Future of work, role of technology
and impact on the HR profession (al)

SECTION 1
Future of Work

Can’t Predict the Future !
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Don’t think anyone can……
So what do we do ?
Keep your ears to the ground , listen to your customers/clients , people and
ecosystem and focus on how you add value .
Use technology to be glued in. Think Special Forces, The big Brother, in a
positive sense !!

Here are a few educated
guesses !
4
Authenticity will be key (Being brutally honest about the situation)
Will result in greater levels of co creation and undoubtedly trust
Uncertainty is here to stay

AI and Machine Learning
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The pace of AI and machine learning will increase
exponentially
Decision making will become hybrid
Machines will think through patterns and make predictions and
people will need to take decisions
Internet will become a public utility (mandatory resource) like electricity

Accelerated Change
6
Changes that companies were contemplating about and nibbling
around for long would be accelerated at hitherto unheard-of paces
and scale
Illus TCS work from home 25/25 in 25
• Organisation structures will flatten , Decision structures will
collapse
• Some employees will have a disproportionate leverage than
others
Work life balance will be the default mode

SECTION 2
Impact on the HR
profession (al)

Increasing Demands
8
People decisions will be more and more based on data and insights rather
than gut , perceptions and intuition (current estimates say its 10-30 %)
Employees will demand and expect highly personalised experiences.
The demand will be on doing more with less.

Focus on behaviours and
Culture
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More and More HR processes will be automated especially
all transactional tasks across sub functions
This will result in the HR professional becoming the custodian of “
Desired Behaviour “
HRs role will also be to provide managers with the right tools
to intervene proactively .
Think about it, what is AI really doing . Its trying to predict
and then pre-empt/influence behaviour

Facilitator and enabler
10
HR will be the facilitator and enabler of
1. Real time skills employees
2. Employee collaboration*
3. Mental health *
4. Physical fitness *
to ensure business results
I believe 2 ,3 and 4 will be a major focus in the next few years because of Covid
19

Workforce Composition
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Three categories of employees
• Permanent , Gig , Machine (Robots/AI)
• Working out of In co premises, client premises, Homes and a
combination
Identifying and hiring /contracting /developing the right skill sets
increasingly challenging
Ensuring quality of Gig workers will be a priority (platforms like Upwork,
Fiverr, Noble House)
Employment contracts will become more personalised.

Emotional intelligence &
relationships
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• Importance of “People and Relationships “ Pace of digitalization
• Emotional intelligence will be a critical skill not just for senior and middle
management but for all employees.
• Self-awareness, Self Confidence, Self-regulation, Empathy and social skills
• Integration of this into all aspects of people management and using technology
to enable
• Helping people build social skills at scale (due to distributed working) a
priority

Mind-set shift
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• Stop creating the Mythical Perfect HR system
• Policies will be far more dynamic
• Assessment of impact of HR initiatives would be in real time
• HR will be far more accountable for Results (Business and People) than just
processes

Impact on skills needed by
HR professional
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• Dealing with the government and unions
• Skills to design and run processes that co-create the future
• Relationship building and innovation at the point of experience
• Ability to listen and be agile
• Digital competence will be mandatory. Skills like data fluency , statistics ,
analytics , data usage
• Skills to assess and evaluate market offerings and technology

HR career paths
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• HR Tech will become a career path: Ability to design, evaluate,
and deploy technology enabled people processes
• Managing employee experience will become a career path,
just like you have teams managing customer experience. This
will require high levels of collaboration with AI to use insights
• Supporting and sustaining change will be a specialist path
• HR Functional clusters like C&B, training, HR ops will
give way to these paths ↓

SECTION 3
Current trends in HR technology
& digitalisation of HR

Collaboration around platforms
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Technologies that align with the Future of Work.
Standalone HR systems are being replaced by Core HR platforms . Eg Workday (
with ability to plug in ).
Everybody is now making apps that can collaborate
The challenge for the HR professional is to pick and choose the appropriate
one for their context !!!
https://www.selecthub.com/hr-management-software/
Just look at the choice that’s available !!

Talent acquisition
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Candidate screening and matching technology is evolving fast
IBM Watson recruitment express is a good example
• Matches score: analyzes the requisition to determine required, preferred, and soft
skills
• Requisition prioritization: Provides a recommended priority for each requisition so
recruiters know where they should focus their time.
• Social listening: Aggregates employer reviews from one or more third-party sites to
provide a view of employee sentiment for the organization or competitors.

Usage of Chatbots
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• Chatbots used for screening applicants in high volume roles, scheduling
interviews, and answering common questions
• Companies like Mcdonald, Ikea are using this extensively
• Olivia is a chatbot from a company called Paradox that engages with prospective
candidates
• IBM Watson Candidate Assistant helps prospective candidate choose the
right roles

Usage of Chatbots ( Contd..)
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• Chat-bots are also helping streamline employee queries and increase
engagement
• Amber from Infeedo a “Predictive People Analytics” tool is an employee
experience chatbot. Finds those who are unhappy , disengaged and about
to leave
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Th0Tby0FgQ&feature=youtu.be
• Being used to provide real time answers to employee queries , that too
customised responses
• Chia from ramco is a Personal assistant at work

Self directed career planning
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• AI tools are suggesting roles and projects and helping employees take their
career planning in their own hands
• Gloat is an AI based internal talent marketplace that is used by global
majors like Unilever, Schneider electric
• Fuel50 is a similar tool that has been reviewed and case document by John
Bersin

Personalized development
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• 2 interesting apps that sit nicely with each other….. Running successfully at
Tata communications. Degreed and Its your skills (IYS )
• Its your skills : Skills Ontology based API
• Degreed , Connects people and internal learning and talent systems to all the
resources they use to learn millions of courses, videos, articles, books, podcasts
and experts from thousands of sources, including your LMS. Degreed curates
and pushes content that's relevant, timely and on-demand
• Leadx & Leaderamp are two AI tools that help managers with coaching
https://leadx.org/
https://www.leaderamp.com/

Creating an “immersive learning
experience”
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• Striver is a platform that’s is using VR in Hiring, onboarding, interview
training. Giving feedback, Difficult conversations
• ‘Immersive Learning,’ where individuals are placed in an interactive learning
environment, virtually, to replicate possible scenarios and learn skills
• Walmart has been using this extensively since fall 2018 to all of its nearly
4,700 stores nationwide, deploying more than 17,000 headsets to reach one
million associates
Think pilot training and you know what it is !

Gamification
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• OrgLynx is a mobile app meant to gamify the new hire onboarding process
• Employees complete interactive challenges along a self guided path
• An engaging set of activities ranging from : Snap Photos, Surveys, Quizzes,
GPS Check-ins, Scan QR Codes, Record Video
Check this one out for sure!

Future of HR
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• HR Will become more important and valued, because of the visible impact on
business, which is data and insights driven
• HR won’t anymore be the last agenda in board meetings/executive decisions.
• Tools are easier to buy. Culture is difficult to build and still needs the human
mind to curate and nurture it!

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You can find me at
sriram@aventus.in
(+91)9895345133
www.aventus.in
People, Performance & Change Consulting