You might have already heard, but recently Paradox acquired leading people analytics platform Eqtble.
Since our announcement, we’ve received a lot of questions about how we’ll work together (and what people analytics even means). So I wanted to take the time to sit down with CEO Joseph Ifiegbu and Chief Product Officer Gabe Horwitz to talk about our partnership: What it means for Paradox, and what it means for our clients.
This conversation has been lightly edited for clarity.
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Adam Godson: Give me a bit of an explanation on ‘people analytics.’ You both have backgrounds in math and data science — you could have done any number of things. Why people?
Gabe Horwitz: We talk a lot about how we fell backwards into it. People analytics was an open opportunity at WeWork, and the reality of it is that there's a huge challenge in this space: I know it’s a cliche to ask, but what’s your largest expense? It’s not software. It’s people. But if you think about it from a data perspective, you probably spend the least amount on actually analyzing employee satisfaction, even though it’s proven to correlate with performance. So people analytics is about using data in smart ways to improve your business through its people. It’s a people-centric study, but we’re coming at it with a data-driven perspective. We don't have traditional HR backgrounds. But we really care about people. We care for the problem.
AG: I find that when people care for the problem, they really love the problem. They’re determined to fix it. So what's the vision for how we, Eqtble and Paradox, can help overwhelmed HR and TA directors make sense of their data?
Joseph Ifiegbu: The first thing is accessibility. When we started Eqtble, the idea was, ‘Hey, there's a lot of data that people don't know how to access or interpret in a simple way.’ So we started building a clean data model — something that makes it easy to access, understand, and make decisions off of a data set. We want to move past having data that sits in untouched systems and instead move towards a place where data becomes systems of action or systems of decision.
GH: We’re going to take the work of connecting the dots out of HR directors’ hands. Because that’s time consuming and frustrating. If you're looking at data dashboards over in one system and then moving to dashboards in another system and then moving to a third system where you’re actually making the decisions, that’s inefficient. It's all about that last mile delivery. Because the data exists, the dashboards exist, and theoretically, the insights exist. And so we’re going to pull out those insights and give them to people in the moment that they're actually going to make that decision. All in one system.
JI: Right. Paradox built… let's just say this Ferrari of a car. And I think about conversational AI as the tires that get you from point A to point B in a very efficient way. Now for us, I think about analytics as a navigation system. There's a chassis built — you have the tires — but then how do you go from A to B in a very sort of a quick and an informed way? And that's sort of how I think about Eqtble augmenting Paradox’s conversational AI.
AG: Yeah, I think we're really excited for that vision to continue to come to life. I was remembering meeting you guys and one of the first things I think Gabe said was, ‘Oh, dashboards are dead.’ And I was like, ‘Wow.’ But you talked a lot about framing data less as a dashboard and more as a story. The data needs to tell a story, cleanly. Walk me through how you think Paradox Analytics can be the foundation for telling the story of AI in TA and HR spaces.
GH: One of the most exciting things we keep going back to is being able to deliver the analytics to people at the exact right moment. Helping them make the decision right then and there, without wasting any time. I mean, think about who we're actually dealing with Paradox software. Recruiters, hiring managers, operators — people that don't have a lot of time in their day. They don’t have time to look at a classic data dashboard and derive specific candidate insights or hiring patterns. So what do we have to do? We have to deliver the data to them in the most efficient way possible, and we need to deliver the most meaningful data to them.
And how do we do that? AI. Conversational AI. Because with conversational AI, we can deliver the best insights in the medium of each individual’s typical workflow. What are they doing on a typical day? They're chatting; they’re conversing; they’re texting. Whatever it is, getting the data to them in that moment that they might be about to make a decision is going to be super critical. Being able to say, ‘You made an offer to someone, and what can I tell you about that offer? What can I tell you about that person that you made an offer? What's the potential quality of hire of that person?’ We want to help people be preemptive with their decisions. Help them use their current actions to make a better future. And that's only possible with the conversational AI that will be powering Paradox Analytics.
AG: So if you're a Paradox client, how should you think about the future of Paradox Analytics going forward? What will this mean for clients?
JI: Yeah, I think they should be excited. That's the first thing. This partnership is going to enable clients to make decisions with data at the point in which they need it. Because the value of analytics is in the action. If there isn't any action that comes from analytics, then it's failed. That's how we see it. We need to get that information as soon as possible so that actions can occur.
We are meeting clients at the point of need and through the ways that they work. And, again, providing them with analytics to really guide a lot of their decision making. So I think that's the biggest thing that they should be excited about. They won’t have any analytics sitting somewhere else. They won’t have to go look for them. No, it's going to be integrated into the day-to-day flow. That is the goal and the vision.
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Read the full press release on the Eqtble acquisition here:
