Effective talent management plays a key role in maintaining the health of an organization. It’s about motivating your people and keeping them engaged, as well as prepared for the challenges of changing work life. For your business to thrive, you need the best software for talent mapping.
According to Gartner, there are major gaps on the horizon for things like tech, collaboration and general work skills. Nearly 60% of employees don’t get on-the-job coaching, and only half feel prepared to deal with unexpected challenges.
When employees don’t have the training to handle their roles, they’re much more likely to experience stress and disengagement. These are both major contributors to employee turnover, which is among the most pressing talent management issues for HR to tackle.
Gallup’s global indicator for employee retention shows that over half of employees are watching for or actively seeking new jobs. Globally, 54% agree that now is a good time to find new employment, although US employees are less optimistic overall (48%).
In order to tackle talent management challenges like skills gaps, retention and succession planning, your HR team needs the best software for talent mapping. Along with some important general criteria, we’ve laid out some of the best options on the market today.
Key features for talent mapping software
At its most basic, talent mapping is the practice of analyzing the distribution of skills, knowledge and qualifications across your business. While talent mapping software providers may vary in the services they offer, there are still some essential features you need:
AI-driven skill gap analysis
Before you can address skills shortages with targeted training, you have to know what training your people actually need. Of course, manual skill gap analysis would be ridiculously time-consuming. AI analytics tools, however, can monitor performance and goal-tracking data in real-time for trends and insights.
Succession planning tools
Succession planning is a specific element of workforce planning which involves organizing the replacement of critical roles and skill-sets in your business as employees retire or find work elsewhere. While “redundancy” is often a scary word at work, critical redundancies (i.e. people who share vital skills) are important for business resilience.
Proper succession planning tools help you internally promote employees efficiently to save on the costs of replacing important people.
Integration with HRIS/ATS
Unless you’re building a new company from the ground up, you probably already have things like applicant tracking systems and a HRIS platform. If you aren’t planning to throw out the old like a teen giving themselves a drastic haircut, chances are you’ll want to keep these things.
Proper integrations limit the required investment for trying new software. Make sure new workforce planning tools have integrations for any specific platforms you already use.
Customizable talent pools
For comprehensive talent mapping, you’ll want to be able to monitor people right from the applicant stage. This includes filtering through pools of potential talent based on key criteria. Maybe your tech company needs more people with AI dev experience, or you need to recruit on-site workers that live nearby.
Data analytics and reporting
You can’t do things like talent mapping or skill gap analysis without solid data. That’s why the best software for talent mapping should take full advantage of the info you collect from recruitment, onboarding and general performance management.
User-friendly interface
Effective workforce planning tools should generally make life easier for HR by streamlining tasks. So, naturally, you need user-friendly talent mapping software.
An intuitive UI makes tools like this more accessible to everyone in your HR team, even if they aren’t especially tech-savvy. Poor UI design, on the other hand, is likely to cost any time your talent mapping software might have saved.
1. Zensai’s Perform365
Perform365 is one of three modules in Zensai’s Human Success Platform. Along with general performance management features like reviews and goal-setting, it also includes talent mapping tools for succession planning. These offer an in-depth understanding of skill distribution across your organization.
Core features of this talent mapping software
Altogether, the Human Success Platform gives you all the talent management tools you need to understand the presence of employee skills and start succession planning today. These include:
- AI-powered talent mapping
- 360 feedback
- Automation for performance conversation admin
- AI-assisted succession planning
- Employee check-ins (with Learn365)
Strengths and selling points of this talent mapping software
The Human Success Platform has plenty of options to enable better talent management for your business, such as:
- It’s built for Microsoft 365: Perform365 and our other modules are ideal for workforce planning in Microsoft. Our platform is 100% accessible through Microsoft Teams. It also has out-of-the-box integration with Viva, SharePoint, Copilot, the former Office apps and much more.
 - HRIS and HCM integrations: These HR integrations ensure our modules will be compatible with your existing HRIS and HCM setup. Our integrations include all sorts of commonly used HR platforms, from BambooHR and Deel to Oracle and Workday.
