Changing trends in HR Technology

Technology has ushered in dramatic changes in human resource (HR) management and the way people work. The past five years, especially, have redefined the impact of technology in HR. The focus has shifted from a ‘high-touch’ structure to channelising huge investments in technology for different facets of the function, such as recruitment, planning, learning and development, Human Resource Information System (HRIS), benefits, and analytics. Streamlined technical support would help accelerate the functioning within an organisation.

The advent of artificial intelligence (AI), chatbots, and mechanical advancements have transformed efficiency, improved employee-employer relationships and employee assessments, accelerated internal processes, and heightened accuracy in results.

All this means that the HR system has become more agile and relevant. There is a visible repositioning of it. The past five years until 2019 had seen prominent improvements in technology in HR management, some of them being:

Talent branding 

In order to build and project a strong value proposition, businesses are investing more in internal talent branding as a way of promoting themselves in the external environment. Adoption of internal branding techniques such as re-strategizing based on the current situation, recognising Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) of existing employees, encouraging employee reviews, and investing in company culture will directly reflect in employees’ conduct and motivate them to achieve more.

Brand followership

Social media platforms such as Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn help promote the overall reputation of an organisation. They also improve the image of the employers within, thus having a positive impact on potential employees. A huge brand followership and engagement makes the organisation more trustworthy and reputable as compared to a less interactive social media presence.

Decision-making tools

The use of decision-making tools such as business intelligence and statistical analysis in HR does not only help businesses understand information but also optimises decision making and employee performance. Other tools such as predictive modelling help predict the future by making use of currently available and relevant data. Another tool being used is risk assessment, which evaluates the risk a particular resource may mean to the organisation – human, financial or operational. These tools are used as early warning systems for HR.

Shift in planning

There is a significant shift in how organisations go about advanced workforce planning. Presently, there exists a systematic approach to talent modelling rather. There is a need to include the uncertainties of manpower planning in the future, such as requirement issues and workforce withdrawals.

Human capital management

This technology is applicable for providing specific competencies to the kind of job description and requirement for acquisition or optimisation. This tool helps increase overall productivity of the organisation, improves flexibility at work and provides the right talent for the required role.

With all the changes in the working environment due to the pandemic, the last one year has brought about a drastic change in the adoption of new methods of working and conducting businesses. Some of the noticeable changes include:

• Cloud HR: With working from home or the remote-first preference becoming the new norm, streamlining activities has become mandatory for the organisation. Cloud collaboration and other productivity tools such as Asana, Slack and Trello have gained momentum. Being cloud-based, such softwares allow employees to work across the globe in a scalable manner. These tools further offer complementary benefits such as real-time decision making, independent control over data and evaluation of the engagement and performance of the workforce.
• Technology-integrated human resource business partner: Human resource business partner is about streamlining all activities and relieving employees of pressure from the management. During the pandemic, HR departments have been able to virtually engage with employees. Virtual planning process for the organisation’s Objectives, Goals, Strategies and Measures (OGSM), family days, annual functions and other such events were carried out only because of the huge contribution of the virtual system.
• Performance Management: Emerging trends in HR have been backed by technological advancements and are the essence of smooth functioning and continuous improvement at work. Mental wellbeing has been the centrestage for a while now. Anxiety and depression being the most common illnesses, organisations are working towards bringing a more harmonious work-life balance to employees virtually. They are incorporating support for the mental health of employees into the performance management practices designed. Practices such as communicating without judging, considering emotional triggers, emphasizing on the employee’s efforts and helping them build on their key strengths are being adopted. 
• Enterprise Resource Planning: Organisations so far have adopted new methods for the smooth functioning of an organisation, and are looking at adopting Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) solution providers. Enterprise resource planning solutions providers should have investments in AI-blended machine learning. This will not only build robust HR systems but also automate key processes. Moreover, these solutions will help organisations manage upskilling HR for the future.

To sum up 2020 has been an amazing year as it redefined the ways of working. We moved into the year with working from home without any planning while the second quarter went in figuring out the continuity plans for businesses and the evolution in HR technology escalating.

The Future

In terms of handling businesses, we are ahead of the curve with adoption of best technology integrated HR practices. Constant upgrading and upskilling of the workforce to understand and smoothly run the applications is a must for the future to come. While work is seen shifting from manual to automated intelligence, the only inclusion of humans would be to correctly and timely arrange and manage all the virtual applications for work to function without any glitches.