The HR Dialogues #27: HR Technology Trends - What’s Next for the Modern Workplace?
welcome to the HR dialogues a podcast where we talk about HR and the future of work I'm your host Dr D felsman and we have an exciting episode lined up today where will'll be talking about the future of HR technology what we should be doing what we should be thinking about and how are we going to make sure that we adapt what we do in HR to be relevant and future fit welcome to the HR dialogues where we learn from people practitioners as they navigate the emerging world of work [Music] we've got a fantastic guest joining us today V welcome to the HR dialogues when I think about you words that jump to mind technologist HR futurist people strategist and so many things more but perhaps in your own world in your own words V who are you and what brings you to our episode today thanks for having me theer it's a pleasure uh in my own words who am I uh I'd have to say uh industry practitioner uh behavioral scientist um people will call me thought leader but ultimately uh I think I'm just a student of the business and I remain humble and and want to be that uh probably till the end of my career so before we jump into the topic and it is quite an exciting one given the times that we find ourselves in you know something we like to ask all our guests is what has been the best piece of advice that you have received in your careers when I got into the uh industry it was the do the.com boom uh and things have just really accelerated so I think back then everybody said in order to be always thinking outside the box you always need to be learning and upskilling and keeping on top of what industry Trends are and if I think about it not a lot has changed in that kind of uh advice that I got that's fantastic I think the advice around to be continuously learning and adapting and remaining curious is probably even more relevant today than what it sounds like was when you initially kind of were confronted with that as well um V why are you passionate about HR why do you spend your time in this beautiful profession of ours technology is an asset it helps us do things but we buy it and we use it and we we absorb it and consume it but human capital people is an asset man that has to be managed right which is why HCM is human Capital Management then of course we have infrastructure buildings and Stu and whatnot so ultimately um I'm very passionate about HR because is it is the most complex you buy a building the building is there uh you buy um technology computers and whatnot the computers are there you of course you have to learn it but the most complex thing that an organization deals with is human resources and uh I think that uh because of that it it poses the greatest complexities and challenges I think that gives us a very nice introduction into the topic that we'll be talking about today which is really this intersect between HR Technologies and where we are today we use big words like digital transformation and what that's going to look like but really this question around but what does it mean practically and how are we going to shift towards the future what is on the horizon you know recently generative AI has been all the talk and all the hype definitely think there's lots of potential for us to unpack that as well but that's not the full picture that's almost just what is at the Forefront of the moment and I'd love to pick your brain today in our episode on what should we be doing in the HR technology space and you know what I would love us to be able to see if we go a couple of years down the road is that we've really grasp the opportunities that is on the horizon pertaining to HR technology my personal view is I think we've missed the boat of some of the older Technologies we are still playing catchup to a large extent but I would love your view on that and maybe let's start out very basically with a question V around when we talk about digital HR transformation what does that actually mean and give us a bit of insight around where we are today excellent question um so first of all when I say when you say what is digital transformation for each company it has to be different because there's no two companies that are the same so as you just alluded to some of the things that companies uh maybe uh ignored in the past you know they're C playing catch up on right so if you're catching up on some of that then you're surely not ready to go all in on digital AI first uh so and as you're you know but maybe your audience doesn't is that uh so I'm at Oxford University and I'm studying postgraduate executive uh AI in global business and when the so ultimately here's the statistics for today if we were to look at the all the organizations in the world how many of them are at level five Nvidia Microsoft digital AI first very very very few in fact it's a single digit so when we say uh you know what is digital transformation look like um my best uh advice to our listeners is that don't try to say I've got to catch you know uh Elon Musk or uh Microsoft Google something like that uh where where are you and then so instead of going from two to eight how about you go to two to three and then three to four maybe make something accelerated But ultimately uh digital is not just pure AI it's not like oh my goodness we just need everything AI That's not the case um so that's my best advice is to look at where you're at and then figure out okay where have we systemically been lacking where have we put no advancement in and sure we could Leap Frog but take a look at what your digital transformation is now and if you don't have a digital transformation what's it going to take for you to get that because let's be fair um we could want the moon but where's the budget yeah you do raise a very interesting point though you know I sometimes find in conversations with HR professionals and clients around the world this notion I always get asked who can we Benchmark against that's the one thing I hear quite a lot and then people want to know what are