for individuals. Our research has identified the factors of workforce data practices that employees say most influence their level of trust in their employers, and we have modeled these to reveal the financial impact of failing to decode organizational DNA responsibly. If businesses adopt irresponsible data strategies, they risk losing more than 6 percent of future revenue growth.
But if they adopt responsible strategies, the trust dividend could be worth more than a 6% increase in future revenue growth.
12.5%
This difference in revenue growth equates to value at stake of more than $3 trillion U.S. dollars.
The Data Trust Dividend: The Impact of Workforce Trust on Financial Performance

At a time when companies are using newly available workforce data to drive greater value, responsible leadership is the key to building employee trust. Trust is the ultimate currency—it’s the path to innovation and fuels growth by unlocking people’s potential.”
Ellyn Shook, Chief Leadership and Human Resources Officer, Accenture
A Framework for Responsible Businesses
Empower people with greater control of their own data.
Involve people in designing systems and put in place accountable executives.
Use technology in responsible new ways to elevate people and to fix its own unintended consequences.
About the Research
Accenture combined quantitative and qualitative research techniques to understand and measure the attitudes and readiness of workers and C-level executives regarding the use of workforce data and modeled the effects of collecting this data on employee-employer trust.
The research was carried out in October and November 2018 and included a survey of