- Real-time performance insights: Regular check-ins and goal-tracking give HR and management a steady stream of performance data to work with. Not to mention underlying engagement data for extra insight. Our platform makes it easy to find emerging talent at the click of a button.
- Personalized employee development: The best way to address skill gaps isn’t with a one-size-fits-all approach, but rather bespoke development to suit the needs of individuals. With the full Human Success Platform, employees can even get AI-personalized learning recommendations.
Drawbacks and limitations
In the interest of fairness, let’s look at some of our software’s limitations and areas for improvement:
- Best used with the full Human Success Platform: While you can get an individual quote for Perform365, it’s most effective when combined with our other two modules. Learn365 is required for employee check-ins, while Learn365 supports upskilling with learning personalization and content access through Content365.
- Relies on Microsoft 365: Our platform is most effective for existing Microsoft users. If you instead use competitors to tools like Microsoft Teams, SharePoint and the like, you’ll need to consider the costs of implementing our platform versus its benefits.
- Basic UI: While we’d argue the Human Success Platform’s simple design is generally a plus, it does lack the sleekness and flash of some of its competitors.
- Talent development toolset still growing: Our primary talent development tool is Learn365, which enables employee education and upskilling. Beyond that, our talent management tools mostly focus on planning and data collection.
Best fit and pricing
Between Zensai’s affordability and its powerful AI tools, it’s a flexible talent mapping option for businesses of all sizes. Basically, the Human Success Platform is a great fit for a variety of industries, from manufacturing and healthcare to finance, government work and more.
We provide scalable talent management and development solutions to educational institutions like Wirral University, tech companies like Priva and synalis, and law firms like Nelson Mullins.
As noted, if you’re mainly interested in software for talent mapping and succession planning, we can offer a quote for Perform365 by itself. That said, our full platform is available under this pricing structure:
- Grow Basic ($): The platform plus Success Basic support, including quick start courses and a live customer success session at launch.
- Grow Plus ($$): Success Plus support adds automation and advanced analytics along with its additional support features. This is our most commonly recommended service package.
- Grow Premium ($$$): The complete Human Success Platform with full access to course content providers and all of our platform’s extra features like Power BI analytics.
2. Engagedly
Engagedly distinguishes itself as being an engagement tool built for employees first. It has plenty to offer as a leading talent management platform, but how does it hold up as talent mapping software?
Core features of this talent mapping software
Engagedly offers a wide array of tools and features aimed at supporting employee engagement and development. These include:
- Skill intelligence and talent mobility analytics
- Advanced AI talent analytics
- Connected performance reviews, goals and OKRs
- 360 and multi-rater feedback
- Marissa™ AI
Strengths and selling points of this talent mapping software
Engagedly is a solid choice of software for talent mapping and development. Despite being a niche adverb, it enjoys plenty of name recognition for the following reasons:
- Transparent pricing: Engagedly displays the pricing for their modules openly on their website. This should make it easy to evaluate basic affordability before you even ask for a quote.
- Succession planning functionality: The platform’s talent analytics include features for succession planning and planning leadership development. Combined with their engagement and performance data collection tools, you’ll easily be able to identify top talent.
- Plenty of HR-friendly integrations: On top of HRIS integrations like ADP Marketplace and HiBob, Engagedly also integrates with Microsoft Teams, Google SSO, and even onboarding tools like Gusto and Paylocity.
- Deep AI integration: Engagedly’s use of AI helps to streamline talent mapping and development in its CXO insights and analytics. On top of that, its AI assistant supports people on all levels with feedback summaries and goal generation.
Drawbacks and limitations
Unfortunately, Engagedly doesn’t always live up to its name for users due to the following issues:
- UI complexity: Although Engagedly’s UI does get a lot of positive user feedback, its sheer range of features can make it difficult to navigate. Additionally, the way some features work seem particularly unintuitive.
- Notifications issues: Some users complain that they aren’t notified about key developments. On top of that, their employee check-ins only become available a few days before their submission deadline, which can lead to rushed results.