other people doing and I must say you know things like maturity models and Frameworks I think they serve a purpose of helping you understand what is possible and where you are today but at times we do take it slightly too far around the fact that it's not necessarily a competition between yourself and others it's more a fit for purpose best fit solution that you should be guided as part of that and you know I share your sentiment around the fact that everybody wants to be first they want to Leap Frog they want to do new exciting things and I think there's a place for that but my real question is always how what are you solving for through your digital transformation what are you actually trying to achieve in terms of the business problem that you're trying to resolve you know through your technology and I must say it sounds a little bit strange potentially coming from my side but sometimes I find this disconnect between those two different elements you know something might be really novel and cool to play with but how useful is it it's true we have a tendency uh and I don't think it's an organizational just one organization one leader I think it's a culture and it is not even a national culture it's an international it's a global culture in HR right we're all working together and if something comes out like when open AI come out came out it wasn't just New Jersey in the United States or United States right the planet got got on board right so um but how how effective is this brand new technology to your agenda and so um I can tell you that I worked with many many clients who say oh my goodness we need this and then after we discuss it they realize yeah I guess you know you just saved us an incredible amount of money uh we don't need it and in fact not only do we or we want it but we don't even have the capability to use it I can't tell you how many times uh a senior executive will say they bought something it wasn't what uh it wasn't as advertised uh but then on the other side it we bought something but we didn't have the capabilities to actually be using it uh we could use it but we were so busy with these other things that were more pressing that we bought this extra component onto our platform and we just didn't get around to it uh so we won't be using it we won't be renewing that part next year um but there's a piece of that budget that was given right I mean so this this happens uh routinely and so I think what uh ultimately um what you and I are really talking about is um looking at current state analysis and where you want to get to in the future state right and do you need to to buy all you know the Cadillac with all the bells and whistles or or do you and I think you know context matters obviously right so I mean it is very much around you know to your point what are we trying to solve for and what is the need that we trying to address and what is the best fit solution for that because I also a firm believer that it will be very different between different organizations depending on context depending on where they base depending on where they find themselves in their life cycle as well and you know I would sometimes be a little bit hesitant just to jump onto every single new thing I think it is good to experiment in a controlled environment but not necessarily throw out everything there has to be some structure to it I sometimes find we almost get caught and I'm going to label it you know MVP syndrome where everything is always an MVP but never a fully fledged product that we can mature over time um and I do think that's something that we do need to address in terms of the mindset that we have in HR pertaining to technology and what technology is going to look like in the future V Let's shift a bit towards the question around when you look on the Horizon with the work that you are doing what HR Tech should we be talking about so one of them will be uh ethical AI um and so this is a human capital issue but it's not a human capital issue just as far as it pertains to people uh the data and the technology is uh I believe everybody in your audience as well as you and I of course we understand that there is a quite a bit of bias that is developed uh it is pulling from llms uh a lot of the data in the LMS that's being pulled is bias tainted Etc it's it might not even be real right it's opinionated um that's why we are hearing right is it on a daily or a weekly basis that we hear things like uh two lawyers cited a uh cases in court and then the judge said these are not real cases and and you know who checked right so we know that Ai hallucinates and or we should by now so there's these things that are happening and uh so there's this bias in AI but then on more to go further with ethical um how much of the data that we are using is data that has been given granted permission by us right or was it just taken and so we have have uh organizations that are in trouble and being sued by the United States government and then there's Europe that is uh suing other organizations and this is all in the front page news so there is a number of these kinds of trust safety ethical AI issues that are right now on the horizon they're not getting solved today tomorrow or in the near future uh and quite frankly there are a number of laws that countries have not formulated they're busy doing it now some of these countries many countries uh but this is we're all doing this at speed in real time because quite frankly AI like many comp like many technologies that are bestowed onto US it gets put on bestowed onto us but we are not prepared for it and so look at this so that's one example um I'd say another thing that we're also looking at and uh this is the world of human capital right HR HCM is uh how will AI impact Learning and Development um in many ways our attention span has been getting shorter shorter shorter shorter and it's not because of AI and it's not because of covid it has been for quite some time so uh AI does have the ability to speed up data absorption and consumption but are we going to