12 Types of HR Reports For Better Business Decisions [+ Free HR Board Report Template]

To make informed, strategic decisions, HR managers must be adept at understanding and interpreting different types of HR reports. These can range from HR board reports to performance evaluation and training and development reports.

These reports distill complex HR data into actionable insights, providing a comprehensive view of the workforce and allowing HR decision-makers to make informed choices that can add strategic value to the business.

In this article, we’ll go over the types of HR reports for HR managers and look at how to create impactful HR reports.

What is an HR report?

HR reports are strategic tools to showcase HR metrics and data, providing a detailed overview of your organization’s workforce and Human Resources activities.

An HR report provides critical insights that enable HR professionals and organizational leaders to make informed decisions about their workforce related to recruitment, training, compensation, and resource allocation.

Monitoring key metrics like turnover rates, employee satisfaction, and compliance with labor laws in your HR reports allows you and your organization to analyze trends, make data-driven decisions, and adjust strategies and policies accordingly.

What’s more, a comprehensive report helps evaluate the effectiveness of HR practices and their impact on the organization. They enable you to see how your HR initiatives align with the broader goals of the organization and ensure that HR practices contribute to the overall success and competitiveness of the company.

Types of general HR reports

From monthly snapshots to annual reviews that shape strategic planning, various types of HR reports are designed to serve a specific purpose. These documents form the bridge between raw data and informed decisions and are the key to unlocking your workforce’s full potential.

Here are four common types of general HR reports:

1. Headcount report

A headcount report provides a snapshot of the total number of employees within an organization at a specific point in time. It’s a fundamental tool for understanding the composition and size of the workforce.

This report typically includes details about various employee characteristics, such as their department, location, job level, and employment type (full-time, part-time, or contract).

What to include in the report

• How many employees do we have? The answer to this seemingly basic question is crucial for resource allocation and strategic planning. It’s especially valuable during budgeting or when assessing the need for additional hiring or workforce reductions.
• Where are our employees located? By breaking down the headcount by location or department, organizations can identify areas with high or low concentrations of employees. This aids in resource allocation, identifying potential expansion opportunities, and ensuring that workforce distribution aligns with business needs.
• What types of employees do we have? Understanding the composition of the workforce in terms of job levels, employment types, and other characteristics helps in tailoring HR strategies, such as recruitment, training, and benefits programs, to meet the diverse needs of employees.

A well-structured headcount report should include an executive summary for quick insights, visual elements like charts and graphs to make the data more digestible, and an analysis of any challenges or risks related to workforce management.

Key metrics to include are the total headcount, departmental breakdown, diversity metrics (e.g., gender or ethnicity), turnover rate, and a historical comparison to identify trends, such as growth or contraction in the workforce.

This report serves as the foundation for effective workforce planning and helps you make informed decisions about your organization’s most valuable asset – its employees.

2. Monthly HR report

A monthly HR report provides a snapshot of HR activities, metrics, and developments for a specific month. It helps HR professionals and organizational leaders make data-driven decisions, monitor progress, and maintain alignment between HR strategies and business objectives.

By offering a regular and systematic view of the workforce, the monthly HR reports enable organizations to proactively address workforce-related challenges and optimize their HR practices.

What to include in the report

• Executive summary: A brief overview of the most critical highlights and key takeaways from the month’s HR activities.
• Key metrics and KPIs: Data-driven insights into important HR metrics such as recruitment numbers, turnover rates, employee engagement scores, and training and development activities.
• Notable HR activities: A summary of significant HR initiatives, projects, and events that took place during the month, such as new hires, promotions, or training programs.
• Challenges and risks: Identification of any challenges or risks encountered by the HR department and the actions taken or planned to address them.
• Trends and emerging issues: An analysis of emerging trends or issues within the workforce that require attention or further exploration.

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Again, to enhance readability and engagement, monthly HR Reports often include visual elements such as charts, graphs, and tables. These make it easier for the audience to quickly grasp complex information and trends.

