Welcome to this issue of The Contingent Compass. Each week, I send two essays to help you navigate the complex world of the Contingent Workforce. If you need support on your journey, upgrade to a paid subscription where you’ll instantly be able to interact with the community through group chat, live Q&A’s, gain access practical program tools and useful how-to guides.
There’s something oddly comforting about a dashboard.
The charts look clean. The metrics are precise. The trend lines point neatly in the right direction.
For a few seconds, you feel like you’ve got the business under control. Everything is visible, measurable, accountable. The data tells the truth.
Except it doesn’t.
Because what most leaders don’t realize is this: your workforce analytics aren’t lying - they’re just not telling you the whole truth.
💡 Reflection time: If your dashboard looks perfect, what’s hiding beneath the surface?
The Comfort of Clarity That Isn’t Real
Every C-suite I’ve ever worked with loves data. There’s power in it - a sense of certainty that makes complex problems feel solvable. But clarity can be deceptive.
I learned that early in my career, running in-house contingent workforce programs at Goldman Sachs and Citigroup. We had every system you could imagine - HRIS, VMS, ATS, ERP - each one flawless in its own right.
Yet, when someone asked the simplest question - “How many people are working for us right now?” - the room went quiet.
HR had one answer. Procurement had another. Finance had a third.
And technically, they were all correct.
Just… not at the same time, or in the same way.
That’s the thing about data: it’s only as whole as the systems that feed it. And in most organizations, those systems don’t talk to each other.
So, the dashboard looks beautiful. But the story behind it? Full of missing chapters.
The Illusion of Accuracy
Data can be dangerously convincing. It wears the suit of precision and walks into every meeting like the smartest person in the room.
But the truth is, most workforce dashboards aren’t mirrors - they’re funhouse mirrors. Each function sees its own distorted reflection.
HR reports on headcount. Procurement tracks suppliers. Finance counts costs. Legal counts risks.
They’re all measuring something real - but none of them are measuring the same truth.
It’s like trying to describe a symphony by listening to one instrument at a time.
💡 Reflection time: When was the last time your HR, Procurement, and Finance teams all gave you the same workforce number - and you actually believed it?
The Hidden Workforce Nobody Sees 🕶️
Let’s talk about the people who aren’t on your dashboards.
Your contractors. Consultants. SOW teams. Freelancers. Outsourced partners.
The quiet, invisible half of your business.
Most companies talk proudly about their “total workforce,” but what they really mean is “total employees.” The rest - the external talent powering product launches, transformations, customer service, and compliance - gets hidden in other budget lines or buried in supplier contracts.
Out of sight, out of system, out of mind.
And that’s how CEOs believe they’re running lean, when in reality, they’re just running blind.
I’ve seen CFOs confidently present labor cost reductions - only to discover six months later that the same contractors were rehired through a consulting SOW. The spend never went away. It just moved.
💡 Reflection time: How many people are actually working for your company right now? Not just on payroll - but everywhere?
When Clean Data Becomes a Costly Illusion 💸
Bad data doesn’t just make bad decisions - it makes expensive ones.
One client I worked with discovered nearly $50 million in untracked SOW labor sitting under “project expenses.” It wasn’t hidden intentionally. It was mislabeled, misclassified, and misunderstood.
Nobody saw it because nobody owned it.
When that happens, the problem isn’t visibility. It’s accountability. You can’t manage what you can’t see - and you can’t fix what you don’t believe is broken.
This is what I call the “data comfort trap”: the more polished your reports look, the less likely you are to question them.
📊 The graphs are tidy.
🧾 The numbers add up.
💬 The meetings end on time.
But underneath, inefficiency, compliance risk, and cost creep are quietly multiplying.
Why Dashboards Keep Lying
Most workforce dashboards don’t lie maliciously. They lie politely.
They show you what each function wants you to see.
Procurement reports cost savings. HR reports engagement. Finance reports forecast accuracy.
But no one reports the workforce truth - because it doesn’t live in one system, one function, or one department.
It lives between them.
And that’s where the data delusion thrives.
💡 Reflection time: Are your metrics designed to show reality - or to show progress?
