Tom Kaeding is the Chief Financial Officer at Wunderkind, the performance marketing platform that has been ranked the number one fastest-growing software company by Inc. 5000. On Reimagining Company Culture, he joined us to talk about something most HR leaders rarely hear from a CFO. How to tell the story of an organization through numbers, including people data.
His view is that the best CFOs and the best CHROs share a habit. They use numbers not as scoreboard but as story. The numbers point to what is working, what is not, and what the organization needs to invest in next. People data, used well, is one of the most strategic stories a leadership team can tell.
Why Most People Data Stays Stuck in Dashboards
Most companies have more people data than they know what to do with. Engagement scores, attrition rates, time-to-fill, training completion, manager NPS, the list goes on. Gartner research on employee experience found that only 29 percent of employees believe HR understands what they need. The data exists. The translation into action is where the gap shows up.
Tom described the gap from the CFO seat. He sees HR teams produce thoughtful reports that nobody reads, while finance teams produce spreadsheets that drive decisions. The difference is not the data. It is the framing. Finance learned to tell stories with numbers because they had to. HR is still learning that craft.
His framing is that people analytics becomes strategic when it answers the question every executive cares about. What should we do differently next quarter, and why? Reports that do not answer that question stay in dashboards.
What also matters is the discipline of choosing the right metrics. A 12-tab people report buries the signal. A one-page summary with three to five clearly framed numbers, paired with a recommendation, lands. Tom's experience is that the latter approach is what gets HR a seat at the strategic table.
How Do You Turn People Data Into a Story That Drives Decisions?
What is the right structure for a people data story?
Tom recommends a three-part structure. What is the trend, what is causing it, and what should we do about it. Each part should be one paragraph or less. The discipline of compression forces the analyst to be clear about causation and recommendation, which is where most people reports fall short.
How do you handle data that contradicts the leadership narrative?
By presenting it carefully and early. Tom emphasized that contradicting data is more valuable than confirming data, but only if the messenger frames it as feedback rather than challenge. Change management research shows that leadership teams that learn to welcome contradicting data make better decisions over time.
What Actually Works in People Data Storytelling
Lead with the question, not the data
Reports that start with data and end with a recommendation lose the reader. Reports that start with a question, walk through the relevant data, and close with a recommendation hold attention because the reader knows why the data matters before they see it.
Pair lagging metrics with leading indicators
Attrition is a lagging metric. Manager NPS, pulse engagement, and employee feedback volume are leading indicators that predict attrition. Reports that pair both produce stronger executive conversations.
Make the recommendation specific
Vague recommendations are easy to ignore. Tom emphasized that strong reports name the decision the leadership team needs to make, the timeline, and the trade-offs. That specificity is what turns analytical work into strategic influence.
Where Employee Relations Fits
ER data is one of the most underused inputs in people storytelling. AllVoices' People Team Efficiency solution and our Data and Insights product give HR a single place to surface case patterns, trend data, and operational metrics that fit cleanly into executive narratives.
How does ER data fit into people storytelling?
It provides the qualitative signal that engagement surveys often miss. Patterns of complaints by manager, by team, or by demographic point to specific operational issues. When that data is paired with attrition and engagement signals, the story becomes much more actionable for executives.
Frequently Asked Questions About People Data and Storytelling
What is people analytics?
It is the practice of using data about employees, including engagement, performance, retention, and case data, to inform decisions about workforce strategy and culture.
Why does most people data stay unused?
Because it is presented as a dashboard rather than a story. Reports that do not answer the question of what to do differently next quarter rarely drive action.
What metrics matter most for executives?
Voluntary attrition, manager NPS, time-to-fill for critical roles, internal mobility rate, and engagement by team. Pair lagging metrics with leading indicators to produce a complete picture.
How often should people data be reviewed?
Monthly at the leadership level for trend tracking, quarterly for strategic decisions, annually for compensation and budget cycles. Pulse data should drive shorter team-level loops.
How do you build credibility with finance using people data?
By tying people metrics to financial outcomes. Voluntary attrition has a real cost. Disengagement reduces productivity. Reports that translate people signals into financial impact get finance attention.
What tools help with people data storytelling?
The tool matters less than the discipline. Strong storytellers can use a basic spreadsheet effectively. Sophisticated tools amplify good thinking but do not substitute for it.
The Bottom Line for HR Leaders
Tom's perspective is a useful corrective for any HR leader who has produced a report nobody read. People data has the potential to drive some of the most important decisions a leadership team makes. The work is in the translation from data to story to recommendation.
The leaders who get this right share a few habits. They lead with the question, not the data. They pair lagging metrics with leading indicators. They make recommendations specific. And they treat contradicting data as the most valuable signal in any people report.
Companies that build this discipline see a different kind of HR conversation in the boardroom. People work stops being treated as cost and starts being treated as strategic capability. That shift is what opens the budget, the talent, and the executive sponsorship that ambitious people teams need.
Across the conversation, the throughline was that people data is a story waiting to be told. The HR teams that learn to tell it well end up shaping the most important decisions a company makes about its workforce, its culture, and its future.
Industry research keeps reinforcing this point. McKinsey research on workforce mobility shows that almost half of a worker's lifetime earnings come from skills acquired through work experience. People data that tells that story clearly tends to land with executives in ways that abstract reports do not.
The HR leaders who do this work well also tend to develop strong partnerships with finance. The two functions, working together, can build a much more compelling case for people investments than either can alone. That partnership is part of what mature people functions look like at scale.
Strong people storytelling also produces a different kind of HR career path. The leaders who can translate people work into financial language tend to advance faster, get larger budgets, and join executive conversations more often. That is partly an organizational benefit and partly a personal one.
See how AllVoices helps HR teams turn people data into stories that move decisions.
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