3. Annual HR report

An annual HR report provides a holistic review of HR activities and workforce management over the course of a year, facilitating strategic planning and goal-setting for the upcoming year.

A meticulous annual HR report includes an executive summary of the year’s achievements and challenges, visual representations like trend charts, and detailed sections on HR initiatives, policies, and outcomes throughout the year.

It should also outline HR’s strategic goals for the upcoming year. By consolidating data and insights into a single document, it provides a valuable resource for informed decision-making and continuous improvement in workforce management.

What to include in the report

• Executive summary: A concise overview of the year’s most significant achievements, challenges, and key takeaways.
• HR initiatives and policies: Detailed descriptions of HR projects, programs, and policy changes implemented during the year. This section outlines how HR strategies aligned with the organization’s goals.
• Key metrics and performance indicators: An overview of key metrics such as turnover and retention rates, progress on diversity and inclusion goals, employee engagement scores, and compensation metrics.
• Workforce demographics: A breakdown of the employee population by characteristics like age, gender, job roles, and tenure. This information helps in identifying trends and assessing workforce composition.
• Notable accomplishments: Highlights of significant HR achievements, such as successful recruitment campaigns, leadership development programs, or improvements in employee satisfaction.
• Challenges and lessons learned: Identification of challenges and setbacks encountered during the year, along with the lessons learned and steps taken to address them.
• Future outlook and plans: A forward-looking section detailing the HR department’s goals and objectives for the next year. This includes proposed initiatives, areas of focus, and strategies to address any anticipated challenges, as well as organizational changes.
• Visual elements: Annual HR reports include visual aids like charts, graphs, and infographics to present data and trends to help stakeholders quickly grasp the most critical information.

4. HR board report

An HR board report is a comprehensive summary of crucial HR data and initiatives for presentation to a board of directors or senior management about the state of HR within the organization.

It showcases how the HR strategies and activities contribute to the company’s overarching goals and vision, offering transparency into HR initiatives and emphasizing HR’s role in driving business success.

You can effectively communicate HR results, issues, and priorities to key stakeholders with a ready-to-use HR board pack template, saving you time and ensuring consistency. With a template, you can always provide the most relevant information in a structured format to get the desired attention, understanding, and support from the board.

What to include in the report

• Executive summary: A concise summary of the most significant HR achievements, challenges, and key takeaways. This section provides a quick overview of the report’s contents.
• Workforce profile: A detailed overview of the organization’s employee demographics, including age, gender, job roles, tenure, and other relevant characteristics, with graphs and charts. This section provides insights into the composition and diversity of the workforce, aiding in strategic planning and decision-making.
• Key metrics and performance indicators: This section provides insights into HR metrics and KPIs relevant to the board, like productivity, recruitment impact, turnover and retention, and succession planning.
• Strategic initiatives update: A review of ongoing or recently completed strategic HR initiatives, detailing their current status, outcomes, key learnings, and any upcoming milestones. This keeps the board informed about the progress of key projects and HR’s contribution to achieving broader corporate goals. It’s also an excellent opportunity to highlight significant HR accomplishments during the reporting period, such as successful recruitment campaigns, talent development programs, or improvements in workplace culture.
• Risks and mitigation strategies: Identification of challenges or risks encountered by HR and the strategies or actions taken to mitigate them. This demonstrates HR’s proactive approach to addressing workforce-related issues like HR compliance, effective talent management, or technology adoption.
• Discussion points: Topics or issues that HR would like to bring to the board’s attention for further discussion or feedback, like emergent issues, policy and procedure changes, and strategic shifts. This section creates a platform for open dialogue between HR and the board, ensuring alignment and collaboration.
• Focus of the upcoming period: Highlighting the objectives and initiatives HR is going to focus on in the next reporting period. In this part of the report, summarize the rationale behind your plans, milestones, potential challenges, and necessary resources.

Types of specialized HR reports

While general HR reports provide useful insights into the state of your HR efforts, specialized HR reports help you and your stakeholders further understand the intricacies and nuances of workforce management.

