A wave of new tech advancements defined 2024, and a partnership between customers and vendors is becoming increasingly critical to drive effective use cases. To capitalize on this, HR leaders should take a collaborative approach with their vendors, according to Neil Jensen, vice president of global product vision and experience at enterprise management cloud platform Workday.

As an example, Jensen mentions Workday's "3x innovation" approach, which includes "built-by," "built-on" and "built-for-customers" solutions. Built-by represents innovations directly from the vendor, while built-on applications come from vendor-to-vendor partnerships. Jensen explains that the third option, built-for-customers, enables clients to "fill in around the edges" and gain the customized innovations they need.

A need for industry- and company-specific data often drives vendor and client collaboration. Jensen has observed an evolving role for HR professionals, in which access to quality workforce and skills data enables the development of an executable "build, buy and borrow" strategy. Armed with data, he says, CHROs and their teams can strategically recruit and develop their workforces, through informed, tech-enabled analysis. "This [data-driven] approach eliminates waste and makes workforce planning much more efficient and optimized."