When Insight Becomes Rearview
Even the best dashboards tend to describe the past. They tell you what happened last quarter, not what’s happening right now or what’s coming next.
It’s like driving with your eyes fixed on the rearview mirror - technically, you’re seeing the road, just not the part that’s about to matter.
That’s why so many organizations struggle with workforce agility. They’re reporting on history while the business moves faster than their data.
Insight isn’t knowing what happened. It’s knowing what to do next.
💡 Reflection time: When was the last time your data truly changed a decision - instead of just justifying one you’d already made?
From Dashboards to Decisions 🚀
The smartest organizations are moving past dashboards and into what I call workforce intelligence.
They’re not asking, “How many people do we have?”
They’re asking, “How is work getting done - and by whom?”
That means integrating HRIS, VMS, Finance, and project data into one visibility layer that focuses on outcomes, not inputs.
Not headcount - but output.
Not spend - but ROI.
Not compliance alone - but performance and predictability.
The goal isn’t to count workers. It’s to connect work.
The CFO’s Wake-Up Call
If you’re a CFO, this one’s for you.
That beautiful labor spend report you review every month? It’s missing up to 15% of your actual cost base. Not because someone’s hiding it - but because no one’s tracking it the same way.
When your contingent workforce, your outsourced teams, and your project-based contractors live in different systems, you lose the ability to truly forecast.
You can’t see where money is going, who’s delivering value, or where duplication is draining it.
The result? A distorted P&L that looks controlled but isn’t.
💡 Reflection time: If your workforce data is fragmented, how confident are you in your financial forecasts?
From Reporting to Reality
True workforce intelligence isn’t about prettier dashboards - it’s about connected truth.
Imagine a world where HR, Procurement, and Finance all pull from the same source of visibility. You’d know exactly who’s working for you, what they’re costing you, and whether that cost is driving growth.
You’d stop managing categories of people and start managing flows of work.
You’d stop reacting to what the data says and start designing what it means.
And for once, your dashboards wouldn’t make you feel smart - they’d make you certain.
The C-Suite Reflection 💬
Let’s be honest - this isn’t really about systems. It’s about trust.
Do you trust that your data reflects your business, or just your org chart?
Do you trust that your “savings” are real, or just reclassified?
Do you trust that your workforce strategy is aligned to growth, or just reporting compliance?
If you had to bet your quarterly bonus on your workforce data being 100% accurate, would you?
Exactly.
Closing Thoughts
Data doesn’t lie.
But it also doesn’t tell the whole truth unless you make it.
The future of workforce strategy isn’t about counting people - it’s about understanding how work gets done, where value is created, and how fast you can adapt.
That’s not a dashboard problem.
It’s a design problem.
So next time someone presents you with a perfect slide deck and says, “Here’s the workforce picture,” take a deep breath and ask the only question that really matters:
👉 What aren’t we seeing?
Because that’s where the truth usually lives 📊✨
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If you need support on your journey, upgrade to a paid subscription where you’ll instantly be able to interact with the community through group chat, live Q&A’s, gain access practical program tools and useful how-to guides.
About Kieran Scally-Carde
Kieran is passionate about helping organizations to stop wasting money on contingent labor - by showing them where the real opportunities lie.
With over 25 years in the Contingent Workforce industry, including leading PMOs at Goldman Sachs and Citigroup (each managing over 120,000 resources), he’s seen it all - the inefficiencies, the over-complication, and the goldmines hidden in plain sight. Today, he works with HR and Procurement leaders to bring clarity, strategy, and savings to their Contingent Workforce programs.
His sweet spot? Simplifying the complex. Whether it’s cost optimization, supplier management, compliance, or DE&I, he strips out the jargon and focuses on what works in the real world. The stuff that makes a CFO nod, a CHRO lean in, and a Procurement lead breathe easier.
He’s especially passionate about:
Making contingent labor strategies work for people, not just process.
Helping teams drive measurable cost savings without compromising quality.
Elevating diverse staffing suppliers and showing how they unlock serious value.
Demystifying who should own the function in your organization - and why it matters.
If you’re a senior leader tasked with managing contingent labor and tired of cookie-cutter solutions, he’s here to help you solve.
You can email Kieran at kieran@contingentcompass.com or reach out to him via Linkedin