What Is an Enterprise Profile? Business and IT Glossary

The enterprise profile is part of a software application that identifies a person and can verify their identity. A complete enterprise profile might also include what users know, what they have done, their performance in each role, who they have worked with, and what their colleagues have said about them. Ideally, the enterprise profile unites human capital management (HCM), social-sourced, inferred, and certified information about associates as part of a people-centric collaboration strategy.

Today, most enterprises do not have a strategy for managing employee profiles. Many different sources are needed to compile this amount of information. Social collaboration and HCM providers are the closest to offering rich enterprise profiles. HCM can play a role here, since HCM systems already have the secure framework, data structures, and critical informational elements that complete an enterprise profile.

Beyond its social utility, information about an individual is a digital representation of that person and establishes their digital identity. Today, the profile is moving beyond a feature of a social network, to become part of a social HCM/talent solution. The problem is that many HCM professionals still don't see enterprise profiles as strategic assets.

Truly knowing all about your workforce can dramatically reduce the friction and overhead associated with collaboration, which are major limiting factors on team productivity.