Year-Over-Year Employee Performance & Retention Intelligence

Info

Industry:Medical Technology

Introduction

This case study describes an automated HR workforce cohort analysis for a 500+ employee medical technology company to identify employee stagnation and top-talent attrition risks. The analysis uncovered $1.8M in avoidable replacement costs and showed that 27% of stagnant employees improved while 37% of at-risk talent reduced attrition risk. Findings revealed strong manager- and department-level bottlenecks, with a small group of managers driving most stagnation. The project delivered a repeatable, data-driven system enabling targeted HR interventions and smarter talent decisions.

Client Requirements

The client requires an automated HR workforce cohort analysis solution to identify employee stagnation and high-potential attrition risks across a multi-region organization. The system must consolidate fragmented HR data, track year-over-year employee performance and risk movements, highlight manager- and department-level bottlenecks, quantify financial impact from talent loss, and deliver actionable, data-driven insights through an interactive executive dashboard to enable targeted interventions and improved retention outcomes.

Key Features Of HR Workforce Cohort Analysis

Interactive Dashboard

A real-time Streamlit dashboard that visualizes year-over-year cohort size trends, tracks individual employee performance trajectories, and enables department- and manager-level drill-down analysis. It also calculates the financial impact of workforce changes and allows users to generate export-ready reports for executive presentations.

Automated Analysis System

An automated analysis system powered by Claude Desktop and integrated with Google Sheets, enabling repeatable cohort analysis through a custom-built skill. It applies automated year-over-year comparison logic and is designed to scale easily across additional years and evolving cohort definitions.

Source Data

Full dataset available for validation and extended analysis

Challenges and Approach

Challenges

Employee stagnation, with many individuals remaining in the same roles for 3+ years without measurable skill or performance growth.
Limited visibility into departments or managers with the highest concentration of stagnant performers.
No structured or data-driven approach to identify timely intervention opportunities.
High attrition risk among top talent, including KEY, HIGHPO, and RISING performers.
Absence of early warning signals to proactively address retention challenges.
Unclear return on investment from existing retention initiatives.
HR data scattered across multiple systems and spreadsheets, creating data silos.
Manual, time-consuming year-over-year performance comparisons.
Lack of automated tracking for individual employee growth and career trajectories.

Project Approach and Results

2024 Baseline:

350+ employee records processed
45 employees identified in Cohort 1 (Stagnant)
38 employees identified in Cohort 2 (Top Talent at Risk)

2025 Analysis:

500+ employee records processed
42 employees in Cohort 1 (net decrease of 3)
35 employees in Cohort 2 (net decrease of 3)

Cohort 1: Stagnant Below Expected – Detailed Findings

Metric	Count	% of 2024 Base
2024 Baseline	45	100%
Still in Cohort (Stuck)	28	62.2%
Improved (Moved Out)	12	26.7%
Left Organization	5	11.1%
New Entrants (2025)	14	—
2025 Total	42	—

Key Findings:

Stagnation Persistence: 62% of stagnant employees showed no improvement after one
year
Success Cases: 12 employees (27%) successfully improved their competence levels
Managerial Concentration: Analysis revealed that 62% of persistent stagnation cases
were concentrated under specific managers in TECH-RPS and CLINICAL-PT-R&D
departments
Geographic Pattern: European operations showed higher stagnation rates (48%)
compared to North American (32%) and APAC (20%) regions

Cohort 2: Top Talent at Risk – Detailed Findings

Metric	Count	% of 2024 Base
2024 Baseline	38	100%
Still at High Risk	18	47.4%
Risk Mitigated	14	36.8%
Left Organization	6	15.8%
New Entrants (2025)	17	—
2025 Total	35	—

Key Outcome

Technology Stack

Technologies we used

Python

Pandas

Plotly

Claude Desktop

Conclusion

This workforce cohort analysis delivered significant value by transforming fragmented HR data into actionable intelligence. The identification of a $1.8M financial impact, coupled with specific managerial and departmental bottlenecks, provides organizational leadership with a clear roadmap for targeted interventions.

The automated analysis system ensures this insight generation can be repeated quarterly with minimal manual effort, creating a sustainable competitive advantage in talent management. By addressing the identified stagnation patterns and retention risks, the organization is positioned
to improve employee development outcomes by 20-30% while reducing costly top talent
attrition