"Speak with numbers." And so one of my MBA professors used to tell us. At that time, I thought that he was just being a mean teacher and just enjoys "torturing" his students. But as I went on developing my HR career, I've found that his adage is probably one of the most useful words of wisdom I've used in my HR practice. (Yes, I've learned that as HR professionals, we can and should use facts and figures and not just our interpersonal skills or charms!)

And it is in the same spirit that JHRL's recent partnership with The AberdeenGroup aims to provide its members. Aberdeen , a leading provider of fact-based research and market intelligence that delivers demonstrable results, is giving JHRL members complimentary access---a US$ 995 value--- to its massive knowledge database of not only HR metrics, benchmarks, survey reports, etc. but also other business areas such as Finance, Supply Chain, Technology and others.

Information or knowledge that we can get from Aberdeen can be used to help build stronger business case to any HR initiatives that we are thinking of introducing to our own organization or simply, to help us make a more informed decision and at the same time be kept abreast with leading and cutting-edge HR thoughts or processes worldwide.

As a quid pro quo, Aberdeen is only requesting our voluntary participation in any of their monthly HR-related surveys that is of particular interest to us, which usually takes about 10-20 minutes to answer. As a JHRL member, we will have access to the findings as soon as they are published. Furthermore, as a survey respondent (i.e., whether a JHRL member or not) we will be able to benchmark our organization's performance against all the other organizations that took part in the surveys. Great deal for a small amount of cooperation indeed!

However, on a wider context, the bigger benefit on our participation in these surveys lies in the fact that our efforts can help put Japanese HR Management on a global stage. For many, Japanese HRM has remained an enigma, a mystery in itself that the rest of the world is trying to solve. Hopefully, through these surveys and with our cooperation, we can let the rest of the world know more about our profession and in the process, collectively start to make a difference in advancing the HR practice in Japan.

The question is, are you up to it?--JK