Similar to general HR reports, specialized reports should also include executive summary and recommendations sections to provide a clear overview of the key insights and next steps to the report viewers.

Let’s take a look at what each specialized HR report covers.

5. Recruitment report

A recruitment report provides a detailed analysis of an organization’s recruitment activities and processes. It’s a tool that enables HR and talent acquisition managers and decision-makers to evaluate the effectiveness, efficiency, and overall performance of their talent acquisition efforts and improve the recruitment process.

It helps organizations understand how well they are attracting, selecting, and hiring candidates to meet their workforce needs. Additionally, it assists in making data-driven decisions to improve recruitment strategies.

What to include in the report

• Recruitment metrics: Detailed data on recruitment metrics and key performance indicators (KPIs) in a given period, such as the number of job openings, time to hire, cost per hire, and quality of hire.
• Candidate experience insights: Feedback and data related to the experience of candidates throughout the recruitment process, including satisfaction surveys and any areas of improvement.
• Diversity and inclusion: Data on the diversity of the candidate pool, highlighting the organization’s progress toward diversity and inclusion goals in the recruitment process.
• Recruitment challenges: Identification of challenges or bottlenecks encountered during the recruitment process and the strategies or improvements implemented to overcome them.

Recruitment reports often include visual representations of data, such as recruitment funnel charts or applicant flow diagrams, to make complex information more accessible.

By assessing the effectiveness of your talent acquisition initiatives, your organization can continuously improve its recruitment processes and attract top talent to support its growth and success.

6. Turnover and retention report

If your organization struggles with high employee turnover, a report that analyzes which employees are leaving the organization and which are staying can help you understand potential reasons and patterns and tackle the issue at its root.

What to include in the report

• Turnover and retention rates: Analysis of the overall employee turnover and retention rates.
• Reasons for turnover: A breakdown of the reasons why employees leave the organization.
• Tenure analysis: How long employees typically stay with the organization, categorized by job roles or departments.

7. Absence and leave report

Continuous absenteeism can be symptomatic of larger underlying issues. An absence and leave report aims to monitor patterns in employee absenteeism, reasons for extended leaves, and other related metrics.

Such insights help in identifying potential problems, be it in employee well-being, workplace environment, or organizational culture, and taking corrective measures.

What to include in the report

• Total absences: A count of total absences over a specified period.
• Reasons for absence: Categorization and analysis of reasons provided for absences, such as sickness, personal reasons, or unpaid leaves.
• Frequency analysis: Metrics indicating how often employees are absent and any patterns that emerge.
• Extended leave tracking: Monitoring of longer-term leaves like parental, sabbatical, or long-term illness.

8. Diversity and inclusion report

Organizations investing in DEIB initiatives can benefit from a detailed breakdown of the organization’s workforce by gender, age, ethnicity, and other demographic factors.

Assessing the outcomes of diversity and inclusion efforts helps identify areas of improvement and implement strategies to achieve a more inclusive workplace.

What to include in the report

• Demographic breakdown: Data on employee distribution by gender, age, ethnicity, and other relevant categories.
• DEIB initiatives outcomes: Results and impact of specific DEIB programs or initiatives undertaken.
• Representation by job level: Analysis of diversity representation across different job levels and roles.
• Inclusion feedback: Insights from employee surveys or feedback mechanisms regarding inclusivity in the workplace.

9. Training and development report

This report evaluates the effectiveness and reach of training programs, detailing participation rates, completion statistics, and post-training performance improvements.

With this data, companies can refine their training strategies to better cater to employee needs and organizational goals.

What to include in the report

• Training program participation: Numbers on how many employees participated in each training.
• Completion rates: Metrics on how many employees completed the training sessions they started.
• Post-training evaluations: Feedback and scores from post-training evaluations.
• Training cost per employee: Providing a clear perspective on the financial aspects of training and development to guide future budgeting and resource allocation.

10. Compensation and benefits report

Fair compensation and benefits are one of the most important elements in employee satisfaction and retention.