- Goal-setting functionality: Engagedly’s goal-setting needs more quality-of-life features to be truly effective. For example, it’s not easy to copy goal lists or set up notifications for goals you’ve created.
- Many modules: Although Engagedly certainly has a lot of features, they’re divided up between several different modules. Aside from their four main modules, they have three “additional suites” available for similar price points.
Best fit and pricing
Engagedly is a good fit for businesses with between 100 and 10,000 employees. That said, with mandatory minimum pricing, it might not be suitable for start-ups and small businesses.
- Basic modules ($):
- Manage Performance
- Learn & Grow
- Recognize & Reward
- Engage & Listen
- Additional suites ($$):
- Mentoring Suite
- Manage Compensation
- Deskless Employee Communication
- Full platform bundle ($$$): The comprehensive platform with performance management, L&D, engagement, rewards, recognition, talent mobility and growth features. Custom pricing is available for organizations over a certain size.
3. Cornerstone
You might remember this platform from when we went over alternatives to Cornerstone. As well as being a high-quality LMS, it’s also some of the best software for talent mapping in 2024. Cornerstone is a cloud-based talent experience platform with plenty to offer.
Core features of this talent mapping software
Cornerstone is primarily an L&D platform, but has plenty of talent mapping and planning features to support this. Its most relevant core features include:
- Cornerstone Galaxy AI with workforce agility scoring
- Cornerstone Succession for comprehensive succession planning
- Talent marketplace for career development opportunities
- Recruiting software for end-to-end talent management
Strengths and selling points of this talent mapping software
Cornerstone has plenty going for it besides its catchy name. Here are its main strengths as strategic workforce planning software:
- Modern UI design: Cornerstone balances out its potentially overwhelming selection of tools with an intuitive user interface that makes navigation a breeze.
- AI-driven skills gap analysis: Cornerstone Galaxy analyzes workforce agility to identify talent gaps and deliver actionable insights on the development opportunities HR should create.
- A highly versatile HR platform: While we’re mainly interested in its talent mapping and succession planning functions, Cornerstone’s various modules cover quite a few vital areas, like recruitment, L&D and experience management. Their platform also includes core HR functions like data management and self-service forms.
- Supports complex performance review processes: Cornerstone’s ability to support complex performance reviews makes it a strong enterprise option. It also means more depth of insight for HR talent mapping.
Drawbacks and limitations
Of course, even with everything Cornerstone does right, it still has its drawbacks:
- Lacks pricing transparency: Cornerstone doesn’t currently display pricing or bundle information on their website, which makes cursory assessments difficult.
- Repeat functionalities: While Cornerstone offers an impressive range of tools, some have overlapping features. For example, their workforce agility engine seems to play a similar role to another Cornerstone product, Cornerstone TalentLink.
- Customer support issues: Some Cornerstone customers report slow response times and difficulty getting issues resolved by support staff.
- Integration difficulties: Although Cornerstone touts its integrations and API, some users report issues trying to integrate Cornerstone with other apps.
Best fit and pricing
Cornerstone is best used by mid-to-large businesses. Its wide range of granular features make it effective for enterprise companies. That said, its opaque pricing means we can’t firmly recommend it for smaller organizations.
Cornerstone prices its various modules by the number of end-users, offering relative discounts for bulk licenses. The company bundles modules together for case-by-case pricing, while some of its features are actually paid add-ons.
4. Workday
Workday is another popular option for talent mapping software in 2024. The company positions their service as a HR and finance platform, but don’t let that fool you. They offer a versatile range of talent management features.
Core features of this talent mapping software
Workday has plenty to offer besides its finance tools. Its most relevant core features are:
- Workday adaptive planning (including workforce planning)
- AI-powered talent management
- In-built HCM and HR management
- 600+ out-of-the-box integrations
Strengths and selling points of this talent mapping software
As a popular HR platform, Workday’s major selling points include:
- Continuous talent planning: Workday allows you to have ongoing, adaptable succession plans with what-if scenarios for local or global influences on your business.
