Buy vs. Build – What’s the best solution to implement people analytics into your organization?

A self-developed HR solution has the advantage that it can be tailored exactly to your specific requirements and needs. This allows you to visualize and analyze very company-specific data and metrics. In addition, the self-developed solution is usually adapted to the processes and the data model in such a way that there is no need for any change in the organization. This is both a blessing and a curse. If the data model changes in the future because you want to use another or different HR software or organizational changes occur and therefore the processes are adapted, then the self-developed analytics solution must inevitably be modified. Even if existing analytics platforms have limitations in the customizability of the platform, they can be adapted very flexibly to new requirements or systems. In case of doubt, it is always worthwhile to contact potential providers to discuss your individualization wishes for the platform.

If your company has a competent team of data analysts and developers, it can use this know-how to develop a functional self-built solution. However, it is important to note that development and implementation efforts often incur high initial costs, and support, fixes, and maintenance are hidden ongoing costs for your company. So maintaining your own solution will continuously require the resources of your internal teams.

The main reason for many companies to build a solution themselves is the issue of data protection. At first, it sounds reasonable that employee data does not have to be put into the hands of external providers. However, this does not solve the data protection issue. In most cases, HR teams do not have the necessary skills to develop such a solution themselves. As a consequence, critical employee data must be made accessible to non-HR team members. No matter how you slice it, the data protection issue remains.

Another critical issue is the length of implementation. HR teams looking to BI/data teams for support are often not very high on their priority list, so other departments such as Sales, Marketing, and Product take precedence. And developing and implementing a solution also takes time, depending on the size of the team. So if you want to get started with people analytics right away, it’s much faster to turn to external platforms. With peopleIX, you can independently analyze your data in the platform within a few days and generate the right recommendations for action and insights.