However, when you leverage data to your advantage, you will save your company time, reduce costs, and increase revenue. Thus, enabling you to

• Do more with less.
• Sell more with less resources.
• Grow your business with the same or less employees.

The Data Source.

The information used for this example was found on the website of a random company looking to add headcount.  There were many different open positions and multiple openings for each position at different locations.

For this example, we are going to look at a single position, an Associate Analyst, Business Operations. In a complete exercise, we would examine all current and open job positions and responsibilities and align them accordingly for our report.

The Scenario.

A Technology company has a job posting for nine open Associate Analyst, Business Operations positions.

These positions and job responsibilities are identical across multiple locations. What this information also tells us is most likely, their other 35 locations have identical filled positions and job responsibilities.

An ideal opportunity and scenario to consider absorbing as many job responsibilities as possible onto data automation.

Job Responsibilities and the Open position.

We summarized a list of the responsibilities from the complete job description and noted the trigger words and phrases within the duties that have the potential be collapsed onto data automation.

Triggers are words, phrases and any other description information that clearly aligns with data automation features and benefits. Keep in mind that there may be many other job responsibilities not included in the job positing that could be candidates to be absorbed also.

Job Collapsing Opportunity Identification.

Here are a few of the key items I like to use to identify potential opportunities for job collapsing and absorbing work onto data automation.

1. Identify the key trigger words and instances that could be absorbed into data automation. Date related (Monthly/quarterly/bi-annual/annual; Reports and reporting; Collect, acquire, and analyze data.)
2. Mention or not mention analytic or enterprise data automation skills.
3. Sometimes spreadsheet manipulation or experience.
4. Identical responsibilities spread across multiple locations.
5. Common data and data requirements are universal across the organization.
6. Common ERP or applications across the organization.
7. General knowledge of Business Analyst challenges.
8. And more..

Nearly every employee, if not all employees, are engaged with data in some way, shape or form. Various functions and responsibility of their job requires them to interact with data. Automating these duties used to be localized to individuals or departments.

Never were there so many similar duties and interactions with data across the entire organization, until now.

When you begin to collapse these responsibilities onto data automation, tasks shift off the employee and onto the data tools.

You now have a very consistent and reliable component to your business that will enable you to grow and expand while minimizing resources and employees.

Trigger Words and Phrases.

The Trigger words and phrases found in this example are noted in bold. They were leveraged to quickly identify job collapsing opportunities.

• On a monthly/quarterly/bi-annual/annual basis pull data from ERP system.
• Take multiple data sets into a single data set.
• Maintain sales data each month.
• Ensure fee payments are delivered by deadlines.
• Provide analysis and support reporting requirements.
• With Sr Business Analyst, compile, and report monthly/quarterly/bi-annual/annual contract reporting.
• Responsible for contract reporting data and its accuracy.
• Assist peer analysts on technical problems.
• Create reports for internal teams and/or external clients.
• Collaborate with team members to collect and analyze data and interpret trends.
• Structure datasets to be used in presentations.
• Acquire data from primary and secondary data sources and maintain databases.

Aligning job duties to data automation

As intelligent data automation capabilities increase so will their ability to absorb additional job duties.

Here are a few of the exercises we use to align job duties to data automation.

• Leveraging software and data automation you have on-hand.
• Acquiring new data software and capabilities.
• Intelligent data automation helping one employee absorb duties from multiple jobs.
• Documenting data interaction processes and procedures as part of the internal job description.
• Identify and educate employees that will help lead and champion your data automation efforts.
• Determining if intelligent data automation can absorb the need for more employees.

Here is what you can expect to happen.

As you begin to analyze and compare the job responsibilities and duties to the data automation capabilities, you will begin to see patterns emerge. Thus, quickly identifying the similarities for job collapsing opportunities.

Keep in mind that we are positioning for short term and long-term impact. The process is more of a journey than a hammer drop. A subtle change and consistent forward data-driven movement is more effective and long lasting.

You may find yourself thinking about and considering including other positions in your organization that have crossover job responsibilities.

The Results and Potential Benefits.

To follow are some of the results and benefits you might expect from identifying and collapsing various job duties and responsibilities onto data automation solutions.

• Ultimately reduce the number of FTE positions required.
• Lowering costs by reducing/minimizing open positions.
• Minimizing costs/overhead moving forward.
• Consolidating and enhancing data capabilities.
• Data and reporting consistency and timely accuracy across the entire organization.
• Advancing your data-driven business journey.
• Setting example for other data-driven initiatives.
• Identifying additional data automation opportunities across the organization.
• Maximizing the use of enterprise software and applications.
• Absorbing identified job duties from other unrelated positions.
• And many more…

Summary

Now, take this information and exercise and extend it to other open jobs across various departments and locations. Then apply the same concept to current internal positions and watch what you uncover. Once you start you won’t be able to stop.

Five Opportunities maintains an extensive library of data strategy resources and content all centered on helping businesses and individuals become more effective at leveraging their data. Job Collapsing is just one of many different methods we use to identify and spotlight these areas.

Contact us to schedule a meeting or your own personalized Job Collapsing discovery exercise and find out how your business can be more data-driven today and far into the future.