Comcast Cable and Merck & Co. Named 2021 HRM Impact Award Winners

Procter & Gamble and PepsiCo Receive Honorable Mention

The Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology (SIOP) and SHRM (Society for Human Resource Management), along with their foundations, announced Comcast Cable and Merck & Co. as the winners of the 2021 Human Resource Management (HRM) Impact Award. The Procter & Gamble Company (P&G) and PepsiCo received honorable mention.

The HRM Impact Award is an honor given by SIOP, SHRM, the SHRM Foundation, and the SIOP Foundation that recognizes organizations with outstanding evidence-based HR management practices. The award promotes HR practices and initiatives that have been measured and determined successful through evidence-based, data-driven analyses.

Comcast Cable is being awarded a 2021 HRM Impact Award for its “Future of Work” initiative. The initiative was designed to look at each step in the company’s hiring process and review what new technologies and human elements could be used to enhance automation, improve business outcomes (e.g., time-to-fill, quality of hire, new hire retention), and most importantly, create a better candidate experience. Four interventions were identified as part of the company’s hiring overhaul: assessments, which included job analysis and assessment design, a validation study, and post-rollout validations and updates; on-demand video as an interviewing technology; automated interview scheduling; and virtual interviews. Heavy staffing fluctuations caused by COVID-19 have presented a unique challenge for staffing practitioners. Comcast’s efforts to modernize and automate steps in the hiring process allow the company to handle surges or drops in hiring volume without significant impact on its internal staff.

Merck & Co.’s winning project, “General Management Acceleration Program (GMAP),” is the global flagship program for high potential early-in-career talent to develop into Merck’s global enterprise-wide leaders. Designed and implemented in partnership with Siena Consulting and Duke University, this program, continuously evolved and substantially expanded every year since inception, consists of a multiple-hurdle selection process of six in-depth, feedback-laden assessments and a two-year developmental program including stretch assignments, action learning projects, and targeted development activities and roles. GMAP has had a demonstrable impact in identifying and promoting strong role performers and those with high potential; fostering career advancement and development; and placing talented alumni into higher level roles. Beyond that, the GMAP program has also spurred a “grassroots” culture change around dimensions such as: inspiring and energizing others; breaking down functional silos and international borders; and challenging the traditional and structural status quos, to spur an innovative mindset.

P&G was awarded the 2021 HRM Impact Award Honorable Mention for its project, “Interactive Assessments,” an online cognitive ability assessments program launched globally in 2019. This solution included a donation of a liter of clean drinking water to children in need for every pre-hire assessment completed. This solution was designed to improve the company’s global assessment process by addressing the candidate experience, digitization, and scale. A rigorous criterion validation study found the interactive assessments to be valid predictors of job performance globally for both managers and non-managers.

PepsiCo’s winning project, the “PepHire Program,” is a multi-trait, multi-method (MTMM) global external selection program designed to assess the baseline capabilities required for success at different levels of management and is aligned to the company’s global leadership competency framework. The program injects rigor, standardization, and objectivity in assessing external talent, supplementing other elements of PepsiCo’s hiring process (e.g., structured interviews, resume reviews, and functional assessments).

Comcast Cable and Merck & Co. will be recognized at the 2021 SIOP Annual Conference.

For details on this year’s winners as well as previous winning organizations and initiatives, visit the HRM Impact Award webpage. Submissions for the 2022 HRM Impact Award will open in early April 2021 and remain open through June 30, 2021.