be getting too much data and are we actually absorbing too much right it's it's economics uh there is a point where okay the the returns are not actually we're not getting the returns at the speed that we're getting at the data at so there's a number of things that have to be looked at and quite frankly that's why AI is is here but there needs to be even more Talent intelligence which is a new trend right uh term and and so when we have more humans that are Highly Educated that have reflective strategic uh uh thinking skills um and understand what the capabilities are and what they're not how to use it and how not to use it but I think some of the things that stand out for me and and we've also found that we've recently completed some work with more than a thousand um HR professionals to try and understand their sentiment towards some of these neurot Technologies is on the one side there's a lack of confidence and sometimes competence in terms of of understanding the tool sets and what they're able to do and how to utilize them but on the other side there's also this component around the fact that how do we take them back to the workplace and how do we go and apply them which is much less a tool and Technology conversation than one about mindset and awareness and knowing what the bigger challenges are you know you spoke a lot about ethics you spoke about privacy you spoke about intellectual property rights those are some real challenges that I think legislation is still catching up with and it's almost like we are writing legislation whilst we're testing the different use cases and seeing what those things would look like around the world a very interesting point that I want us to double click on a bit is your point around distractions um I read a study recently and I can't remember the exact number but the attention span of somebody when viewing things like digital content for example or listening to audio um content Etc and the number is so so low that it's literally a couple of seconds before somebody moves on towards the next thing so how do we help HR firstly and then HR help help the organization in this digital domain and space to capture the minds and the imaginations and the attention of the employee or is that really a losing battle I'm going to answer this in in a behavioral scientist in a cognitive uh cognitive development way I really think that when I look at the attention span and how it's gotten less and less and less which is what you're alluding to right so I believe the statistic some of the statistics that I read recently you're talking about that what you just said I read that the recruiter now reads a resume within two to five seconds I don't know if you you saw those statistics so this is an issue which means that people are not actually reading resumés are they I've never been able to read a resume in two seconds um I I don't you know so what do we do when we're doing something like that um I think we have to get back to fundamentals of doing you know solid business uh and that doesn't mean oh add another AI or add another platform or buy something because people's attention spans are at two seconds two to five seconds so uh I think we really need to stop and look and say wait a second there's some things that are fundamentally now broken let's go back because they did work it's it's not like the future is where everything works uh and that everything in the past didn't work that's just not true right but I think we also have a culture where we're like okay anything older as in yesterday is is no good only tomorrow matters uh so let's speed up everything faster I think that that's really my answer to your question is is if we don't stop to look and see where why things are broken then we're not going to fix them I think we have fallen into the trap in HR specifically around always want to be you know faster and better and more efficient and I think that's been the behavior that we've rewarded to you know an extensive period of time I do think in our current environment it is worthwhile to take a step back and say but are we spending enough of our time on the things that really do matter and what are they um you to your point I mean I think still believe and this is maybe my assumption that I'm making or my own bias towards it but I still believe that meetings in most organizations are underutilized and it's a an area and a domain that if we are able to optimize the way and the manner in which people engage with each other that organizations will be a lot more productive and effective and you know there's a whole bunch of different um outcomes and you can also be able to tie to that but a lot of that is really based upon the fact that nobody's ever there in the moment they are answering this message on teams whilst still checking WhatsApp on their phone whilst being in a physical room with somebody else or in a meeting while somebody else is sliding something across the desk that they do need need to look at and I know it sounds strange but you know you and I both know from a cognition point of view there are limits to what you can process as a human being and it doesn't matter how smart and how clever you are does not relate towards that it relates towards your ability to process information within a particular context and time so I do believe that there is work to be done around the habits and rhythms we start putting in place in organizations on how we are going to work in the future and I love the point you make to say that remember the future is not where everything works necessarily there are still some things we need to from today that allows us to be able to shift and move into that new environment and hearing what you were saying goes right into my answer and that is if a culture if a company doesn't have strong culture Dynamics for example let's go back to your meeting thing right if you're allowing everyone to come in and while they're you know in the meeting where half the people at minimum have their phones in their hand and and somebody is you