An understanding of the corporate strategic goals themselves. These will be unique to each organization. If well conceived and articulated, corporate goals are the shorthand description of the path to success for the firm.

A set of hypotheses that describe how Human Capital relates and how it can impact corporate goals. This requires a firm understanding of the role of Human Capital and the ability to develop plausible causal effect models that trace the route of the potential impacts through a chain of effects. For example, consider a cell phone service provider with a corporate goal of creating ultimate differentiation through the best customer service in the industry. There are many ways that employees play into positive customer service, one of which is training. A potential hypothesis is that better and more extensive training of customer service representatives will positively impact customer service ratings. Additional training will have a cost associated with it but should yield superior customer service. Matching these up in as quantitative an approach as possible is the heart of the modeling approach that will be discussed.

A clear, predefined plan for showing, in as concrete terms as possible (and appropriate), what the impacts and changes have been. This book will provide you with the tools and methodologies to tackle the second and third items above.