Analysis of GAO’s Human Capital Accounting model
Text GAO released an exposure draft on its Model of Strategic Human Capital Management, intended to help federal agency leaders better manage their organizations' most important asset--their people. GAO believes that "employees should be viewed not as costs to cut but as assets to be appreciated”.
The model is designed to help agency leaders effectively use their people, or human capital, and determine how well they integrate human capital considerations into daily decision-making and planning for the program results they seek to achieve.
In so doing, the model highlights the importance of a sustained commitment by agency leaders to maximize the value of their agencies' human capital and manage related risks.
Focus has been concentrated on modernizing outdated federal human resources policies.
This changing model of human HR--human capital management--requires reengineering the management of human capital through analytics and measurements. For HR to play a genuine role in developing and managing human capital, it has to measure intangibles, identify unusual patterns in data through technologies such as data mining, anticipate future needs by understanding correlations between measures, and take action.
Unlike traditional transaction-based HR, today's human capital management system should:
* Support organizational goals by providing the information to acquire, maintain, develop, and retain the right employees.
* Align people, processes, and technology around common goals.
* Measure the strategic value of human capital investments.
* Anticipate, forecast, and predict human capital changes.
* Learn from best practices by leveraging benchmark data.
A Single View: Making Human Capital Management Successful
As the function of HR evolves within government, agencies will expect HR to document its benefit to the bottom line by demonstrating the ability to:
* Attract, retain, and...