This report delves into the organization’s compensation structures and benchmarks them against market standards. By analyzing the perceived value of benefits by employees, businesses can make informed adjustments and build competitive and appealing compensation packages.

What to include in the report

• Salary benchmarking: Comparison of the organization’s salary structures against industry or regional averages.
• Benefits valuation: A detailed breakdown of the perceived value and utilization of provided benefits.
• Pay equity analysis: Analyzing potential pay disparities within the organization across gender, race, age, or other factors.
• Employee feedback on compensation: Results from any surveys or feedback mechanisms related to compensation and benefits.

11. Performance evaluation report

Regular feedback and evaluation are vital for employee and organizational growth. A performance evaluation report provides an aggregate view of employee performance scores, areas of excellence, and potential improvement areas.

With these insights, HR can implement strategies to enhance overall team performance and address individual development needs.

What to include in the report

• Performance scores: An overview of scores from performance evaluations, further broken down by department, job level, etc.
• Feedback themes: Common themes or feedback areas from evaluations.
• Areas of improvement: Identified areas where employees may need additional training or support.

12. Health and safety report

Depending on your organization’s industry, a health and safety report provides essential insights for creating a safe work environment.

Such a report meticulously documents workplace incidents, potential risks, and the effectiveness of existing safety protocols. By spotlighting areas that need attention, organizations can effectively address health and safety issues and create a safe and hazard-free workplace for all employees.

What to include in the report

• Incident data: Detailed data on any health or safety incidents that occurred in the workplace.
• Risk assessments: Evaluations of potential risks in the workplace.
• Safety protocol reviews: Analysis of the effectiveness and adherence to established safety protocols.

How to write an impactful HR report

The ability to transform complex data into actionable insights is an indispensable skill for an HR manager. This is where the art of crafting impactful HR reports comes into play.

Your HR report isn’t just a document; it offers strategic insights to guide decisions, shape policies, and harness the full potential of your workforce. That’s why it’s important to have the knowledge and techniques needed to create reports that drive change and enable informed decision-making.

• Clarify the purpose: Determine the specific purpose of your HR report. Are you addressing an issue, highlighting positive results, or providing an overview of HR activities? Knowing your objective will guide the content and structure of the report.
• Know your audience: Tailor the report to your intended audience. A report for the board of directors will require different information than one for your HR team members. Understand their needs and preferences to make your report as relevant and effective as possible.
• Use storytelling and data visualizations: Merely presenting raw data to your stakeholders isn’t going to capture their attention and drive action. It’s the narrative and storytelling behind the numbers combined with data visualizations like charts, graphs, and tables that transform abstract statistics into relatable stories. This helps make complex insights easily understandable and resonate with the audience.
• Utilize HR report templates: Consider using HR report templates to ensure consistency in formatting and content. Customizable templates can streamline the reporting process and make it easier to organize data while ensuring you’re covering all the key points.
• Double-check accuracy: Before sharing your HR report, double-check all data and figures to provide correct and timely information. Errors can undermine the report’s credibility.
• Provide actionable insights: Highlight key data findings, trends, and anomalies. Offer recommendations or action items based on the insights to guide decision-making and problem-solving.
• Consider automation: Explore how your organization’s HR software or tools can automate data collection and reporting processes. Automation can save time, reduce errors, and ensure reports are up to date.
• Train your team: Invest in training your HR staff on best practices for data collection, types of HR reports, and report creation. Ensure they understand the goals and audience for each report they produce and that they are proficient in translating data into insights.

By following these best practices, you can create HR reports that are informative, engaging, and actionable, ultimately contributing to more informed decision-making and improved workforce management.

Key takeaway

Each type of HR report serves a unique purpose, providing insights into different facets of workforce management. When HR managers understand the different types of HR reports and their goals, they can utilize the right reports to communicate urgency, highlight successes, and drive decisions.

An HR manager who can take advantage of a variety of HR reports stands in the best position to steer an organization toward sustained growth, employee satisfaction, and overall success.