Headquartered in Virginia, Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) is a professional HR membership association that promotes the role of HR as a profession by providing education, certification, and networking to its members.

The ever evolving technology has changed the way of doing business across all functions in the organizations. It was only a matter of time that HR too adopted this fundamental change. Today, technology is viewed as a powerful weapon in the armour of HR to draw data-driven insights on talent, and play a more strategic role in the organization to drive profitable business decisions.

A Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) report titled ‘Transforming HR Through Technology’ highlighted that HR professionals must not only master traditional HR skills and knowledge, but also have the ability to apply that knowledge via technology and transform HR service delivery into ‘e-HR’. Technology is a necessary skill set that will empower them to design a robust people strategy and gain a competitive foothold in the global talent war.

Another key trigger to embracing technology in HR is the growing expectations of the potential as well as existing employees to work in a tech evolved workplace. A recently published Dell and Intel Future Workforce Study revealed that 50 percent of employees expect to work in a smart office in the next five years, 80 percent of millennials will be influenced by workplace tech before deciding for a job, and more than 60 percent of millennials will prefer receiving high tech perks. In my opinion, collaboration through high end technology is also gaining prominence due to the rapid expansion in the global, remote and virtual workforce. Teams working in silos can be detrimental to the health of the organization. Hence, HR is also looking at leveraging technology to strike a balance between employee work preferences and organization’s goals.

The foremost impact of technology has been witnessed in the Recruitment space which has been conventionally a gut based decision. Owing to the length of recruitment cycle and the high risk of a poor hire, recruitment is considered a very expensive process for organizations. In a Harris Interactive Poll, it was found that a bad hire can cost an organization anywhere from $25,000-50,000, resulting in 41 percent less productivity and raise the recruitment cost by further 37 percent to recruit and train another worker. However, use of technology can reduce the cycle time by 25 percent and cost per hire by 95 percent. These days, HR is using a mix of several digital recruiting methods such as social media screening,

Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS), mobile recruitment,video interviews, online assessment tests and other recruitment software. Technology driven recruitment also increases the quality of candidates and provides them a better hiring experience, thereby enhancing the organization’s Employer Value Proposition (EVP) and differentiating its employer brand image in the talent market.

AI is a revolution that HR Managers cant ignore and those who embrace it quickly will enjoy the first mover advantsge.

Employee Engagement is another HR area where technology is making its presence felt loud and clear. The Deloitte Global Human Capital Trends 2016 report states employee engagement as one of their top challenges and hence, understanding human behaviour to attract and retain workforce has become more important than before. Using big data, algorithms and predictive analytics, HR can study historical data and current trends to predict future trends. These three technology tools can enable HR professionals to apply statistics to their experience & foresight and arrive at business intelligence. They can identify high-flight-risk employees or the reasons for high attrition, and accordingly develop a retention strategy to keep the workforce happy.

HR has discovered the relevance of technology in Compliance Management as well. Adherence to labour laws and regulations is the basic requirement; any lapse or blunder on this front can land anorganization in a legal soup. However, this involves a tremendous amount of paperwork, creating physical storage space, processing tons of information and ensuring data security. Cloud-based systems have been able to streamline the compliance process for HR to a great extent. Most of the paperwork such as legal documents, employee handbook, auditor reports, performance reviews and payroll data can be stored electronically on the web for easy storage and retrieval anytime, anywhere. Moreover, these systems allow to set-up authority approval controls for access, which significantly reduce risk of breach of security and leakage of information.

I think that technology has also made implementation of Training and Development programmes effortless for HR. From pre-designed computer based learning to dynamic web based learning, e-learning has evolved considerably over the past few years. The recent technological developments in this area have been webcasts, webinars, podcasts and mobile learning. These e-learning techniques establish an organization as a tech-savvy identity, reduce the training costs and give employees flexibility to take control of their learning at their own convenience of time, location and pace.

Several HR technology vendors have developed performance management software which simplify the Appraisal Process and make it a transparent, constructive exercise for all stakeholders – HR, functional managers and employees. These softwares can automate goal setting, schedule meetings, track real-time status report on employee performance, give 360 degree feedback, show a dashboard on employee performance history, and integrate learning modules.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is the latest buzzword in HR. Will machines replace humans? Not exactly, I would say. AI will automate transactional, routine and repetitive tasks such as payroll management, resume screening and interview scheduling. It will free HR to focus on its core job – making people happy and fostering a positive work environment. AI is a revolution that HR managers can’t ignore, and those who embrace it quickly will enjoy the first mover advantage. Machines and humans will work together, not against each other.

Technology will play a crucial role in shaping HR in the coming years and dramatically (in a positive way) alter the way people are managed. It will give HR a strategic edge and empower it to don the hat of an ‘advisory business unit’ in the organization.