know at the Whiteboard or you know on the screen doing something and presenting um attention span is a is a real issue and so this comes down to corporate culture leadership and uh these are core things that design and develop how a company operates a company doesn't operate only through the T1 line and so our electricity and our computers are up a company operates through leadership culture mannerisms and expectations uh so I think a lot of this has to be done and a lot of this work has to be done and I think we've we've allowed for people to come and show up and there's no real rules or guard rails right uh if if a if if meetings have no structure and no um rules and guid lines uh you're just going to allow people to do whatever they want because they don't know any better and um so there I think that's one of the things that is a process that a company should go through to understand for example when it comes to meetings how do we want our meetings to look like how are we going to be get the most out of our meetings and are we having meetings where we're not actually leaving with actionable agendas or we're kicking this into the next month's meeting or you know what I mean I bet so many of that so much of that is happening yeah you know coming back a little bit towards the the topic of you know HR technology what I find fascinating is you and I keep on steering and veering a little bit into you know behavior and skills and mindset and types of and ways of thinking more strategically as HR professionals when we start thinking about the HR technology future so if I play Devil's Advocate is the future of HR technology much more rooted in US changing the mindset of the HR professional and how we think about Technology's role in it I think that's too narrow because that has to be part of it but HR being that it's humans right so we picture this concrete building there's lots of tech across the entire company on every single floor in every single room and a lot of the floors have different well it's also filled with people and people doing different functions so when you when you ask the question is HR is it rooted in Tech or or the answer is of course it is right we're always trying to get newer uh kpis and data uh we're trying to get uh platforms that actually hey this was a great platform for us but now we need something new uh we just merged with a new company and we have three more different kinds of capabilities these kpis no longer cut it so technology of course will always be there I mean just imagine any company saying well we didn't really have to upgrade our company our computers we're good with the Apple to from 1980s but the fact of the matter is the computer processing is evolving faster and faster well recently within the last six seven years right we have entered a new generation and that's gen Z so we can't just operate the same we were in the 2000s or in the year 2010 because they weren't in our world of work but now they are so this is really a four- generation Society so we must evolve for a four generation Society not a three but there are other issues many companies may be targeting only gen Z and leaving off the Millennials and the Gen X and of course boomers are still here right and many of them are the most executive but if the only agenda is Gen Z and we disengage Gen X and and Millennials what are we doing so I think we should we've got to be able to answer these questions in a way where we can say yes we are a modern society we can walk and chew gum and that means we need to advance our human capital agenda and our technology agenda but quite frankly those two may not fully answer the question of culture Dynamics and so that is a holistic organization and when if companies say we don't need that I mean the numbers are staggering aren't they deer that we haven't gotten to aren't the numbers staggering about productivity losses at a national and a global level something we've spoken about quite a bit before is you know the productivity Paradox that even though we feel we are getting smarter better um you know faster in terms of what we are able to do it hasn't necessarily translate back into the workplace in terms of increased productivity I think especially in the HR domain and in the HR space to ask this question around but the organization is a living system it's got different parts that move together but these parts don't move in isolation and I love about the fact that you spoke about the fact it's not only Tech and it's not only the human capital agenda it also has to fit into the context of you know culture leadership strategy markets macro environmental challenges that we also need to try and face and address and I think that has to be a realization for the HR professional in future that to solve the problems that we will face is going to require a multi-pronged multidisciplinary type of approach that is no longer just solved by one single Silver Bullet not that it ever was but I think there has been some impressions in the past that you know if we could only Implement X or when system X comes in we will be in a position too it's a lot more complex than that and I think it has to be a little bit more holistic um in terms of how we address and how we we look towards the future as well um V I want to turn the question around to you and ask the question what should we be leaving behind because as we start moving and shifting forward you know and whether that is Tech whether that is current behaviors whether that's past perceptions about who we are as HR professionals and the function what are those things that if you gaze into your crystal ball and we speak again in 5 to 10 years time we hope is no longer on the agenda that we are talking about as HR I think that we we've got to be able to leave behind uh the systemic biases that we still deal with today right so I'll just uh I'll give two how do we consider ourselves a modern society when we H still have an issue with this glass ceiling how does a vet and uh Jennifer who are both level four senior project