Charting the path ahead: defining the role of AI for HR Professionals and beyond

The development of full artificial intelligence could spell the end of the human race. Once humans develop artificial intelligence, it will take off on its own and redesign itself at an ever-increasing rate. Humans, who are limited by slow biological evolution, couldn’t compete and would be superseded.

While we may not entirely endorse Stephen Hawking’s dystopian outlook on humanity’s future in conjunction with artificial intelligence, it has become imperative for us, as human resource professionals and individuals engaged in evaluating and navigating the profound societal shifts that have transpired and continue to unfold, to contemplate the strategic utilization of this exceptionally potent instrument.

The magnitude of this transformation we address is akin to, if not surpassing, the digital revolution that has unfolded in recent times.

For those who may still harbor doubts, consider the following statistics:

• The global AI market is expected to reach $1.58 trillion by 2028. (MarketsandMarkets, 2023)
• The number of AI jobs in the US is expected to grow by 31% between 2020 and 2030. (US Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2021)
• 61% of respondents to a recent Deloitte Insights report say AI will substantially transform their industry in the next 3–5 years.
• Adoption is significant on a per-organization basis, with 53% of those polled spending more than $20 million during the past year on AI tech and talent.
• 83% of companies in Deloitte’s survey on AI adoption in manufacturing believe AI will be a pivotal technology to drive growth and innovation in the sector.
• 92% of respondents in Deloitte’s State of AI in the Enterprise 2022 survey set a target to be industry-leading or market-leading in AI within the next three years.

The significance and scale of the phenomenon are evident from the data presented. Delaying reflection is no longer an option.

In a thought-provoking article, Josh Bersin has shed light on some exciting applications of generative artificial intelligence in HR. These include:

1. Talent Intelligence for Recruitment, Mobility, Development, and Pay Equity: Managing talent in organizations has become increasingly intricate. Strategic workforce planning and matching the right people to the right roles require a collaborative effort between technology, HR systems, and processes to optimize the organization’s most valuable assets.
2. Employee Apps: Another burgeoning area is “intelligent employee chatbots” that seamlessly integrate documents, support resources, and transactional systems, providing users with a user-friendly experience.
3. Employee Training, Learning, and Content Production: The $350 billion employee training sector stands to benefit significantly from generative AI. Recent developments include tools that generate training materials from documents, automate quiz creation, and transform existing content into interactive learning assistants.
4. Employee Development and Growth Apps: Enter a vast realm of tools and platforms facilitating employee career progression. AI-driven “career paths” generated by Talent Intelligence platforms analyze your skills and experience, providing visual representations of myriad growth opportunities based on insights from millions of others.
5. Performance Management and Operational Improvement: The age-old debate of human vs. computer evaluation gains depth. AI can enhance traditional evaluation criteria, rapidly processing extensive data, and offering valuable insights.
6. Retention, Hybrid-Work, Wellbeing, and Engagement Analysis: Harness AI and automated systems to navigate data-rich landscapes. Gain deeper insights into employee dynamics, hybrid work scenarios, well-being, and engagement, augmenting our limited human capacity to fully comprehend complex contexts and situations.

In addition to Bersin’s identified dimensions, I believe we can incorporate the following:

• People Analytics: This entails creating integrated models that offer in-depth insights to employees and team leaders, leveraging the power of data to navigate organizational complexities. While data accessibility was a challenge in the past, today’s multitude of data sources necessitates adept data utilization for actionable insights.
• Employee Experience: Raise your hand if you’ve experienced a seamlessly smooth employee journey in recent years within your professional life. AI’s contribution can enhance the entire process, serving as a supportive ‘companion’ during critical phases like onboarding and throughout the employee journey.

Further expansion of use cases is possible by exploring intersections between the Human Capital realm and internal communication, marketing, and collaborative innovation.

Hence, at Deloitte, we’ve taken an extra stride. We’ve curated a repository encompassing over 60 use cases within the realm of Artificial Intelligence. This resource aims to demystify AI terminology and illuminate its practical applications within our work processes, delivering tangible value to organizations. Explore further here.

Another critical aspect that HR and transformation professionals must consider is ethics and the ramifications of applying these scenarios to the workplace.

This issue demands our close attention because technology is far from neutral, and its ethical and philosophical impacts are not readily apparent.

To acknowledge that technology is not entirely neutral, that it possesses intrinsic purposes and can impose its values, is to recognize that it influences our growth and behavior as part of our culture. Human beings have always had technology in some form, shaping the course of their development. This ongoing relationship cannot be halted; our task is to understand it and, hopefully, guide it toward noble human goals (Kranzberg and Pursell, 1967, p. 11).

Therefore, profound reflection is essential within our work processes, education, and in shaping our vision of the future society to navigate this transformative change thoughtfully.

P.S. Yes, this article was written with the assistance of AI.