- Easily customized with integrations: Workday’s sheer range of included integrations means you can modify it to suit your HR needs. That means you can leverage the features you want without having to throw out existing systems.
- Useful UI features: Workday’s user interface offers plenty of tools and tricks to streamline HR admin. This makes it a popular choice with those trained to use it.
- Broad HR functionality: If you’re looking for a primary HR platform which can also handle talent mapping and skills gap analysis, Workday is a solid option. It offers a wide range of useful tools, from HCM and finance planning to workforce planning and vendor management.
Drawbacks and limitations
Workday has some great selling points, but unfortunately, also suffers from the following issues:
- Complexity despite UI design: Many users find Workday complicated to navigate. This means it can necessitate considerable training to use, especially for less tech-savvy employees.
- Cost of implementation: Workday’s setup can be quite expensive. Combined with the additional costs of training users, it’s one of the more significant investments on this list.
- Lacks common performance management features: While Workday outperforms a lot of competitors in terms of sheer HR functionality, it has no native performance reviews, goals or OKRs. These features are important sources of talent mapping data.
- Vague price structure: Workday offers two paid options and a free trial for its adaptive planning tools. Beyond that, it’s unclear how the rest of their platform fits in.
Best fit and pricing
Workday’s customers include small, medium and large businesses. That said, complex implementation and its pricing mean we can’t confidently recommend it for small businesses.
Here’s the price structure for Workday’s adaptive planning tools:
- Free trial:
- 30-day access
- Guided walkthrough for core planning
- Guides for planning, reporting and dashboards
- Workday adaptive planning ($):
- Full adaptive planning access
- Connects with any ERP or GL
- Unlimited versions and what-if scenarios
- Adaptive planning close & consolidation ($$$):
- All of the above
- Close and consolidation functionality
How to choose the best talent mapping software
If you want to choose the best software for talent mapping in 2024, then you need to think about the specific needs of YOUR business. It wouldn’t matter if every Fortune 500 company used the same system if it’s not compatible with your organization. For example, here are some essential internal criteria for picking workforce planning tools.
Organization size and objectives
Most of the options we’ve discussed today have pricing and features for enterprise businesses, but only a couple were suited for smaller companies. Specifically, the size of your business affects how you handle everything, from employee onboarding to offboarding.
For instance, a small business might rely on talent mapping to make sure they have essential skills covered. An enterprise business, on the other hand, uses it to assess skills density across different areas of their massive organization.
Integration with existing tools
Talent mapping is a very specific function, and it’s quite likely your chosen platform will have other features too. As shown by the examples we’ve covered, it could have anything from performance management tools to HRIS functionality.
Of course, just because you want talent mapping capability doesn’t necessarily mean you want whatever comes tacked on with it. The tool you choose should, at the very least, offer common HRIS and HCM integrations to minimize disruption. Even better, it should integrate with other common workplace software, like Microsoft 365 and Teams.
ROI vs cost
With different software options covering a range of price points, it’s important to have some idea of your return of investment. Talent mapping tools for managers and HR can produce ROI in a few ways:
- Identifying critical skill gaps to improve productivity
- Spotting top performers for succession planning
- Making improvements to workforce planning
Let’s say you crunch the data and figure out that talent mapping solutions could improve financial productivity by 20%. You need to compare that against the predicted costs of implementation and upkeep (e.g. subscription costs) to determine if the investment is worthwhile.
Vendor support and scalability
Flashy features and a nice UI aren’t the only things of importance. So, you need to assess the customer support reputation of any vendor you’re thinking of contracting.
For one thing, it’s a matter of service reliability. Lengthy response times will drive up the costs of implementation and disruptions. For another, you need to make sure they meet compliance requirements for any sensitive data they handle for you.
Demos are the deciding factor
Lastly, product reviews and user testimonials are great. But, without the opportunity to get hands-on experience, you’re ultimately making a blind purchase. That’s why most reputable talent mapping software providers (and SaaS providers in general) offer product demos.
These demos are usually product tours guided by a representative, often with the opportunity to try out key features to see how they work. So if you’re interested in an experience like that, schedule your Perform365 demo today!