managers I get a dollar and she gets 90 cents for what because she's a woman this kind of a scenario is just uh right this is a prehistoric this is a legacy this is an this is a a sad state that these kinds of measurements are still there why are they there doesn't make any sense right surely uh Father's Day just passed what father wants to know that his daughter gets less than his son for the same job none no mother or father wants that no Auntie no Uncle no grandparents quite frankly we don't want it as a society because it doesn't make any sense it didn't make sense then it doesn't make sense today but surely we consider ourselves a modern society don't we uh and so that's one I'll just use another one um or give another one I should say and that is age discrimination so we have this huge discrimination that is rarely discussed and talked about it is extremely complex but you know uh age discrimination starts in the around the world at age in for people in their 40s now in 1920 maybe 60 was was everybody's guaranteed time to retire but in the United States they're we you can retire at 62 65 and 67 they're pushing it to 70 but how can they push it to 65 and 70 or how does the government have that when AE discrimination starts over 20 years before this doesn't make any sense now I would uh pose this question to our audience and even to you my friend um when a person hits 40 are they no longer qualified to work what is the purpose of of upskilling what is the purpose of getting certifications what is the purpose of taking more moot courses what is the purpose of learning more if we're not getting smarter when experience experience is always an asset but when experience doesn't become an asset we're in trouble and so I believe that and I know right you and I know and we should tell our audience artificial intelligence is not going to wipe out everybody's jobs right what every what AI needs is more data and more intelligence and that means more people in our society that know how to work with AI there'll be more and more people with good jobs there's a lot of you know with an aging population and people working longer and due to Medical advances Etc I think there's a lot of discussion around us thinking very differently about careers especially late stage careers in future and you to your point there's also a lot of good work being done on how wisdom actually develops over time and how experience plays into that and I think that's an important thing to realize that people in different career stages life stages contribute differently and contribute different things you I want to come back to our previous point to say um couple of years time what have we solved uh Ideal World what is it that we are facing today that we would have solved by that point that's no longer an issue well for lucky I think that will have a harmonious four generation Society all learning and motivating and being productive with each other if all four generations can find all the good and the positive positives in each generation and corporations can look at these four generations and find Value in all four of these Generations corporations will make lots of lot more money they'll cater to all four generations and be making products that are generating more money uh and they're going to be able to solve things like some of the biggest issues of the day right for younger Generations like mentoring well if we're not hiring or retaining our older Workforce yet we want more mentoring it you know these these things seem like it's logical but then look at our actions so I would hope that if our if our our true nature of doing right by Society by human capital if we're truly going if we can start to invest and focus more on human Capital just like we are with technology I'm a very big proponent of you know what does meaningful work look like at an individual level at an organizational level and at a societal level and as I start wrapping up for us a couple of things that really stood out for me from our conversation today is really this intersect between where we are heading from a technology point of view and how that and human Capital Management is really one conversation and we should not necessarily split it out but look at it in a lot more in a holistic way and really start thinking about how we utilize technology and people together to solve some of the challenges that we face today in organizations we spoke quite extensively about the fact that productivity is really a challenge and even though we might think that we are smarter better and faster today it's not necessarily translating back into the workplace into productivity and to the results that we want to see and that's a challenge for us for the future and definitely we spoke about distractions and we spoke about how digital agility is not only about tool sets but it also about mindset and rhythms and habits and culture that we instill within different organizations V thank you so much for sharing some of your thoughts and views on the HR dialogues if people want to know a little bit more about you where can they follow you and where can they see the great work that you are busy with absolutely uh LinkedIn is uh where you'll find me uh as well as vs.com perfect V any last words from your side any last advice to HR professionals listening in um what would what words would you like to leave them with I'd say that our best days are right ahead of us and I think that at this moment in time even though we've got a number of the biggest challenges that we feel are insurmountable if we dial them back and we actually start to unify and connect and start to work more with each other we're actually going to solve a lot more of these issues you from my side a big thank you thank you so much for sharing your wisdom and your perspectives and views on the hi dialogues and to everybody listening please do join us for our next episode and thank you so much much for listening and taking some of the learnings from V and team thank you so much bye-bye [Music]
2024-09-05 07:50
